nano reef GHA and nitrate issues

[claybers]

hello everyone, I am a college student at Ole Miss and decided to set up my first reef tank a little less than a year ago. As i have been avidly reading forums for my questions and concerns however, i feel lost on what to try next to battle this green hair algae i have on my LR. From what i have seen on these forums, i see that it is best to describe every detail to find a successful solution.

tank- 8 gallon jbj desktop rimless, put a hygger powerhead to increase flow, build a stand and installed ATO system to stabilize salinity, upgraded the mechanical filtration to be more efficient, chemi pure elite, and Fluvalsmart marine light

Residents- two clownfish (i think they are premium picasso but if someone can identify please tell me), Peppermint shrimp, one blue leg hermit, one or two trochus snails.
rock flower anemone, ricordea, leather coral, frogspawn, polyps, GSP

- this liverock was purchased from somebody that broke down their tank and dried out the rock in the sun and bleach. yes, i know this was a bad idea but i didn't know what i was doing and was guided wrong
- carib sea pink sand
-i use chemipure elite nano as useage of chemical filtration which includes GFO
- I have my own 4-stage RODI system that i recently replaced filters.
- i use a FluvalSmart marine light that i can run from the app (will be sending a screenshot of light cycle soon)
-i do waterchanges at least once a week and pick off the longer pieces of GHA with around 20%-40% water
- i dose kalkwasser in my ATO when calcium and or alk gets low

the issues i am facing is the growth of this green hair algae on my liverock and sometimes on my sand. it started when i added some purple helix to the tank in efforts to add a lot more coralline algae. i have been battling for about 3 months now and losing my patience with it.
also, i have been noticing recently that i cannot get my nitrates to go below 10ppm even when doing a 40% waterchange. my water seems to just stay around the 10-20ppm range. could be my salifert testing kit but i doubt it.

as i have been contemplating getting a lawnmower blenny, a few turbos, and hermits, i dont want to raise my bioload a ton and would rather kill the algae at its source. hydrogen peroxide dip is also not an option for me as my corals and anemone are preeminently attached to my rocks

ill get more pictures today and send them in here

 

[PokeFish]

just get a couple of turbo snails.

 

[PokeFish]

maybe a conch for the sandbed

 

[claybers]

just get a couple of turbo snails.

One thing I also wanted to add, I did at one point purchase two big Mexican turbo snails and had them for about 2 months and they didn’t do anything on the hair algae. Those snails unfortunately died in a ph jump when I had to move to the tank to someone else’s house over Christmas break

 

[claybers]

maybe a conch for the sandbed

I agree

 

[PokeFish]

One thing I also wanted to add, I did at one point purchase two big Mexican turbo snails and had them for about 2 months and they didn’t do anything on the hair algae. Those snails unfortunately died in a ph jump when I had to move to the tank to someone else’s house over Christmas break

turbo snails dont eat hair algae thats very long. you can get some mithrax crabs that will eat your algae. I have them. they came on my liverock. One thing to add tho is that they also eat macroalgae, possibly other snails and coral if they get hungry enough, but they will eat your algae first

 

[NS Mike D]

check the sand rinse thread for rock scrubbing/scraping. You can clean the rocks (may need to remove the anemone (shouldn't be in a 8 gal tank anyway), just need to be surgical about it. The thread covers which corals would be ok to remove, scrape and hit with H2O2

@brandon429

 

[claybers]

Here are pictures

 

[PokeFish]

seahare?

 

[NickSc]

Try an urchin