Battling Bryopsis with Algae Scrubber?

uli-the-nihlist · Aug 17, 2021

I have noticed a few patched of bryopsis on my SPS dominant mixed reef and I am not really sure how to battle it. I have used fluconazole in the past with great success, however, I have since added an algae turf scrubber, which has been running now for about 4 months. It has done an outstanding job of keeping nutrients close to undetectable and would hate to take it offline.

I understand that adding fluconazole will knockout my scrubber, but is there an option to remove the screen and place it in clean tank water while dosing and then add it back after treatment? The bryopsis is spreading rather quickly and I'd like to get a handle on it.

I haven't seen many threads posted that address this specific question, so I am hoping this will answer the question of how to battle bryopsis with an ATS.

vetteguy53081 · Aug 17, 2021

Scrubber will do nothing. Pull as much as you can by hand and reduce white light intensity. Pull the roots (very important) with a dental pick or small crochet needle and remove roots or it will continue to thrive.
afterwards, add chitons, astrea and trochus snails for final cleanup

G Santana · Aug 17, 2021

I have never used Fluconazole, but if it's anything like Vibrant, it will impact your scrubber.
You could take the screen off and place it in a 5 gallon bucket with a pump to recirculate the water and it will be fine.
I left my screen on while I dosed Vibrant and the production of algae went down significantly, but it did not kill the algae altogether
I hope this helps.

Phistergosh · Aug 17, 2021

It

G Santana said:
I have never used Fluconazole, but if it's anything like Vibrant, it will impact your scrubber.
You could take the screen off and place it in a 5 gallon bucket with a pump to recirculate the water and it will be fine.
I left my screen on while I dosed Vibrant and the production of algae went down significantly, but it did not kill the algae altogether
I hope this helps.

Its nothing like vibrant. Fluc is a chemical anti fungal treatment that happens to also kill bryopsis.

Fluc only kills certain algae. Basically bryopsis and hair algae but it takes a significantly longer time on hair algae and some report that it can't finished the job.

I guess it would come down to the type of algae growing on your scrubber. I'd say to just go for the fluc treatment before you are infested. I had issues in the past and set up a new tank last weekend and preemptively did a half strength dose of reef flux just in case.

I had some green film algae and dinos that were unaffected by the fluc. Your scrubber algae might survive

Turbo's Aquatics · Aug 18, 2021

Apparently Bryopsis grows super fast on a scrubber screen. I think it was @atoll that figured this out (correct me if I'm wrong). So I don't know if this could help at all but what I can envision (and note that this would only be for a tank already infested with bryopsis) is purposely putting bryopsis on the scrubber in an attempt to out-compete the bryopsis in the tank. Then, when you've beaten the tank growth down, it might be easier to pull it out.

Adding to an above comment - bryopsis is strong, so if you have a bunch sticking out of a rock, typically you can remove that rock from the tank and grab on to the root with a needlenose pliers and pull the whole root system out without it breaking off in the rock. I had a buddy do this, took a while, but he got it all and it never came back.

atoll · Aug 18, 2021

Turbo's Aquatics said:
Apparently Bryopsis grows super fast on a scrubber screen. I think it was @atoll that figured this out (correct me if I'm wrong). So I don't know if this could help at all but what I can envision (and note that this would only be for a tank already infested with bryopsis) is purposely putting bryopsis on the scrubber in an attempt to out-compete the bryopsis in the tank. Then, when you've beaten the tank growth down, it might be easier to pull it out.

Adding to an above comment - bryopsis is strong, so if you have a bunch sticking out of a rock, typically you can remove that rock from the tank and grab on to the root with a needlenose pliers and pull the whole root system out without it breaking off in the rock. I had a buddy do this, took a while, but he got it all and it never came back.

Nope not me sorry. I have never had Bryopsis since I started using ATSs only GHA, some slime and a short dark almost moss you get on a roof type and Ulva intestinalis which I currently grow in my ATS.