Just talked myself off of the ledge

[Yates273]

I have been battling GHA for about 7 months now! It has driven me crazy. I tried reef flux no luck. Weekly water changes with manual removal. It still comes back and alway finds its way on some of my frags that I have to dip in H2o2 to remove it. It seems like whatever I do is not good enough to get rid of the GHA.
My parameters are as follows:
Ph 8.33
Temp 78
Alk 8.58
Cal. 414
Mag 1295
Nitrate has been steady at about 5 ppm since carbon dosing
Phosphates are .02 which may be higher due to GHA.
I started running GFO again since it couldn’t hurt. I know everything takes patience and time, but this GHA is relentless. Today I was looking at my bottle of Vibrant and figured others have had great success with using this for GHA so I decided to take my Refugium offline and start dosing Vibrant at 1 ml per 10 gallons. Just as I was about to begin dosing I did a little more reading about it and decided against it. I really don’t want to add an Algaecide to my tank, but good god I am at my wits end with this GHA! Guess I may just keep doing what I have been doing and hope my tank finds its happy place.

 

[blaxsun]

So you're back on the ledge, holding a bottle of Vibrant...?

 

[Fish Think Pink]

I have been battling GHA for about 7 months now! It has driven me crazy. I tried reef flux no luck. Weekly water changes with manual removal. It still comes back and alway finds its way on some of my frags that I have to dip in H2o2 to remove it. It seems like whatever I do is not good enough to get rid of the GHA.
My parameters are as follows:
Ph 8.33
Temp 78
Alk 8.58
Cal. 414
Mag 1295
Nitrate has been steady at about 5 ppm since carbon dosing
Phosphates are .02 which may be higher due to GHA.
I started running GFO again since it couldn’t hurt. I know everything takes patience and time, but this GHA is relentless. Today I was looking at my bottle of Vibrant and figured others have had great success with using this for GHA so I decided to take my Refugium offline and start dosing Vibrant at 1 ml per 10 gallons. Just as I was about to begin dosing I did a little more reading about it and decided against it. I really don’t want to add an Algaecide to my tank, but good god I am at my wits end with this GHA! Guess I may just keep doing what I have been doing and hope my tank finds its happy place.

Hang in there. Keep scrubbing it. Here is my tool I built using bristles cut from scrub brush super glued into spare bit of tube to give me a flexible handle. During a water change, I capture the water going out, and I lift the rocks out and scrub rock at sink, then use tank water that was getting thrown out anyhow to do my rinse before returning scrubbed rock back to tank.

FYI: Reef Flux is for bryopsis so of course it did not work.

Vibrant would likely be 3+ month commitment, and last algae to go ... so also think manually removing, controlling is your best approach.

Most fish don't like GHA even if they are algae eaters.

You are wise to realize both your nitrates and phosphates are likely a lot higher than your testing results, because your GHA is uptaking them... my algae tools:

So you're back on the ledge, holding a bottle of Vibrant...?

that is a very funny visual! ...

but I have felt their pain, and lived with GHA a long time now. I even did the Vibrant path for 4 months, but once I stopped GHA returned... did I miss a molecule or did it get reintroduced - no way to ever know now but not doing Vibrant again.

I now accept a little bit I can see but water management and planted refugium on 24 hour cycle has helped keep me off that ledge. If I didn't have that planted refugium in my sump I'd definitely go for one of the algae scrubbers out there...

but still... in the main tank, I have some algae maintenance I do during water changes (as already described above)

 

[Yates273]

My GHA tool is a 5 gallon bucket vacuum with micro bristle attachments. My rocks are not completely covered but there are patches that keep coming back no matter what I do. It always seems to find its way in my zoa colonies and on the bases of my torch coral. Fish and CUC could care less about it. Sea hare did munch on it but only lasted a week and then he died.
I’ve seen plenty of people with positive results using fluconazole.

 

[GHOSTLY]

You should invest in a sea urchin! Cool little inverts who eat like pigs. That, manual removal, and lower light intensity

 

[Lavey29]

3 tuxedo urchins and couple turbos then call it a day.

 

[Yates273]

I have one pin cushion urchin who likes to wear the GHA. My Snails are useless for GHA. I did turbos no luck. Maybe I’ll pick up 2 more urchins. Tank is a 120 gallon so I should be good there. I have also been pondering the idea of adding hermit crabs instead of snails.

 

[HighlandReef]

Have you tried dosing phyto to your tank?
My tank is now at about the 6-7month stage, tank is still maturing and ever since I started dosing phyto, it has kept the nuisance algae at bay.
Basically, it will outcompete the nuisance algae. Made a big difference for my tank, corals also seem a lot healthier. They swole like the hulk, lol!
I know GHA would drive me nuts.
Imo… worth a try.

 

[dedragon]

I’ve seen plenty of people with positive results using fluconazole.

As stated before its most likely because of bryopsis and people confusing their GHA with bryopsis. You most likely have GHA which reef flux isnt for. This is from BRS

 

[dedragon]

Hydrogen peroxide is also pretty effective if used as a spray to spray on rocks before and after scrubbing while out of water if this is an option for you. I have used a small hydrogen peroxide dosing for my tank then changed to a sochting oxydator but there could be other variables that played into my loss of gha.
The spray method is more hands on but definitely will cut a lot of it back so that herbivorous fish and inverts can finish the job

 

[Yates273]

Have you tried dosing phyto to your tank?
My tank is now at about the 6-7month stage, tank is still maturing and ever since I started dosing phyto, it has kept the nuisance algae at bay.
Basically, it will outcompete the nuisance algae. Made a big difference for my tank, corals also seem a lot healthier. They swole like the hulk, lol!
I know GHA would drive me nuts.
Imo… worth a try.

I culture Nanno phyto and dose this but not religiously every night.
I have removed a few rocks, sprayed with peroxide and that worked but there are some rocks I can’t remove. I know peroxide does work, but it kills off everything. Whenever I do the peroxide spray I see all of the pods jumping off of the rocks.

 

[ninjamyst]

This is going to go against everything you have read...

- manually remove as much as you can
- buy some pods and live phyto
- dose aminos
- if you are feeding pellets or flakes for fish, switch to frozen and feed more often but less quantity each feeding

The main idea is to grow your corals and other beneficial fauna to outcompete the algae. The old school way of lowering nutrients does not work.

 

[Yates273]

I feed algae strips once a day and freeze dried mysis twice a day via auto-feeder. Also give them frozen oysters every once in a while.

 

[ShoreReefer]

I recently bought a package from reefcleaners that included a few pincushion urchins (I have 7 total now) and 100 hermit crabs, 100 snails, and about a dozen porcelain crabs. The tuxedo urchins do a great job mowing them down but the algae just grows back a few days later. I do twice a week or so manual removal that i sphon to a filter sock in my sump and scrub the rocks inside the tank weekly to bi-weekly. The algae is not growing under the ledges so i know the light is helping it grow but i've had my t-5's off and run AB+ with the hydras so there's little reds and whites. I recently started doing 60 gallon weekly water changes (150 gallon system) and will try to stick with that for at least a few months to see how that works. I feel your pain.