Turf Algae Nightmare

[salty joe]

Is this algae similar to a pad of fine steel wool?

 

[Mastiffsrule]

I feel ya. Im doing a whole redo. I had Dino. Cyano, turf, and diatoms from my new sand. Just a little diatom and lots of algae left to go

I have been running my reactor on and off with carbon and gfo. Dose vibrate 2x a week. Big time skimming, and Microbacter every night. I just got Dr. tims. And water changes. I just got 200 CuC also.

I actually let it grow for a while since my coral is limited due to the rebuild. I like watching it wave back and forth. Kinda relaxing. Now it’s time to go nuke. If it doesn’t work, I follow Brandon thinking alot. May pull everything but forget peroxide, I pulled out the pressure washer.

 

[medtoad]

Fluconazole and your lights up high. That’s all you need. Won’t hurt anything else in your tank (except ding your chaeto pretty hard...). Works great and you’ll wonder why you wasted so much effort on everything else

 

[medtoad]

Fluconazole and your lights up high. That’s all you need. Won’t hurt anything else in your tank (except ding your chaeto pretty hard...). Works great and you’ll wonder why you wasted so much effort on everything else

 

[EmptyWallet]

I tried everything over 1yr plus (low/near zero nutrient water, lower PAR blue/AB+ radions, good flow, good equipment, chaeto in fuge, extensive cuc/tang population, HP, etc) nothing worked, it always grew back invasively. And that was over rock full of coralline not dry rock.

The only thing that worked for me long term, was when I moved house I scrubbed every rock down (under lights so you can see and get it all), lots of dipping in tank water to get any loose bits off, then left the lights off for a week after setting up at the other end. The 'new tank' was filled with fresh saltwater and I didn't move the sandbed, went bare bottom. Either there was something funky in the old water (ICP showed ok) or the gunk in the sandbed was feeding it (i.e. releasing phosphate into the water column, then being uptake by GHA quickly making it undetectable on the test kits).

 

[blackbeltmom]

I had a similar problem at work, not quite so bad. It took Reef Flux and Nopox to beat it and even that took two rounds with Reef Flux. The water in Union County NC where I work is naturally high in phosphates. I didn't realize that it had exhausted my DI resin so I was adding the phosphates to my tank. When I had fresh water at work, I had the same problem, I had to dose the tank with Flourish Excel to get rid of it.

 

[KenO]

Others have mentioned Reef flux which is Fluconazole. It may take a couple of rounds of treatment. It will work and it's a whole lot easier vs pulling rock or using H2O2. I've used it on some really nasty algaes, and it works without harming anything else. Some folks are now using Fluconazole at a lower dosage as a maintenance routine like you would with Vibrant.

 

[Naso180]

I’ve had it bad recently too! I can remove it with a toothbrush in the tank because I can’t remove my rock work either. I got a couple of small pencil urchins and they are the only things that I’ve seen eat it. I have a large sailfin tang, yellow tang, large Naso tang, two bristle tooth tangs, emerald crabs, Turbo snails and a bunch of non-herbivorous fish. Nothing eats it but the urchins. They do also eat coraline, but I think it competes with my corals for resources anyway so I don’t mind if they eat it. It’s not a quick solution, but I think it’s more balanced and permanent (and cheaper) than additives and media. Just make sure everything small is anchored because they’ll push things around. Pencil urchins won’t try to wear things like some urchins do, which is nice. Be patient! All of the good stuff in reefing that lasts takes time. One word of caution. If you have a copper band butterfly, mine eats the tentacles off of pincushion and tuxedo urchins. Pencil urchins only have tentacles on the bottom where he can’t see them so he leaves them alone.

 

[Sallstrom]

I get a bit scared of all of the chemicals brought up to battle these algae :eek: But that's just me :)

Like some before have mentioned, urchins and patience would probably solve the problem. I like the black longspined urchins, but there are a handful to choose from.
I think the pencil urchin might eat some types of corals, so keep your eyes open for that.

 

[GeoSquid]

Don't fight it! Try adding a DIY Algae Turf Scrubber. Give it a place to grow away from your display. It will take a little while to out compete what's in the display but will eventually work - no chemicals or animals you might not want.

 

[Prime Coral]

consider trying Mexican turbo snails

 

[Prime Coral]

I recommend trying
1. Mexican turbo snails (x6 ) these should work. If not then option 2
2. Sea hare

 

[stacksoner]

Don't treat this like Steve Jobs trying to cure his cancer with ginger tea, yoga, and vitamin C.

You need medicinal intervention here. Stock up on Fluconozole and fight this the right way.

 

[ZoWhat]

I did read a few years ago that LR does in fact has a life cycle....before it gets saturated with NO3 PO4.

once LR is saturated the only solutions are:

* get an animal like an urchin to eat it. this doesn't eliminate the problem as it still grows only to be eaten. problem is certain crevasses in the LR exist where urchins cant reach. heres where you get "puffs" of turf. frustrating

* unfortunately sadly PULLING the LR to scrub, swoosh it in a bucket seems to be the only permanent solution. I had LR that was about 5 yrs old and I pulled it a violently swoosh it in a bucket. the leftover water in the bucket was n a s t y. I couldn't believe what the LR released

* a 3rd option that only applies to my situation is to grow out and cover all LR with zoas/palys. where light cant reach, there is very minimal turf or any other form of nuisance algae

hth

 

[KevinsReef]

Update: On Friday, 7/5, I dosed the tank with Reef Flux RX (flucanazole) and started a 3 day black out. I know it can take up to 14 days to see results from Flux RX but so far no change. Here are some pics after the 3 days.

I’ll keep you posted on how it goes. Right now I’m thinking of taking the rock out this weekend and scrubbing it.

 

[KevinsReef]

I had something similar looking, it was easy to scrub off with a toothbrush but came right back. I had fairly low NO3 also PO4 was hard to keep down. I think it was because this stuff was consuming a latent source of fertilizer. In my case that source was 4" MarinePure blocks. They worked great at trapping detritus in my sump and converting it to nutrients. I did a deep clean, ditched the blocks and added a rollermat. Green monster is gone now. PO4 creeping up might be leeching from rocks. They can be a giant storage buffer and re-release quickly. I did a few treatments with Phosphate Rx, and GFO reactor. I could drive PO4 down and it would rebound, do it again and it would rebound less, again, again. Once I got it to stay low (depleted the rocks), it has stayed low with moderate GFO usage for maintenance (I feed heavy).

You know, I have a large Marine Pure block in my sump. I wonder if that could be the culprit.

 

[Hermie]

My current combatant against hair algae:

small pincushion urchin from @reefcleaners
it spent about a week mainly on the back glass, but this evening it migrated onto the target area! We'll see how it goes :)

 

[Diznaster]

You know, I have a large Marine Pure block in my sump. I wonder if that could be the culprit.

I'd be willing to bet money on it. I'm not going to say they are bad for everyone, but in my case they became boxes of trapped rotten. When I pulled them out the liquid drained was brown. I put them in a trash bag for disposal and the next day (trash day), when I touched the bag the smell was something I can't explain in a family friendly forum. You don't have to pitch the block, but seriously pull it out (be careful of what drains out). Scrub the green off your rocks and give it a little time. Maybe use GFO or PO4 reducer if needed. I'm so glad I ditched those blocks!

 

[Ling_Thing]

Api algaefix this stuff is magic

 

[Hermie]

Api algaefix this stuff is magic

not to use scary terms, but is "dimethyliminoethylene dichloride, ethoxylate" reef safe?