Algae

[duckdodgers]

What is the best way to get rid of this algae?

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

tooth brush and siphon.

 

[duckdodgers]

It just keeps growing back though?

 

[MaccaPopEye]

You need to increase nutrient export, for this I highly recommend an algae turf scrubber. I have posted this a few times before so this is just copied from a previous post of mine :)

Adding things like a sea hare, urchins, snails and tangs can help control the algae, but all of those animals will just eventually digest the algae and turn it into more nutrients (which then turns into more algae).

Only way I have seen work is to increase your nutrient export. Things like bigger skimmers or more water changes help a lot. But IMO macro algae is the way to go for this. Having a fuge to grow macro is good but an algae turf scrubber can be implemented without a sump or even just a sump without much room. As long as it is lit with powerful enough (and not too powerful) lights, has the correct flow and a big enough screen to handle the amount of nutrients you are adding to the system an algae scrubber should work well.

I tried everything I could think of (more clean up crew, herbivore fish, manual removal, more water changes). No matter what I did I could scrub the rocks clean and the algae was back, super long and over every surface within a week.

5 months of an algae scrubber and I am almost algae free, and the only reason IMO why it has taken so long is because I have been really busy and have only done 1 water change since I put it on and have actually started feeding double what I used to as I have added a few more fish. But still the algae is decreasing and the scrubber is going awesome :)

If you haven't tried one I do recommend it. Nail the screen size, lighting and flow and it should work perfectly for you! (recommended guidelines are on algaescrubber.zohosites.com)

This is my tank before (bottom pic) and 4 months after the scrubber was added (with no water changes and increased feeding). It's been almost 6 months now I think and looking even better (still a month or two to go to be algae free) but have done a bit of rescaping so it looks different and doesn't make a good before and after.

And here is the same time frame focusing on just one coral.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

yuck.
If you can scrape away the spot and get the roots that works. If you can get the pieces out you can spot treat it with peroxide.

the rest of the in tank stuff will affect the rest of the tank.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

You need to increase nutrient export, for this I highly recommend an algae turf scrubber. I have posted this a few times before so this is just copied from a previous post of mine :)

Adding things like a sea hare, urchins, snails and tangs can help control the algae, but all of those animals will just eventually digest the algae and turn it into more nutrients (which then turns into more algae).

Only way I have seen work is to increase your nutrient export. Things like bigger skimmers or more water changes help a lot. But IMO macro algae is the way to go for this. Having a fuge to grow macro is good but an algae turf scrubber can be implemented without a sump or even just a sump without much room. As long as it is lit with powerful enough (and not too powerful) lights, has the correct flow and a big enough screen to handle the amount of nutrients you are adding to the system an algae scrubber should work well.

I tried everything I could think of (more clean up crew, herbivore fish, manual removal, more water changes). No matter what I did I could scrub the rocks clean and the algae was back, super long and over every surface within a week.

5 months of an algae scrubber and I am almost algae free, and the only reason IMO why it has taken so long is because I have been really busy and have only done 1 water change since I put it on and have actually started feeding double what I used to as I have added a few more fish. But still the algae is decreasing and the scrubber is going awesome :)

If you haven't tried one I do recommend it. Nail the screen size, lighting and flow and it should work perfectly for you! (recommended guidelines are on algaescrubber.zohosites.com)

This is my tank before (bottom pic) and 4 months after the scrubber was added (with no water changes and increased feeding). It's been almost 6 months now I think and looking even better (still a month or two to go to be algae free) but have done a bit of rescaping so it looks different and doesn't make a good before and after.

And here is the same time frame focusing on just one coral.

Yea Im a refugium guy. that works too.
not sure if its just spots or an infestation.
lowering nutrients if there too high works well. but keeping it out of the tank is key.

 

[MaccaPopEye]

I am pretty sure green hair algae is a naturally occurring organism so just keeping it out of the tank wont help as if there is nutrients it can grow out of nowhere. And it doesn't always happen but just spots can turn into an infestation quite quickly.

I agree that peroxide treatments on spot areas will work (and work well) but that is just a treatment after there is algae and unless you do something to reduce nutrients after the peroxide treatment it will eventually come back.

I scrubbed the algae away right down to bare rock and it still came back. Any nutrient reduction method can work but something extra needs to be put in place. Combine that with either manually removing it as often as possible or removing the rocks and spot treating with peroxide and eventually it wont come back (peroxide is probably best for initial removal, I didn't know about it when I started my battle or I would have gone that route too).

 

[mcarroll]

@duckdodgers what is your feeding routine like? I'm especially curious how consistent your feeding is?