Algae ID, Bryopsis?

[pfoxgrover]

Can you tell if this is Byopsis? It is really hard to get off the rocks, you have to pinch really hard and pull hard enough to move the rock to get a little to break off in your hand. Definitely not GHA. I have not seen the feather like pattern from the stuff growing in my tank but it is wirey and does branch out a little.

 

[KJ]

Cladophora herpestica.

 

[pfoxgrover]

Thanks for the help. You can probably guess my next question. How do I get rid of it? It in a 29 gallon softy tank. I have a elephant snail and a few astrea snail snail and they don't touch it but keep the rest of the tank pretty clean. I have some clams in there that I plan to move to my big reef tank and some point but worry now about spreading this algae.

 

[KJ]

Take the rock out and submerge in peroxide solution for lil while. After that scrub with the brush.

 

[pfoxgrover]

I am a big fan of using peroxide to kill algae but it would be quite a pain in this case. I have multiple corals attached to the rocks and this algae is growing on the tank back and on the clam shells a bit I think. I could knock it back for sure. I also have some bubble algae in there also to take care of. A grazer that would eat it would save me a ton of labor...

 

[pfoxgrover]

I can't find much of anything online about Cladophora herpestica? Is this different from what people are saying about Cladophora algae? On one thread it said Algaefix works for Cladophora algae.

 

[pfoxgrover]

I did a water change and took the 4 rocks with the most of this algae out of the tank and brushed them with 35 percent hydrogen peroxide followed by a rinse in the water change water and put them back in the tank. The rock must have soaked up more peroxide than I expected because most of the corals closed up including two clams that now looked like they had pinched mantel disease. Thankfully all the corals including the clams look normal now that it has been about two weeks. Algae looks dead but I will report back with an update. If I do this again I will soak the rocks longer to rinse off the hydrogen peroxide.