Help! Caulerpa Brachypus invasion

[Budman93]

Hi guys Ive been fighting dinos the last couple months and ive finally decided it must be my macro sucking up the nutrients. i've had modest success with a uv sterilizer, dosing bottled bac, cutting water changes, sporatic blackouts etc, but the dinos remain. I have a rock with a ton of caulerpa brachypus on it and one more where it is starting to spread. I've plucked it off the rock before but it grows back extremely quickly. I've been doing research and have seen that maybe pitho crabs will eat it or rabbitfish. Problem is I have a 40g tank and dont want to throw a bunch of animals in that might not even solve the problem. Also the fact that my tank is 100% too small for a rabbitfish.

Right now I am leaning the algaecide route (reeflux) but just wanted to see if there are other options. I dont really like dosing a bunch of chemical into my tank but am at my wits end with the dinos and various invasive algaes. (Bryopsis and bubble algae are also present just in smaller amounts)

 

[Tired]

Maybe try a tuxedo urchin? They do fine in smaller tanks, are reef-safe (aside from moving small frags around), and will eat macroalgaes. I don't know if they'll tackle that, unfortunately, but a tuxedo urchin is nice to have regardless of if it solves your problem.

 

[LgTas]

A couple short spine sea urchins did the job for me when my fuge caulerpa escaped into my DT.

Have you tested N and P? Could be a range of factors contributing to the issue.

 

[Budman93]

Maybe try a tuxedo urchin? They do fine in smaller tanks, are reef-safe (aside from moving small frags around), and will eat macroalgaes. I don't know if they'll tackle that, unfortunately, but a tuxedo urchin is nice to have regardless of if it solves your problem.

Added a white shortspine urchin a couple weeks back actually. Very cool and he may have helped slightly but the main rock iit's on is untouched. To be honest I'd suck it up and spend 20 minutes manually ripping off all the caulerpa if my goby and randalls shrimp didnt live in the rock. By live in i literally mean lives inside. Last time i pulled off algae im pretty sure he just stayed in the rock out of the tank the entire time. Guy is the size of a jellybean.

I could maybe see about getting a baby foxface with the intention of returning him after a week or two assuming he likes macro algae. Just really would rather not dose chemicals.