Sea lettuce went sexual. I have ulva everywhere

Aere

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Hallo there.

I have a 300g aquarium. Has plenty of livestock and life in the tank. I had sea lettuce go sexual on me. And now it's everywhere. And when I say everywhere I mean my snails are flying around the tank with sea lettuce attached to them like its a propeller.

I have a decent cleanup crew. But this stuff grows fast.

I have 5 smaller yellow tangs, a purple and a Hippo.

I have 2 sea hares recently added

I have 5 tuxedo urchins

I added the urchins and sea hares to naturally try and combat this. But they aren't even making a dent.

If this was a small tank I'd be inclined to tear it down. But the thought of doing this on a 300g with life in it seems terrible.

Will this go away? Thoughts on vibrant? I really don't wanna dos anything. But I don't know what to do anymore.

Tanks 4 months old.

My parameters are
Alk 9
Ca 460
Mg 1440
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0
Salinity 1.025
Temp 78
 
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Aere

Aere

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I was under the impression tangs will eat this. Maybe someone with better knowledge can chime in.

They do. But they aren't keeping up with it. I have 7 tangs. They don't make a dent. This stuff grows crazy fast. And its on every square inch of rock. Its out of control.
 

WVNed

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I would decrease the lighting until it grows more slowly than it is being eaten. Fluconazole will also greatly affect it although it wont completely kill it.
 

Ippyroy

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I had it all over my tank as well. i increased the light for my fuge with chaeto and decreased my DT light to 6 hours a day at 45%. Some people struggle to grow, I struggled to kill it. In about 3 weeks it was all gone. Good Luck!
 
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Aere

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I had it all over my tank as well. i increased the light for my fuge with chaeto and decreased my DT light to 6 hours a day at 45%. Some people struggle to grow, I struggled to kill it. In about 3 weeks it was all gone. Good Luck!

Interesting. I'll try and decrease the lights for sure. And increase the fuge. Thanks!!
 

SliceGolfer

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This may not help much, but when I had this happen adding Gold Ring Cowries took this stuff down. Now granted, my tank is a 20g so you’d likely need a farm of them. I have wondered if certain algae is seasonal as I’ve had Ulva and Dictyota show at certain times, while the rest of the year there is no sign of it.
 

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I literally lol'd at this: "And when I say everywhere I mean my snails are flying around the tank with sea lettuce attached to them like its a propeller."

Have any pics? I have a Sailfin Tang that gobbles that stuff up. Thankfully it's not growing in my DT, but I have some in the fuge that I feed every once and a while when fuge gets too full.
 
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Aere

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I literally lol'd at this: "And when I say everywhere I mean my snails are flying around the tank with sea lettuce attached to them like its a propeller."

Have any pics? I have a Sailfin Tang that gobbles that stuff up. Thankfully it's not growing in my DT, but I have some in the fuge that I feed every once and a while when fuge gets too full.

There's a tiny snail under that. Its attached to him. I find them drifting all over the place lol. I have to manually pluck this stuff off them all the time.

20200929_115844.jpg
 

esther

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There's a tiny snail under that. Its attached to him. I find them drifting all over the place lol. I have to manually pluck this stuff off them all the time.

20200929_115844.jpg

That's crazy. Between my sailfin and my blue tang, they mow that stuff. Good luck!
 

Dan_P

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Hallo there.

I have a 300g aquarium. Has plenty of livestock and life in the tank. I had sea lettuce go sexual on me. And now it's everywhere. And when I say everywhere I mean my snails are flying around the tank with sea lettuce attached to them like its a propeller.

I have a decent cleanup crew. But this stuff grows fast.

I have 5 smaller yellow tangs, a purple and a Hippo.

I have 2 sea hares recently added

I have 5 tuxedo urchins

I added the urchins and sea hares to naturally try and combat this. But they aren't even making a dent.

If this was a small tank I'd be inclined to tear it down. But the thought of doing this on a 300g with life in it seems terrible.

Will this go away? Thoughts on vibrant? I really don't wanna dos anything. But I don't know what to do anymore.

Tanks 4 months old.

My parameters are
Alk 9
Ca 460
Mg 1440
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0
Salinity 1.025
Temp 78
I look forward to this happening. I have 15 Mexican turbos I have to feed because they have stripped my fish only 75 gallon bare. I wonder if the the low nitrate and phosphate levels stimulates the sexual event. Caulerpa is believed to have a tendency to sexually reproduce because of low nutrient levels.
 

Mkkari

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Hallo there.

I have a 300g aquarium. Has plenty of livestock and life in the tank. I had sea lettuce go sexual on me. And now it's everywhere. And when I say everywhere I mean my snails are flying around the tank with sea lettuce attached to them like its a propeller.

I have a decent cleanup crew. But this stuff grows fast.

I have 5 smaller yellow tangs, a purple and a Hippo.

I have 2 sea hares recently added

I have 5 tuxedo urchins

I added the urchins and sea hares to naturally try and combat this. But they aren't even making a dent.

If this was a small tank I'd be inclined to tear it down. But the thought of doing this on a 300g with life in it seems terrible.

Will this go away? Thoughts on vibrant? I really don't wanna dos anything. But I don't know what to do anymore.

Tanks 4 months old.

My parameters are
Alk 9
Ca 460
Mg 1440
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0
Salinity 1.025
Temp 78
Hows it going with the SEA LETTUCE in DT? I have the same F$%^&*( issue....
 
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Aere

Aere

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Hows it going with the SEA LETTUCE in DT? I have the same F$%^&*( issue....
100% gone.

Here is what I did.

Like 11 weeks of dosing vibrant twice a week per directions.

Dosed reeflux and followed directions at week 4.

100% gone. Tank looks great now. Had a small battle with cyano after. But that's gone now too. I tried everything before resorting to dumping a bunch of crap in the tank. But they all failed. This worked. I manually pruned it every week too.
 

Mkkari

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100% gone.

Here is what I did.

Like 11 weeks of dosing vibrant twice a week per directions.

Dosed reeflux and followed directions at week 4.

100% gone. Tank looks great now. Had a small battle with cyano after. But that's gone now too. I tried everything before resorting to dumping a bunch of crap in the tank. But they all failed. This worked. I manually pruned it every week too.
Did the Vibrant affect your sea lettuce in the refugium ?
 
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Aere

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Did the Vibrant affect your sea lettuce in the refugium ?
Dude I burned that crap with fire. I'm never putting sea lettuce in my tank again. But yes. It'll wipe out all algae in your tank. What size is your tank? If mine was smaller, and not 8 feet of reef I would have probably tried the peroxide method. But that would have just sucked with all my rock and tank size.
 

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