Dealing with long hair algae

[DEL 707]

My 250l tank finished it's cycle and the occupants from my old 55l tank were added on 25th of April.

Around August I lost 4 of my 6 fish to white spot. I've not bothered to restock my tank because I plan to farrow it soon.
My remaining fish is a Midas Blenny and a Purple Firefish.

I had a small hair algae before the white spot, but now, it's out of control.

Forgive the mess, I've just come back off holiday.

Here's what the tank looks like under just white lights.

And my sump.

I don't have the greatest microscope in the world, but I got a close up.

I did some water tests today.

PH - 8.2
Nitrate - 0
Phosphate - 0.09
Alkalinity - 7.9
Calcium - 380
Magnesium - 1350

I have an automated doser, that doses 12.5ml Reef Zlements InOne, daily.

I'm looking for advice on what I can try to do to eradicate this hair algae?

I'd like to think I'm not overfeeding. The Midas is a complete pig and very little food escapes him. What he doesn't catch is immediately caught by my army of fire shrimp.

Should I be trying to raise my nitrate levels or leave them as they are?

What's the best way to remove by hand? I've seen some people say to get a brush and scrub, but other people say that just helps it spread around the tank.
I have been removing it with a syphon, but it uses up a lot of water. I've seen algae nets advertised for ponds, they're meant to be fine mesh. Would it be a good idea to put 1 over a bucket to catch the algae so I can reuse the water?

I have ordered some Blue Life Flux RX to try out, but I want to remove as much as I can before I dose.

 

[Baldyreef]

My 250l tank finished it's cycle and the occupants from my old 55l tank were added on 25th of April.

Around August I lost 4 of my 6 fish to white spot. I've not bothered to restock my tank because I plan to farrow it soon.
My remaining fish is a Midas Blenny and a Purple Firefish.

I had a small hair algae before the white spot, but now, it's out of control.

Forgive the mess, I've just come back off holiday.

Here's what the tank looks like under just white lights.

And my sump.

I don't have the greatest microscope in the world, but I got a close up.

I did some water tests today.

PH - 8.2
Nitrate - 0
Phosphate - 0.09
Alkalinity - 7.9
Calcium - 380
Magnesium - 1350

I have an automated doser, that doses 12.5ml Reef Zlements InOne, daily.

I'm looking for advice on what I can try to do to eradicate this hair algae?

I'd like to think I'm not overfeeding. The Midas is a complete pig and very little food escapes him. What he doesn't catch is immediately caught by my army of fire shrimp.

Should I be trying to raise my nitrate levels or leave them as they are?

What's the best way to remove by hand? I've seen some people say to get a brush and scrub, but other people say that just helps it spread around the tank.
I have been removing it with a syphon, but it uses up a lot of water. I've seen algae nets advertised for ponds, they're meant to be fine mesh. Would it be a good idea to put 1 over a bucket to catch the algae so I can reuse the water?

I have ordered some Blue Life Flux RX to try out, but I want to remove as much as I can before I dose.

as someone who has dealt a with massive hair algae outbreak before I would say you should lower your phosphates, and manually remove as much as you can

 

[Euphyllia97]

Once the algae is long, few creatures will still eat it. So you are stuck with manual removal and nutrient control.

Don’t try to raise nitrates as you have plenty of them. They are being used up by the algae so not coming up in your tests. You will have to do manual removal. (You can take the most impacted rocks out and scrub them out of the tank. It will not kill your bacteria)

Don’t dose :) Just good maintenance for a couple of weeks and things will get better

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

You've just come back from holiday meaning the auto feeder was on? IMO its normal to come back to algae, just bring it back under control with weekly water changes and keeping an eye on nutrients, no need for bottled solutions IMO.

IMO I would not try to raise nutrient levels when there is a bad algae problem, the algae is causing the test to show low nutrients.

 

[Red_Beard]

Yes, increase nitrates. Shoot for about 5ppm. Also manually remove as much as possible if you do fluconizol. You can even wait a bit until it starts looking visibly affected to remove it, but do try and remove as much as possible before it turns to mush in your tank.