Algae growth?

[David Whitlock]

I recently had this outbreak in my tank. I think it is algae. I tried an algae treatment with no luck. I did a water change. Any suggestions?

 

[keatonmjenkins]

Looks like hair algae. What are your parameters?
Best thing to do is when you do a water change pinch it with your tube and finger to suck it out and just keep up on removing it before it gets bad. Eventually the corals will outcompete it and it’ll go away if you keep it manageable.

 

[damsels are not mean]

Yeah just hair algae. Nothing you're doing wrong. Just happens.

 

[David Whitlock]

Looks like hair algae. What are your parameters?
Best thing to do is when you do a water change pinch it with your tube and finger to suck it out and just keep up on removing it before it gets bad. Eventually the corals will outcompete it and it’ll go away if you keep it manageable.

My parameters are good. It has started taking over my tank. I keep having to get it off my coral. And it’s growing super fast

 

[vetteguy53081]

Assure phosphates are not elevated. Pull as much as you can by hand and add snails such as astrea-turbo grazer- cerith and a few blue leg carribean hermits

Are you using RODI water or tap water from the faucet ?

 

[Bph]

Green Emeralds, Mexican turbo snails etc a good clean up crew is a must.

 

[David Whitlock]

Assure phosphates are not elevated. Pull as much as you can by hand and add snails such as astrea-turbo grazer- cerith and a few blue leg carribean hermits

Are you using RODI water or tap water from the faucet ?

Ok great. I am using tap water but my whole house is filtered.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Ok great. I am using tap water but my whole house is filtered.

It’s the tap water even filtered contributing to algae

 

[Timfish]

How old is your system? Did you use any maricultured or wild live rock to set up your system? (See this article on establishing healthy microbiomes.) I only use manual removal to deal with nuisance algae issues, I will sometimes remove rock to scrub algae off it but most of the time it's not necessary. I have no issue with using RO or RO/DI but tap water may be just fine in your area (check with you utility) and this is a thread I did for the local forum where I fixed a bad algae issue with tapwater:

Hair Algae, a second case study

Nuisance algae in reef systems is pretty much a ubiquitous problem, and one that is a common source of frustration for reef aquarists. It is also one I've learned to view the problem very differently than what is generally portrayed and it just takes a few rather basic steps, and patience. (This ...

www.austinreefclub.com

Make sure your PO4 doesn't drop below .03 mg/l, this is the minimum threashold identified by SOuthampton Univeristy to preven phsophate deficiency in aquarium corals. When corals have a PO4 deficiency they are unable to compete with algae and algae will quickly take over.

This video using steel straws to remove stuff might be helpful



This links are by researchers will help you better understand the microbial stuff and nutrient stuff and conflicting roles of algae and corals in reef ecosystems:

"Coral Reefs in the Microbial Seas" This video compliments Rohwer's book of the same title (Paper back is ~$20, Kindle is ~$10), both deal with the conflicting roles of the different types of DOC in reef ecosystems. While there is overlap bewteen his book and the video both have information not covered by the other and together give a broader view of the complex relationships found in reef ecosystems


Changing Seas - Mysterious Microbes


Nitrogen cycling in hte coral holobiont


BActeria and Sponges


Maintenance of Coral Reef Health (refferences at the end)


Optical Feedback Loop in Colorful Coral Bleaching


Richard Ross What's up with phosphate"