Algae issue

[Perthegallon]

so my tank is about 5 months old and I've been battling the hairline issues. It started I think because I fed my coral's lota and lots of food but now I've stopped. In so though I have 3 emerald crabs, tons of hermits, sand sifting starfish, 7 turbo snails, and conch I do weekly 25% water changes barley to feed the fish and keep my other everything stable. I'm still not seeing much of an improvement even with everything I changed I constantly pull out the algae is well. Is there anything else I can do I want to do a refuge but dont really have the space in my sump.

 

[Perthegallon]

also three sea urchins as well

 

[Uncle99]

You are in the ugly stage, so not abnormal. As your tank matures, much of this will go away.

I find that except urchins, many CUCs really don’t consume the amount of algae you are showing and they also add back to the nutrients levels. In my 65g, I have only 10 snails, don’t need more, I rely on consistent, stable parameters and almost no flux in them, then I have little to clean.

First things is to check the levels of your nutrients, your Nitrate and Phosphate. These should be in the ranges Nitrate (2-10)ppm and Phosphate (0.03-.15).

Algae needs two things to survive:
1-Light, red, green, outside light, algae loves this.
2-Nutrients, Nitrate Phosphate Ammonia and Iron.

Nitrates can be reduced easily by Nopox and phosphate can be reduced by GFO.
Scrub as much off with a toothbrush weekly and siphon out.
Keep up WC of 10% weekly. IMO, 25% is too much and can aid instability in parameters.
Keep nutrients in the ranges.
Keep out any ambient light.
Reduce your photoperiod, intensity or both, you can ramp this later after ugly stages finished.

The next stage 5 months to 1 year, work through the uglies.