Green hair algae war still going!

[JZ199]

Figured I would finally post on this, I feel like I'm making headway and then I feel like I'm losing. I have a few questions as well.

I got my tank almost a year ago, set it up using RO water, cycled it and added fish and cuc slowly, then about 2 months in green hair algae started showing up and just exploded! I've been battling for months with water changes and manual removal.

I just did a WC a few days ago, removed a ton manually, and within a few days it's back like crazy again!

I used the rocks the previous owner had which I feel like may be my issue and leads me to my next question, can I set up a container and cycle it with dry rock, and then once it's seeded, swap it with these current rocks without any issues arising in my tank? Or is it not even worth it.

Tank is a fluval flex 32.5, has aftermarket higher flow pump, intank media baskets with floss, chemipure blue, charcoal, biopellets, and matrix.

My newest additions are about 5 turbo snails.

Previous residents are
Pencil urchin
Handful of nassarius snails
Handful of astrea snails
2 clown fish
1 royal Gramma
1 lawnmower blenny(is Mia, but doesn't leave his cave often)

I feed lightly and do 20% changes regularly along with the manual removal.

Current parameters
PH-7.8
Phosphate-0
Calcium-460
Nitrate-0
KH-179
Salinity-1.025
Temp-78

 

[Kathy Floyd]

Following, as I am starting to see it in my tank also.

 

[blaxsun]

The short answer is yes. While you don't need lighting, you will want heating and flow when cycling the new batch of rock.

 

[neonreef3d]

I would continue manual removal, and dont do any water changes, due to your nutrient being zero. get a CUC that will help remove what is remaining, corals will uptake the nutrients and using pns from algae barn will help aid the process.

 

[damsels are not mean]

There is literally nothing you can do to prevent algae taking over when it has all it needs. If you put bare rocks in water, give it lights, and a consistent nutrient source (fish), you will grow something. If you do not plant something in there to grow instead of algae, mother nature will make do with what she has. Your plan will work to get rid of the algae (temporarily) but you can't wait for it to get this bad next time. I would thoroughly clean the back and sides as well otherwise it will grow back faster.

 

[Jekyl]

Manual removal, cleaner package from reefcleaners.org, and start dosing live phyto. Do these and get back after 2 weeks. I'll bet the problem isn't so daunting anymore.

 

[situationlol]

I had this issue not long after starting up my tank ~6 months ago. It lasted about 3 months, but I beat it by doing the following:

(1) Turned down the lighting about 50% for about 2 months (I credit this with doing an outsized amount of the work). I also reduced the white lighting even more drastically. It's not clear to me that blue vs. white has a big impact, but some people seem to think so.

(2) Manual removal. I tried to do a little bit every day, but in reality I probably did it every 2 or 3 days.

(3) Reduced feeding.

(4) Added a diverse clean up crew. Snails (varied), hermit crabs, emerald crabs, urchins, etc.

(5) Not sure I would recommend this, but I did a single dose of vibrant.

I've never heard anyone suggest changing out the rocks. I'm not sure that will solve it for you, but perhaps people more knowledgeable can weigh in on that. Good luck.

 

[sixty_reefer]

You will need to increase your nutrients if you want to make any progress in the battle

 

[situationlol]

You will need to increase your nutrients if you want to make any progress in the battle

Isn't GHA on that scale just consuming all the nutrients though?

 

[BAMatter]

Manual removal, cleaner package from reefcleaners.org, and start dosing live phyto. Do these and get back after 2 weeks. I'll bet the problem isn't so daunting anymore.

This plus add some pods

 

[John Bolden]

My two cents are I fought algea specifically GHA and bubble algea and what finally fixed it wasnt the 100 dollars worth of cuc it was reef flux. It didn’t affect any of my corals and if acted fast I wish I had done it earlier.

 

[Jekyl]

This plus add some pods

With the tank already being established there's already a pod population. BRS mentioned an experiment done before where everything was heat treated before being put in a tank. Even with extreme measures pods still ended up in the system. Just feed what you have, nature has its own methods.

 

[Jekyl]

Isn't GHA on that scale just consuming all the nutrients though?

Yes, but bottoming out is a bad thing also.

 

[BAMatter]

With the tank already being established there's already a pod population. BRS mentioned an experiment done before where everything was heat treated before being put in a tank. Even with extreme measures pods still ended up in the system. Just feed what you have, nature has its own methods.

It’s beneficial and can speed the process of biodiversity up by adding pods. I’d recommend more than 1 species. I know they’ll end up in there eventually. But eventually can be sooner.

 

[sixty_reefer]

Isn't GHA on that scale just consuming all the nutrients though?

Probably not, although you still have to run it as a reef tank. If you had a Refugium in the system you wouldn’t allow it to bottom out nutrient as this brings more issues than problems, the reason algae is thriving in this particular case can well be due to zero nutrients as this affects the beneficial bacteria

 

[JZ199]

Thank you everyone for all the replies! Since posting this, I turned down my whites to 0 and am running just blues, I've continued to manually remove and it also seems like my CUC is starting to get rid of some of it.

I'm going to continue to keep removing it manually, and I'm definitely going to check into all the options and suggestions you guys offered to continue to finally eliminate this all.

 

[bnord]

All kinds of great ideas above, and looking at your scape, I would consider taking a rock out every other day , and with a squirt bottle of peroxide, I would scrub nooks and crannies of the rock, rinse with fresh and replace it - rinse and repeat as they say.

White lights down to zero and dim other wise, and much of the rest.

In my personal experience, few CUC apart fro. urchins will eat the hairy stuff once its flourishing, but if you are lucky enough to get a donabella slug that you can turn back to the shop once its clean, that will work.

the other CUC keep it from taking hold and returning - again, in my experience

Best of luck, we have all been there and this too shall pass

 

[exnisstech]

You will need to increase your nutrients if you want to make any progress in the battle

the reason algae is thriving in this particular case can well be due to zero

This is exactly where I was at. N and P zero so I started dosing N and P to raise them. Everyone one said raising them is good but it won't get rid of the hair alage. Well guess what I raised them and kept them measurable and the hair algae is almost all gone. I believe it's like @sixty_reefer said it affects the benificial bacteria. In my case I think raising N and P allowed the benificial bacteria to grow and start to out compete the hair alage.

 

[JZ199]

This is exactly where I was at. N and P zero so I started dosing N and P to raise them. Everyone one said raising them is good but it won't get rid of the hair alage. Well guess what I raised them and kept them measurable and the hair algae is almost all gone. I believe it's like @sixty_reefer said it affects the benificial bacteria. In my case I think raising N and P allowed the benificial bacteria to grow and start to out compete the hair alage.

did you dose a specific product? I was looking at ordering phytoplankton and pods?

 

[Jekyl]

did you dose a specific product? I was looking at ordering phytoplankton and pods?

Unless your tank is brand new or resupplying food for a mandarin or such pods aren't needed. As for phyto I started with the algae barn stuff and eventually cultured my own.