Considering pulling the plug on my tank - GHA

[Eric R.]

Didn't know there was a cheaper mislabeled product on the market lol

Sorry got confused by this part. Lots of evidence shows vibrant is actually an algaecide though it's not labeled as one, and their marketing indicates it isn't. API is honest about the product which is probably why they charge less. It's not supposed to be magic in a bottle.

 

[PigFarmer]

I have a 185 gallon predator tank I was about to toss in the towel after 6 months of battling dinos then gha... only thing that saved me was a lot and lots of scrubbing but it would return... i was recommended to try dosing microbacter "clean" daily by an experienced tank head. Once I added the microbacter clean to my everyother day scrubbing it only took about 6 weeks for the tank to return to full on beautiful. Just reporting what saved me from tear down. I'm 6 weeks in on the dosing of MB clean and I'd say 95% of gha is gone at this point. Nitrates are now at 5ppm and phos .10 where ae before they were zero and .02 as the gha was eating up all the nitrates and they would show zero on testing. Mb clean is a bacteria and not a chemical.

 

[workhz]

I may have missed it but do you have coral that won’t appreciate a bit less light? On my gha issue early on, way less light and 2-3 turbos plus a little manual removal did the trick.

 

[Crustaceon]

I have a 185 gallon predator tank I was about to toss in the towel after 6 months of battling dinos then gha... only thing that saved me was a lot and lots of scrubbing but it would return... i was recommended to try dosing microbacter "clean" daily by an experienced tank head. Once I added the microbacter clean to my everyother day scrubbing it only took about 6 weeks for the tank to return to full on beautiful. Just reporting what saved me from tear down. I'm 6 weeks in on the dosing of MB clean and I'd say 95% of gha is gone at this point. Nitrates are now at 5ppm and phos .10 where ae before they were zero and .02 as the gha was eating up all the nitrates and they would show zero on testing. Mb clean is a bacteria and not a chemical.

That’s how it works. When you scrub algae off the rocks, ideally, you want something else to take up that habitat. It’s usually going to be bacteria and dosing beneficial bacteria after manual removal can speed up that colonization.

 

[sanzz18]

So I did quite a bit of manual removal tonight. My question is, what about manual removal finally makes the game change and you finally get it managed?

When will manual removal not have to be a task anymore?

Is 50-60 astreas, 50-60 hermits, 10-14 Mexican turbos snails, tuxedo urchin, sea hare, some trochus/nassarius/ceriths (good amount of both dwarf and regular), fighting conch - enough to wipe out the hair algae once I remove as much as I can manually? My tank is 160g display.

 

[sanzz18]

That’s how it works. When you scrub algae off the rocks, ideally, you want something else to take up that habitat. It’s usually going to be bacteria and dosing beneficial bacteria after manual removal can speed up that colonization.

What do you recommend dosing? Would it be beneficial for a 2 year old tank?

 

[Crustaceon]

What do you recommend dosing? Would it be beneficial for a 2 year old tank?

I’ve personally used microbacter 7 and Seachem Stability. I’m sure pretty much any brand would work. A two year tank would absolutely benefit still as you’re exposing habitat that’s “barren” after it’s been scrubbed. Pouring a little bacteria in afterwards will give the bacterial population a boost and will “push” it to colonize any available bare spots quickly. I love bottled bacteria. It’s one of the few things in this hobby that isn’t going cause negative effects if you add it and it really wasn’t needed.

 

[sanzz18]

I’ve personally used microbacter 7 and Seachem Stability. I’m sure pretty much any brand would work. A two year tank would absolutely benefit still as you’re exposing habitat that’s “barren” after it’s been scrubbed. Pouring a little bacteria in afterwards will give the bacterial population a boost and will “push” it to colonize any available bare spots quickly. I love bottled bacteria. It’s one of the few things in this hobby that isn’t going cause negative effects if you add it and it really wasn’t needed.

so just to be clear, I was only pulling as much much gha as I can, not scrubbing it off. I will definitely order some mb7 regardless.

 

[Eric R.]

So I did quite a bit of manual removal tonight. My question is, what about manual removal finally makes the game change and you finally get it managed?

When will manual removal not have to be a task anymore?

Is 50-60 astreas, 50-60 hermits, 10-14 Mexican turbos snails, tuxedo urchin, sea hare, some trochus/nassarius/ceriths (good amount of both dwarf and regular), fighting conch - enough to wipe out the hair algae once I remove as much as I can manually? My tank is 160g display.

Not all of those CUC are great herbivores. I don't think hermits make the best CUC, especially because they like to kill snails. Nassarius and cerith are mostly going to be cleaning your sand bed, not algae from your rock.

I think the most important part of manual removal is getting what you remove out of the tank effectively (something like an in tank polishing filter can be helpful for this, or siphoning out with a small diameter hose while removing), and making sure that what is left is relatively short. I think the astraeas and turbos are your best snails for HA removal. I recommend making sure that they are actively placed on where the algae is growing. My urchin was ignoring a patch of algae growing on one of my rocks, so I picked it up and placed it on that rock. A few days later, the algae was gone on that rock. There's cyano now though, and I need to do a blackout to address that.

I know you said you haven't had much luck with your tuxedo, but all I can say is that I have had luck with mine. You could try picking up a few more if you want to see if they help. Urchins eat a lot of algae off of real reefs.

Also, as they say on reef beef, the dishes are never done. What maintenance is needed on a reef tank changes as they grow in and mature, and the particulars depend on your system, but they are largely not set and forget. There's always some work that you're going to need to do. Hopefully they look nice most of the time, and your biggest concern with your corals ends up being that they overgrow each other and need to be pruned back.

(Also note - I have limited experience compared to others. I like finding people, like Ben and Rich and others who have lots of experience and listen to what they say. So take my particular advice with a big grain of IO salt).

 

[sanzz18]

I beat GHA everyone! It is considered managed! Since I first noticed this post, I only manually removed the GHA 3 or 4 times max. It was never enough to make a significant difference….. until it was. The almost 30 mexican turbos I added to my tank, I believe, really did the bulk of the work removing the GHA. I did also slowly raise my mag from 1350ish to 1450-1500. I don’t really think that made much of a difference. Best part is I used no chemicals like Reef Flux besides simply raising mag.

 

[sanzz18]

Hopefully this thread ain’t dead and you guys will help answer this so I don’t have to make a new post. During my GHA battle, I always had a little dusting of cyano on the sand in a few spots. Now that I beat GHA, looks like the cyano is taking advantage and starting to get a hold of the sand bed. Once again, I will not use chemicals to beat this. Will just doing a bunch of water changes take care of it eventually? I do have good flow in the tank. Upon claiming victory over my GHA, my nutrients ended at 0.15 for phosphate and 22 for nitrates. Any suggestions? I will post a pic or video in a little while.

 

[Eric R.]

Hopefully this thread ain’t dead and you guys will help answer this so I don’t have to make a new post. During my GHA battle, I always had a little dusting of cyano on the sand in a few spots. Now that I beat GHA, looks like the cyano is taking advantage and starting to get a hold of the sand bed. Once again, I will not use chemicals to beat this. Will just doing a bunch of water changes take care of it eventually? I do have good flow in the tank. Upon claiming victory over my GHA, my nutrients ended at 0.15 for phosphate and 22 for nitrates. Any suggestions? I will post a pic or video in a little while.

I had persistent cyano for ages. To get rid of it, I did a 5 day tank blackout (my tank is in my classroom, and it doesn't have windows, so I just turned the lights off for 5 days on a school vacation). Worked a charm, cyano hasn't come back since. If you have light sources (windows, room lights) in the room your tank is in, you can just cover the sides and top to stop light, but be sure you still have air/gas exchange. Some folks that do this say they occasionally need a repeat treatment a few months later. Rich Ross recommends this method primarily. It works best if you manually remove as much cyano as you can before starting.

 

[Eric R.]

You can also start with a 3 or 4 day blackout to see if that does it, but I found 5 effective and didn't harm my corals in any way. Anecdotally, the 3 day doesn't always have as much success as the 5 day it seems, but I don't know if anyone is really tracking this. Be sure to keep feeding your fish as usual, it's okay if the tank gets a bit of light when you do so.

 

[Bruttall]

My tangs (4 of them so far) keep the GHA cleaned out of my 8 foot 300g tank, unless I am giving them Nori sheets daily, then the GHA blooms and they ignore it because I am feeding them too much. In addition to my herbivores ignoring the algae because I am over feeding, I am also stocking the water column with nutrients the GHA needs to grow.

Good Luck to you.

 

[Northern Flicker]

Hopefully this thread ain’t dead and you guys will help answer this so I don’t have to make a new post. During my GHA battle, I always had a little dusting of cyano on the sand in a few spots. Now that I beat GHA, looks like the cyano is taking advantage and starting to get a hold of the sand bed. Once again, I will not use chemicals to beat this. Will just doing a bunch of water changes take care of it eventually? I do have good flow in the tank. Upon claiming victory over my GHA, my nutrients ended at 0.15 for phosphate and 22 for nitrates. Any suggestions? I will post a pic or video in a little while.

I won't comment on cyano as I am fighting it as well and have not secured victory, but I did want to say congrats on slaying the GHA monster!

 

[GARRIGA]

Over dosing NoPox solved it for me several times. Only side affect being white bacterial slime which goes away quickly once dosing stops. Rather have the latter than the former.

30 day blackout didn't work. Urchin, Margaritta and Astrea didn't work although no recurrence since adding that aestrea and perhaps as I've read they won't consume the strands but keep it a bay when just starting.

 

[ptrick21186]

IMO blackouts don't work. They just stress out your corals and as soon as the lights come back on the algae comes back.

 

[Eric R.]

IMO blackouts don't work. They just stress out your corals and as soon as the lights come back on the algae comes back.

Blackouts usually work well for cyano, not for algae. It works best when you can syphon a lot of the cyano from the sand bed first.