Is this cyano or algae

[ryudo80]

My tank is abou 6 months old. Its been chugging along fine until recently I noticed a lot of clumps in the sand and also on some soft mat material on some of the rocks, not all. I can easily brush it off the rocks with a toothbrush. I've noticed the clump started recently after I started dosing benepets. Not sure if that was the cause. Is this algae , cyano, or something else? None of my snails including turbo snails are interested.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

Is it a reddish color? The way you are describing it, it sounds like cyano.

 

[ryudo80]

Its not red. It's more like dark green. I picked some up and put in a container. I dropped some hydrogen peroxide on it but it doesn't seem to do anything to it.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

Interesting. Generally cyano is a maroon/red color. Do you have any other pics of it? The stuff in the container is hard to see.

 

[ryudo80]

Here's another picture of a clump of sand spread out. This is all under white light.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

In that pic it almost looks like hair algae when it’s out of water.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

If you get a chance take a pic of it in the tank tomorrow. It might be easier to identify in the tank.

 

[ryudo80]

Oh ok. I have hair algae in another tank it its flowy on rocks. This is clumps on the sand and not flowy on rocks. Perhaps a different type of hair algae. I'll reduce dosing and see if it helps. Thanks!

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

That’s what it sounds like. Depending on your phosphate levels the benepets could be contributing to an increase in those.

 

[ryudo80]

My phosphates level is low. It's been around 0.03 to 0.07 and my nitrates is around 10. I'll reduce dosing these nutrients to see if it helps.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

Those numbers are actually pretty good. You could possibly increase po4 a little bit…maybe around .10…but I don’t think that is causing your issue.

Have you searched turf algae by any chance? Most snails aren’t really interested in turf algae but urchins will generally go after it.

Take a look here and see if anything looks similar.

https://www.reefcleaners.org/nuisance-algae-id-guide

 

[ryudo80]

I do have 2 urchins but I moved them to another tank due to they keep eating my clove polyps corals. Perhaps its time to put them back.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

I do have 2 urchins but I moved them to another tank due to they keep eating my clove polyps corals. Perhaps its time to put them back.

You could try just moving one over to see if it will go after the algae.

 

[ryudo80]

Yeah I think it's turf algae. I moved the 2 urchins over and it's already cleaning up the part of the covered rocks.

 

[Catawba_Valley_Reef]

Yeah I think it's turf algae. I moved the 2 urchins over and it's already cleaning up the part of the covered rocks.

Glad to hear it. Turf algae can be kind of a pain.