Almost a year in, still no coralline

[DarkSky]

You DONT want corraline! Although it looks good on LR, it overtakes your tank and grows on power heads, areas of glass you don't want it. The only way to get rid of it on things you don't want it on is using a razor blade. More of a nuisance nightmare IMO

It has benefits too, like helping prevent algae from growing on the rock and taking nutrients out of your water. While not 100% effective, when I would have a bit of algae pop up in my display it was always on the bare rock and not where coraline was established.

With a glass tank, removing coraline was a very small part of my maintenance tasks and I feel like everyone that complains about it being a nuisance is more humble-bragging than anything.

I just started a 220g acrylic tank so we'll see if my opinion changes with a more scratch prone aquarium.

 

[RayT]

I agree you don’t want it. You can run a healthy tank without it. Once it gets going it’s unsightly on the rear of the tank and makes your corals less visible from a distance.

 

[OriginalUserName]

I agree you don’t want it. You can run a healthy tank without it. Once it gets going it’s unsightly on the rear of the tank and makes your corals less visible from a distance.

Yeah, I hate how it looks on the back of the tank. It does help reduce real estate for algae though. My latest reboot has been extremely slow in growing coralline, despite having SPS growth. No idea why.

 

[ejpreefer]

I have had about 15 different tanks NONE of those every had it and the one I have now HAS it been set up about a year. I do a water change about every 3 months and use Sea Lab 28 block, and that is it.

I think it has to do with Calcium and lighting spectrum. I have the Red Sea 525XL so I am running the lights about at 60%.

 

[lbacha]

I can usually tell my nutrients are bottoming out if the coralline dulls and isn't bright pink. If you have a ulns tank that may be why coralline doesn't grow well for you.

 

[Zeal]

Is this Coraline? I have it growing on the back wall of the tank

 

[WVfishguy]

I finally set up a personal reef tank (after taking care of customer tanks for the past 20 years). I used decades old live rock from the 'fuge of my quarantine tank, which had no coraline. After five months, with plenty of calcium, etc., I have lots of coral growth and NO coraline. And I don't want it. I always had it before, and it covered everything! I didn't realize you could even keep a marine tank without coraline! I'm going to take pains not to get it again.

 

[Maggie321]

Is this Coraline? I have it growing on the back wall of the tank

Yes that is coralline.

 

[Zeal]

Yes that is coralline.

Woohoo not bad for a 3 month old tank

 

[BigJohnny]

Like the title says, tank has been running almost a year. I occasionally get a couple red spots and green spots. No purple.

Running reef crystals salt.

LED lights.

Corals are growing.

There are many different colors of coralline, including red and green. Which varieties are present in your system and prefer your tanks conditions will determine what thrives. Just let it be. Coralline can get really annoying and your corals will cover it eventually anyway.

 

[Clownfishy]

I have not had coralline algae and my tank is about 1.5 years. I put this down to my rocks leaching phosphate all this time. Since agressivly removing phosphate, I have started to see it grow on my pumps and a couple of very small patches on the rocks. Nothing major, just small patches.

 

[Jl330]

I have not had coralline algae and my tank is about 1.5 years. I put this down to my rocks leaching phosphate all this time. Since agressivly removing phosphate, I have started to see it grow on my pumps and a couple of very small patches on the rocks. Nothing major, just small patches.

I also have high phosphate gfo doesn't do much.

Picking up a 75 gallon with a sump today. I'll setup a fuge and hopefully get there nutrients down.

 

[x2uranium]

Like most said.. it becomes a problem after a while mine will start growing on the front of my glass after about a week if I don't clean the glass heavily

 

[User1]

Best way to seed new rock is to remove one from another source and carry it forward. If you can't obtain a rock then go to a LFS or fellow reefer and ask for some sample chunks that float around when others clean their glass. The floaty bits will work just as well which is more or less the video showed minus the blender. The flakes need to get stuck in your rocks, rubble, and substrate. If none of those sources are available to you you can also buy frag plugs or plates from sources like Indo Pacific Sea Farms which are the same thing. Heavy coralline growth on something. Just toss it in the tank or scrape a bit and toss into tank. Problem solved.

Or....just wait it out. It is a natural process one of which I'm going through now with my 210 gallon tank that I used 150 lbs of dry Pukani. If none of those options are viable then do what I should have done and don't let fellow reefers use dry rock - use TBS

 

[MrPike]

It's a bit like a stony coral in a way, tends to dislike a lot of p04, so keep that number low, but not 0. Also, it tends to like stable KH/CA. In my opinion when using reef crystals you can pretty much ignore magnesium unless you have insane coral growth and never do a water change. Micro-algae tends to outcompete it as well so if you have a lot of that growing everywhere the corraline may not show up, keeping P04 low will help that situation as well.

 

[Clownfishy]

It's a bit like a stony coral in a way, tends to dislike a lot of p04, so keep that number low, but not 0. Also, it tends to like stable KH/CA. In my opinion when using reef crystals you can pretty much ignore magnesium unless you have insane coral growth and never do a water change. Micro-algae tends to outcompete it as well so if you have a lot of that growing everywhere the corraline may not show up, keeping P04 low will help that situation as well.

This sums up very well with what I have seen in my own aquarium.