Caulerpa in Refugium

[bluemon]

I used to use Caulerpa for nutrient control.

1. Because Chaeto refused to thrive

2. The species I got never went sexual and was not too invasive.

I had some weird hybrid of serrulata and prolifera, and it was great having it in the refugium. Grew well, and did its job.

Now a mistake I made was chucking some excess live rock in there and they anchored onto them.

Recently, I started dosing iron and manganese and Chaeto is flourishing now, and since all Caulerpa was made illegal, I decided to make the shift 100%.

I threw out all the free floating ones, and did manual removal of the ones anchored in the rocks.

I then took all the live rock and put them in a bucket in the dark for a week, which resulted in a severe die off of worms and some pods, but I just wanted the bacteria on there alive. All the Caulerpa seemed to be dead.

Except forward a month, they’re popping back up.

Anyone have a list of creatures they know are good with short strands of Caulerpa?

I know my species is very palatable since my tangs love them (hence their absence from DT) and I’ve seen pitho crabs eat them.

I did move my one pitho crab down to the refugium but it seems pretty disinterested now.

I did throw in some urchins but not sure they’re doing anything either.

Any pointers?

I COULD rotate some rocks onto the display so the tangs could eat them but I think they’ll pop back up.

Or dry the rocks completely but I’d rather not do that

 

[dvgyfresh]

I had caulerpa too, honestly the best way was tangs. They loved it , I would rotate rocks from the sump / display in your case

 

[Kmst80]

I had caulerpa too, honestly the best way was tangs. They loved it , I would rotate rocks from the sump / display in your case

I second that....with the addition of foxface or ranbbitfish.

 

[Daniel Doherty]

I had caulerpa too, honestly the best way was tangs. They loved it , I would rotate rocks from the sump / display in your case

Great idea! I’ll definitely be incorporating this!

 

[ileolai]

3% peroxide will kill it. take the rock out, spray it, rinse, it will melt and your cuc will eat it. completely eliminated caulerpa from my dt this way.