Algae on my sand

[Lyss]

I have some sort of turf style algae on my sand and it’s driving me nuts. It’s green and grows on individual pieces of sand — often I see my blenny pick up individual green pieces of sand to munch on and then spit them back out. So it’s not like a carpet over the sand.

B/c of the nature of the way this stuff grows, I’m not able to just syphon it up like you would with something like cyano.

I’ve got two of the large Nassarius snails, and about 10 decent sized Ceriths that bury themselves in the sand, but that doesn’t seem to help. The Ceriths also munch on it, but it’s not helping.

I have 4 big trochus snails that prefer to stay on my the rocks and back wall of the tank, so they’re not helping.

I run chemipure blue and my phosphate is usually right at .06. Nitrates are higher but not more than 25. Aside from keeping nutrients in check, I’m thinking of getting a strawberry/tiger conch but my Q is: Is that a good idea or should I be approaching this differently? I don’t want to add livestock and then regret it later.

Attached is a still from a video I took of my blenny the other night when I thought something was wrong w/him — you can see this algae in it on the sand and the shell.

 

[blaxsun]

A conch might help or an emerald crab, but we're getting down to the bottom of the barrel in terms of available inverts that might help. I'd try to get your nitrates down by half. A UV is also a long-term solution as well.

 

[Lavey29]

If your water numbers are good what is your lighting schedule, intensity, spectrum?

 

[Lyss]

Yeah, I’m working on reducing nitrates further to see if that makes the difference.

Other than that my lighting schedule is a 12-hour schedule I’ve cut slightly, 80/5 blue/white — comes on at 7:30 and peaks at 10:30 am, then begins to drop off around 3 pm, and shuts off at 6 pm. Then moonlight is 7 - 10 pm and follows the lunar cycle. The corals — a mix of lps and softies as of now — have been doing well so I’ve been resistant to messing with that but realize that could also make the difference.

I thought the conch, in addition to these other things might be helpful, but like I said I’m not crazy about the idea of getting more livestock just to try to fix this unless I’m gonna be truly happy to have it.

 

[Lavey29]

Yeah, I’m working on reducing nitrates further to see if that makes the difference.

Other than that my lighting schedule is a 12-hour schedule I’ve cut slightly, 80/5 blue/white — comes on at 7:30 and peaks at 10:30 am, then begins to drop off around 3 pm, and shuts off at 6 pm. Then moonlight is 7 - 10 pm and follows the lunar cycle. The corals — a mix of lps and softies as of now — have been doing well so I’ve been resistant to messing with that but realize that could also make the difference.

I thought the conch, in addition to these other things might be helpful, but like I said I’m not crazy about the idea of getting more livestock just to try to fix this unless I’m gonna be truly happy to have it.

Nitrates could be contributing but fairly easy to lower. Might want to cut out some of the white in your light schedule to.

 

[Lyss]

Nitrates could be contributing but fairly easy to lower. Might want to cut out some of the white in your light schedule to.

It's only 5% white tho. Still less than that?

 

[Lavey29]

It's only 5% white tho. Still less than that?

Sorry I thought I saw 80 blue and white. 5 is fine. Maybe taking an hour off then might help.

 

[Lavey29]

Most of my algae problems on my 7 month old tank were primarily on the sand. Stabilizing my parameters helped but I also dropped my light intensity by 10% and run 10 hours. My sand on the surface got noticeably better week after week and now is virtually clean on top. Still deep cleaning some buried discoloration now though.

 

[Lyss]

Most of my algae problems on my 7 month old tank were primarily on the sand. Stabilizing my parameters helped but I also dropped my light intensity by 10% and run 10 hours. My sand on the surface got noticeably better week after week and now is virtually clean on top. Still deep cleaning some buried discoloration now though.

Yes, I have no issues on the rocks, and the trochus keep those clean like they're on a salary -- it's just the sand, and back wall which I don't mind b/c it's not as easy to see and the snails like it. On the sand it's so annoying b/c it just gives the whole vibe of the tank an unclean feeling. In my FW tank I don't mind some turf algae on the rocks and whatnot b/c it gives them a bit of a natural look, but on my reef sand is driving me crazy.