Hair algae?

[buzzfin]

Trying to figure out if this is hair algae. It's brownish in color, but almost opaque. Kind of wispy like GHA. Clean up crew seems to like it, except the areas that are long. Same with lawnmower blenny. 100 gallon tank, about 8 months old. 11 fish, 10 snails, 1 pin cushion urchin in the tank. Just started adding coral - only have one small zoa. Nitrates have been 0 for months, but I've been reluctant to dose nitrates for fear the available nitrates are not showing up in testing because they are being consumed by algae. Trying not to chase numbers. Any thoughts on how/if to treat?

My Parameters:
NO3 (hanna): 0
PO4 (hanna): .08
Mg (salifert): 1200
Ca (salifert): 400
dKH (hanna): 6.5
Salinity 1.025
NH3: 0
NO2: 0

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Can you post a pic?

 

[Razorbacks]

Personally I don't let nitrate or phosphate bottom out at absolute zero. I dose. A lot more bad things happen when nutrients totally bottom out. Worst you'll get dosing a small amount is slightly more algae.

Adding more corals will help with the algae. You need a certain critical mass for them to get the competitive edge in nutrient consumption. I tried just dabbling with a few corals at the beginning and they got choked out by algae. I had far more luck when I bought a reasonable amount for my tank size.

 

[buzzfin]

Can you post a pic?

Added pics to original post above. Guessing the video was too large.

 

[buzzfin]

Personally I don't let nitrate or phosphate bottom out at absolute zero. I dose. A lot more bad things happen when nutrients totally bottom out. Worst you'll get dosing a small amount is slightly more algae.

Adding more corals will help with the algae. You need a certain critical mass for them to get the competitive edge in nutrient consumption. I tried just dabbling with a few corals at the beginning and they got choked out by algae. I had far more luck when I bought a reasonable amount for my tank size.

I can dose nitrate, but with no way of knowing if it's testing at zero because it's being consumed by the algae I'm afraid I'll just create a massive algae bloom. I have more corals waiting in QT but won't go in the DT for a few more weeks.

 

[Reef.]

If the nitrates are bring used up by whatever thst is, possibly some kind of algae, that still means there is none available for the rest of the tank, I would like to see at least some nitrates on a test. I would dose to at least 1-2ppm..do you restrict food, as you have a good number of fish, hardly any corals from the pics, so surprised you have zero nitrates.

Have you had any algae, as in green algae covering the rocks, for 8 months old tank your rock looks very clean, you could be trying too hard to keep the tank too clean.

 

[buzzfin]

If the nitrates are bring used up by whatever thst is, possibly some kind of algae, that still means there is none available for the rest of the tank, I would like to see at least some nitrates on a test. I would dose to at least 1-2ppm..do you restrict food, as you have a good number of fish, hardly any corals from the pics, so surprised you have zero nitrates.

Have you had any algae, as in green algae covering the rocks, for 8 months old tank your rock looks very clean, you could be trying too hard to keep the tank too clean.

Hard to tell from the pics, but the rocks have some normal brown/green algae. Also have a bit of GHA in the refugium. I've been over feeding to try to get SOME nitrates showing on a test. Wondering if my overfeeding is causing this hairy stuff. Seems like no matter what I do, nitrates always test at zero. Tempted to do manual removal of the hairy stuff and then let the tank continue to mature instead of chasing nitrates.

 

[Reef.]

Yeah I would definitely remove it if possible…you are not chasing numbers when you are fixing an issue, if you take that phrase “not chasing numbers” too literally there would be no point doing any testing at all.

My idea of the meaning is, if the tank looks good but your ideal magnesium is 1400 but its 1380, don’t go chasing that extra 20 mag.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

I would try to manually remove as much as you can, beef up your cuc, and do water changes. Hopefully, by doing those three, you can control your algae before it gets too out of hand!