Algae ID and advice desperately needed!

[Morpheosz]

OK, maybe not quite an emergency, but this algae caused a flood while we were out of town last week so I am a bit at my wits end. This is my son's 18 month old 20g softie / mixed tank. It was doing great up until about 3 months ago when this hair algae appeared. We have tried everything to get rid of it and are having no luck. My son is so frustrated he's about ready to get rid of the tank. I offered to take a stab at it this weekend for his birthday so I'm urgently crowd sourcing ideas on next steps.

I have no idea where it came from or why. He does water changes every 1-2 weeks. Feeds conservatively his 3 fish - 2 clowns and a damsel. I have tested periodically and never seen out of control nutrients. A month ago I tested and his nitrates were around 7ppm, phosphates around .013. I had him siphon and pull as much out as possible and did 50% water change over the course of 2 days. We also added a chemipure blue pouch to try to starve it of phosphates. As of today, nitrates are 3.6ppm and PO4 reads 0 (I know can lead to other issues but should have slowed down the algae at least!?). Algae bounced back and is going as strong as ever. I even tried a round of fluconazole with no effect as well as 2 weeks of Microbacter 7 dosing.

It has never been on the glass or sand if that's at all diagnostic but grows like crazy on rocks and plastic weir as well as on the snails (one has a comically large 2" long algae head of hair). I added a couple large turbo snails from my tank and they aren't touching it. We bought a tuxedo urchin, it's not touching it.

I'm hoping to tackle it this weekend so any advice would be much appreciated! Should I pull the rocks and try H2O2 or something more aggressive like that? As you can see he has thriving zoa colonies and a big leather so anything I do will likely be pretty disruptive.

Other params
Temp is 80-82 (his room is pretty warm)
Kh is 7.1
Salinity is a bit high at 1.027 (this is a recent development as the algae blocked the weir when we were out of town and flooded the floor with ATO water, and seems he over corrected a bit on restoring the salinity)

We use tropic marin reef pro salt and a 7 stage RO/DI with 0 TDS output. It's the same water source I use on my 75 which is pristine so that's not a source of any algae fuel. Same source for the top off water (which also tops my main tank).

This shouldn't be a difficult one but I am at a loss at this point!

Thanks in advance!!

 

[Lavey29]

Nice looking nano. Cut lights back to 6 hours with blue and uv only no whites. Get a couple turbos and a tuxedo urchin. Daily manual removal. Raise magnesium to 1500. You may have briopsis mixed in with GHA.

 

[mattgsa]

Brightwell Aquatics Hydrat-MG - Hydrated Magnesium Salt Solution for Use in Marine Aquarium

 

[i cant think]

OK, maybe not quite an emergency, but this algae caused a flood while we were out of town last week so I am a bit at my wits end. This is my son's 18 month old 20g softie / mixed tank. It was doing great up until about 3 months ago when this hair algae appeared. We have tried everything to get rid of it and are having no luck. My son is so frustrated he's about ready to get rid of the tank. I offered to take a stab at it this weekend for his birthday so I'm urgently crowd sourcing ideas on next steps.

I have no idea where it came from or why. He does water changes every 1-2 weeks. Feeds conservatively his 3 fish - 2 clowns and a damsel. I have tested periodically and never seen out of control nutrients. A month ago I tested and his nitrates were around 7ppm, phosphates around .013. I had him siphon and pull as much out as possible and did 50% water change over the course of 2 days. We also added a chemipure blue pouch to try to starve it of phosphates. As of today, nitrates are 3.6ppm and PO4 reads 0 (I know can lead to other issues but should have slowed down the algae at least!?). Algae bounced back and is going as strong as ever. I even tried a round of fluconazole with no effect as well as 2 weeks of Microbacter 7 dosing.

It has never been on the glass or sand if that's at all diagnostic but grows like crazy on rocks and plastic weir as well as on the snails (one has a comically large 2" long algae head of hair). I added a couple large turbo snails from my tank and they aren't touching it. We bought a tuxedo urchin, it's not touching it.

I'm hoping to tackle it this weekend so any advice would be much appreciated! Should I pull the rocks and try H2O2 or something more aggressive like that? As you can see he has thriving zoa colonies and a big leather so anything I do will likely be pretty disruptive.

Other params
Temp is 80-82 (his room is pretty warm)
Kh is 7.1
Salinity is a bit high at 1.027 (this is a recent development as the algae blocked the weir when we were out of town and flooded the floor with ATO water, and seems he over corrected a bit on restoring the salinity)

We use tropic marin reef pro salt and a 7 stage RO/DI with 0 TDS output. It's the same water source I use on my 75 which is pristine so that's not a source of any algae fuel. Same source for the top off water (which also tops my main tank).

This shouldn't be a difficult one but I am at a loss at this point!

Thanks in advance!!

I would personally tug it completely off (Wash the rocks one by one and everything).
Then try pure blue lighting, absolutely no whites for a few weeks and see if that helps it.
Finally, I’d add a few trochus snails and if there was room then definitely try and get a Koumansetta hectori (or rainfordi) in there. Mine decimated all algae and kept it out of my nano for ages. Although, you may want to ask your son if he likes the fish as it’s all opinions with the fish.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

Following
I understand your frustration

I too have hairy snails lol, I have a similar problem, I removed majority by working in sections across all my rocks with fingers and toothbrush but some areas I can not reach, I think similar approach in your aquarium would be a good start. I even tried scrubbing and pulling from snail shell but it was very tough, try to remove worst manually then as suggested white lights off (this is my next move)

 

[Morpheosz]

Brightwell Aquatics Hydrat-MG - Hydrated Magnesium Salt Solution for Use in Marine Aquarium

Have you used this against hair algae? I looked into raising Mg at one point then discovered that the modern consensus was that the old technique of raising the magnesium wasn't actually the magnesium, but other impurities in the specific brand of Mg additive people were using (which has since changed and therefore no longer works for that purpose).

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Have you used this against hair algae? I looked into raising Mg at one point then discovered that the modern consensus was that the old technique of raising the magnesium wasn't actually the magnesium, but other impurities in the specific brand of Mg additive people were using (which has since changed and therefore no longer works for that purpose).

You’re mostly correct. The old kent marine formulation had been changed and is not beneficial at +1600 for unwanted algae. But the original founder of kent started brightwell and has brought the original formula back with the brightwell hydrat magnesium. I’m currently in the 4th week of using it for bryopsis and gha at +1600 ppm. I’ll let you know how it goes in the next 2 weeks

 

[Morpheosz]

You’re mostly correct. The old kent marine formulation had been changed and is not beneficial at +1600 for unwanted algae. But the original founder of kent started brightwell and has brought the original formula back with the brightwell hydrat magnesium. I’m currently in the 4th week of using it for bryopsis and gha at +1600 ppm. I’ll let you know how it goes in the next 2 weeks

Ah, very cool, good to know! If you're 4 weeks in, are you seeing some results by now? Does it seem to be helping? I'd love the updates as well, thanks for offering!

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Do a water change, keeping the old tank water, Pull out the rocks 1 at a time, manually remove the algae with tweezers, scrubbing with a toothbrush when possible (areas without corals). Rinse in the old tank water as needed.

Once you have removed as much algae as possible, use H2O2.
(Rinse off the rock in tank water if you haven't already.) For rocks without coral or just zoas, you can dip in a solution of 3 parts saltwater 1 part 3% H2O2 for 10 minutes. (You can also put this solution in a spray bottle and treat this way)
After the dip (or after spraying and waiting about 5 minutes), put the rock back in the tank.

For rocks with other types of coral, I'd spot treat around the coral using the spray bottle, makeup brush, q-tip, etc. Wait a few minutes and put back in the tank. (You may need to treat these rocks several times depending on how much of the rock you can treat without getting the H2O2 on the coral.)
You can also research the other types of coral to see how tolerant they are to H2O2 and dip accordingly.

 

[Dkmoo]

As far as CUC goes. Nothing will touch them once they get that long. Snails IMO mostly stick with film algae. I have had better luck with hermit crabs for hair algae bc they plug out the "baby sprout hair algae". Again once the hair algae grows long, critters don't like them anymore.

You can't detect any excess nutrient bx the algae absorbed it already.

Manual removal, daily, as others pointed out, and keep it up for a month. Dont starve your tank. Keep the nutrients up and by daily manual removal, you are forcing ur system to find an alternative natural path for the nutrients to go. Nutrients have to end up somewhere. And right now your current system doesn't have enough "alternate" nutrient absorbers (bacteria, filter feeders like sponge, corals, etc) that have reached enough biomass to outcompete algae (bc algae is the easiest and most efficient ansorber). By daily manual removal and upping your CUC (which will help cut back on the new baby hair sprouts), you give these other absorbers a chance to reach that critical biomass to help keep algae in check.

If space allows, get a fuge and a good grow light or a ATS. That is another direct competition against algae growing in your tank and who will win that competition will basically boils down to which side has a bigger biomass (so don't start with a small gulfball size of chaeto in the fuge if the DT has a full head of hair algae) and light. I always say "one strand of hair algae growing in your fuge is one less growing in your DT.

Dosing live phyto will also help turn the competiton against hair algae, and your corals and pods will love it.

You don't need chemicals or miracle bottles. Those tend to upset the balance and stability in your tank and unstable conditions make algae grow faster. What you want to achieve is that balance and natural control and competition to keep algae in check. A little elbow greese and the multipronged competiton against the hair algae listed above and you should see positive results in a month.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Ah, very cool, good to know! If you're 4 weeks in, are you seeing some results by now? Does it seem to be helping? I'd love the updates as well, thanks for offering!

It seems to be helping so far but not as much as I’d like. The majority of the algae/bryopsis is changing color and much easier to remove but I am still seeing new growth in some places. Not the cure I was hoping for so far. Stay tuned

 

[Lavey29]

Have you used this against hair algae? I looked into raising Mg at one point then discovered that the modern consensus was that the old technique of raising the magnesium wasn't actually the magnesium, but other impurities in the specific brand of Mg additive people were using (which has since changed and therefore no longer works for that purpose).

This is false. I spoke to Kent marine directly and their product production has always remained the same. 1500 mag turned the ends of my GHA white and made it pull off like a piece of cotton.

 

[Lavey29]

As far as CUC goes. Nothing will touch them once they get that long. Snails IMO mostly stick with film algae. I have had better luck with hermit crabs for hair algae bc they plug out the "baby sprout hair algae". Again once the hair algae grows long, critters don't like them anymore.

You can't detect any excess nutrient bx the algae absorbed it already.

Manual removal, daily, as others pointed out, and keep it up for a month. Dont starve your tank. Keep the nutrients up and by daily manual removal, you are forcing ur system to find an alternative natural path for the nutrients to go. Nutrients have to end up somewhere. And right now your current system doesn't have enough "alternate" nutrient absorbers (bacteria, filter feeders like sponge, corals, etc) that have reached enough biomass to outcompete algae (bc algae is the easiest and most efficient ansorber). By daily manual removal and upping your CUC (which will help cut back on the new baby hair sprouts), you give these other absorbers a chance to reach that critical biomass to help keep algae in check.

If space allows, get a fuge and a good grow light or a ATS. That is another direct competition against algae growing in your tank and who will win that competition will basically boils down to which side has a bigger biomass (so don't start with a small gulfball size of chaeto in the fuge if the DT has a full head of hair algae) and light. I always say "one strand of hair algae growing in your fuge is one less growing in your DT.

Dosing live phyto will also help turn the competiton against hair algae, and your corals and pods will love it.

You don't need chemicals or miracle bottles. Those tend to upset the balance and stability in your tank and unstable conditions make algae grow faster. What you want to achieve is that balance and natural control and competition to keep algae in check. A little elbow greese and the multipronged competiton against the hair algae listed above and you should see positive results in a month.

True dat

 

[Lavey29]

I'm sure Charlie's advise is beneficial too. He has a bazillion healthy corals in his tank so he obviously knows what works too.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Ah, very cool, good to know! If you're 4 weeks in, are you seeing some results by now? Does it seem to be helping? I'd love the updates as well, thanks for offering!

Treating Bryopsis Algae With Brightwell Aquatics Hydrat-MG | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog

There’s many different kinds of nuisance algae that can cause problems in the reef aquarium and Bryopsis can be one of the worst, or one of the ‘best’ depending on your perspective.

reefbuilders.com

 

[Lavey29]

These dudes are cool but you have to give them a pep talk before the game and then hand place them in the middle of the jungle and force them to eat their way out. Same with the turbos.

 

[Morpheosz]

Thanks everyone for your thoughtful suggestions and insights. I'm going in tomorrow, armed with a few buckets and bins, toothbrushes, tweezers, H202, and some squirt bottles. I'll let you all know how it turns out, wish me luck!

 

[Baronen]

I had a tank overgrown with bryopsis. 20 gallon tank so same as yours. I removed all the algae I could and then added six emerald crabs and 2 Mexican turbos and it was gone within a week

 

[Morpheosz]

I had a tank overgrown with bryopsis. 20 gallon tank so same as yours. I removed all the algae I could and then added six emerald crabs and 2 Mexican turbos and it was gone within a week

Wow! That's a lot of emerald crabs I don't believe this is bryopsis. I have been battling that in my main tank - it looks / acts quite a bit different. I haven't had the same luck there with my emerald crab as he doesn't touch it . I do believe I have gotten the upper hand (fingers crossed) with fluconazole and a scribbled rabbitfish.

 

[Baronen]

Wow! That's a lot of emerald crabs I don't believe this is bryopsis. I have been battling that in my main tank - it looks / acts quite a bit different. I haven't had the same luck there with my emerald crab as he doesn't touch it . I do believe I have gotten the upper hand (fingers crossed) with fluconazole and a scribbled rabbitfish.

Ahh okay. This was while tank was fish less so I added all of them and just didn’t feed the tank. They were forced to pick at the rocks and slowly but surely they took care of it all. Returned everything but one emerald once I was sure things stabilized. Anyways best of luck