The OFFICIAL how I beat Hair Algae thread! How did you do it?

[Mike9976]

how I and 500 friends beat GHA in private messages:

1. clean out your filthy sandbed feeding it all.
2. take apart your reef via surgery
3. while rocks are on counter, knife scrape all the algae off like a dentist handles filthy plaque while working around your gums.
4. apply peroxide to the former spots
5. quit storing up all this waste in your sand and rocks, clean that out more often next time.
6. dont care what your params were before, during or after, the filth was the issue, and your param issue. we fixed that.
7. reassemble the tank with no detritus in the sand, or rocks, easy skip cycle.
8. any reef too big for this process is too big for you to own, have the size reef you can control and stop 100% of invasion losses before they occur. starting over, not allowed. losing coral, not allowed. be a reef dentist and clean that filthy mouth out.
i have never asked for nor needed po4 and no3 measurements in 15 years of online algae work. measuring your params is hesitation, while leaving in filthy mud. Identifying your invader, hesitation.

steps 1-7 are antihesitation steps, its why they work so well. Do all of your ID via pics, while owning the clean condition tank you willed into place. Do not let algae sit in your tank on purpose, that’s the initial cause of your problem. Humans can dominate plants in one day given sufficient will, such as already losing a prior tank to invasion and refusing to repeat lead up steps.

* one day all your algae gardening stops, and thats when corals and coralline take over the surfaces, they'll reject algae. do not listen to the masses and allow your new reef to be fully taken over; start busy, back off in time as coralline and coral flesh allows you to back off.

never permit an uglies phase in reefing, adjust your busy levels to match the need.

That sounds like a complete breakdown of the system

 

[brandon429]

It indeed 1000% is that. What’s reassembled is the original stuff just minus all former wastefeed and the targets.

*its possible to design reefs that don’t store filth, requiring breakdowns. But you can see how many of us use sand...

We started breaking away from the assemble once/ride out till doom or success as luck may have it method cuz it kills so much reef life...it makes aquarists possibly the greatest source of waste of them all bc we throw out, start over, use same methods, throw that lot out etc

ouch
we‘re responsible for our reef success or failure, and if a certain no-loss method is avail to not apply it is to choose loss.


we‘re not bucking trends for the sake of it...it’s because we want totally compliant systems. Once we make a reef live forever in a jar it’s really not fair to the large tankers to withhold all the good tricks ~

the reason why we cannot easily find an current algae invaded pico reef on the web is simply due to willingness and ability to access. Large tankers see that as destruction, bad, negative, yet all my work jobs are never pico reefs they‘ve got it made.

pico reefer sees a tuft of Gha sprout up: dead killed before tomorrow no hesitation no change to water params, already running low detritus by design

large tanker sees a tuft of hair algae:

 

[Reefr]

Took the chance and did peroxide dosing. Cleared it up.

A good and safe alternative is, if you can, spot treat rock with H2O2 outside the tank, wait for a few seconds, rinse to remove excess H2O2 and voila, you can now place the rock back with dying algae soon to be gone

 

[Doctorgori]

I'm battling this right now in my seahorse tank.
I think it is cladophora. I dosed Reef Flux 4 days ago and it has receded some.
Water changes and phosphate removers didn't help much at all.

Maybe try changing socks a lil more often; like every other day, use 100 microns if you have to.
You can try removing whatever rocks you can and treat with a toothbrush + peroxide
Using Hikari Mysis or PE Mysis?, rinsing 1st?...other brands are often brown mush, and with Seahorses spouting out half the food anyway, your water doesn't need anymore floaters than necessary
Are they dish trained or are you scattering food?
I got Big leather corals and Kenya trees that seems to help, I suppose so does Xenia if you are brave
Edited to add: I got a short spined urchin that seems safe enough, if you don't mind the totally bare trails they leave; anyway, their waste makes for easy removal of excess nutrients or whatever.
I use a lot of those cheap small N.Vibex snails
Good luck

 

[brandon429]

Algae Identification

Any opinions on what type of algae this is growing on my rocks and sand bed?

www.reef2reef.com

see how GHA works

we just: poof, be gone. see first before pic vs last after pic 48 hrs succession.

compare that to waiting till November


when you want shocking results, treat your whole tank for GHA not just the water.

*we didnt care what his params were during the work, and still dont. Params need to be what grows coral, that above is GHA fixed without param testing. no cloud tank after a fresh water change= u have great params.

by cleaning that sandbed, any rockwork done in the future upwells no cloud. key detail

-he may have a high degree of follow up maintenance work required.

-he may have a low degree.

neither of the possibilities has anything to do with his ability to cause a clean condition reef, upon will. Our hobby freezes us into inaction; that is a thawing event above. He can select for a lower-work second round by adjusting blue vs white intensity, by stocking corals that directly compete for space against algae when their flesh is adhered to a rock; by adding a clean up crew, and by controlling nitrate or phosphate if things get extreme.

he applies these changes in the clean condition, not the ugly one. His willingness to work saved his reef, not any form of luck, especially not due to patience with the invasion.

we did opposite of all known reef rules.

 

[brandon429]

I realize this above isn't practical for all reefs, but up till recently we never had a roadmap to even work it in the 50% of reef tanks that are accessible.

thats the problem with GHA info in the hobby...all of it is geared towards what large tankers have no choice but to do.

when size and gallonage allows for access-wield it. dont hesitate.

if you are running a 300 gallon setup u hv large tanker problems lol

 

[JackerVenom]

My phosphates were pretty low. Upped those and most of the hair algae disappeared!

I thought hair algae was caused by an excess of nutrients like phosphate so wouldn’t raising cause a bigger outbreak? Or was it Dino's? Because Dino’s feed off low nutrient tanks. Unless I have this wrong and theirs something I’m missing?

 

[ShawnSaucier]

Pincushion Urchins work for me!

 

[Jesterrace]

When mine got so bad that I couldn't get it under control through any other method, Fluconazole (aka Reef Flux) is what did it for me.

My tank 2 week before (notice all the hairy gunk in the rockwork):



My tank after letting it sit for a month with no water changes:

 

[ca1ore]

Haven’t had any pest algae problems in my main display in years. I mostly manage nutrient levels and have an army of inverts and fish that eat it. I do have some GHA in my connected frag tank (so same water), but no fish to eat it.