HELP! How do I get this algae under control?

[nhorner]

I keep my magnesium around 14 - 1450 and i have never had an algae problem since. So i know if you mag is low algae can creep up. Also, the aminos in your tank if there is to much could do it as well. what is your mag at? do you dose aminos/vitamins?

 

[Ibassfsh]

One thing not noted is amount off fish in the tanks. How often they are fed. What type of food. Increase water change quantity from 10% to 15%-20%. Try running GFO, carbon. Add emerald crabs for briopsis, and possibly a sea hare. Make sure RO membrane is seated properly, and DI is not exhausted I using it.

 

[james2369]

Iv used alge fix with good results also peroxide dip that will not fix what the cause is I would have to agree as replace ro fliters aslo makeing sure you a good blanced clean up crew and maybe cheeking on adjusting lights why this is going on and when I had a similar problem I hick up my mag all this helped me hopefully some of it does for you good luck

 

[Reefing Madness]

I don't remember seeing a Phosphate number. ??

 

[DragKnee]

What kind of macro algae do you have in the sumps?
I have Chaeto in mine...it's helps but your gonna have to break out the tooth brush and get the majority out by hand...it's a battle that you can win.

The 30g frag tank has a 20g sump with assorted macro algae like chaeto in the sump that is doing very well. The 12g Aquapod and 29g Biocube, I believe have none since they are AIO's.

Have they tried running some GFO?

They run Chemipure, I believe the Elite with GFO in the AIO's. No stand-alone GFO though.

I keep my magnesium around 14 - 1450 and i have never had an algae problem since. So i know if you mag is low algae can creep up. Also, the aminos in your tank if there is to much could do it as well. what is your mag at? do you dose aminos/vitamins?

One tanks Mag is 1340. The other 2 tanks are 1400. I believe nothing is dosed in any of the 3 tanks.

One thing not noted is amount off fish in the tanks. How often they are fed. What type of food. Increase water change quantity from 10% to 15%-20%. Try running GFO, carbon. Add emerald crabs for briopsis, and possibly a sea hare. Make sure RO membrane is seated properly, and DI is not exhausted I using it.

and the 30g Frag only has 1 damsel, the 12g Aquapod only has 1 damsel, and the 29g Biocube has a Yellow Wrasse and a Firefish. I believe she just feeds them once a day, and only enough for them to consume. In fact, I believe they don't even feed the damsel in the 30g Frag as it's been living off of flatworms.

Iv used alge fix with good results also peroxide dip that will not fix what the cause is I would have to agree as replace ro fliters aslo makeing sure you a good blanced clean up crew and maybe cheeking on adjusting lights why this is going on and when I had a similar problem I hick up my mag all this helped me hopefully some of it does for you good luck

Only concern about adjusting the lights over the 29g is the fact that some SPS Colonies she has are doing well. I know the 29g has the Reefbreeders with the built-in controller and whites hit a max of 30%, and blues hit a max of 100%.

I don't remember seeing a Phosphate number. ??

I will let her use my Red Sea Pro Phosphate Test Kit to get a #. She never tested phosphates.

 

[reefraf]

i would still up the magnesiumto 1500-1600 and keep it there make sure your RODI water is at 0ppm . if its bryopsis i would not do water changes just up the mag and keep it there till it kills it

 

[Bad Company]

I'd beef up the clean up crew. Cerith snails and a bicolor blenny as well as hermits eradicated all the algae in my tank during startup. If the nutrients are locked up in the algae, no amount of water treatment will eradicate it. I would gradually add clean-up crew until the algae is effectively managed. I have a number of different snails in my tank: cerith, turbo, trochus, and nassarius. Now they are spawning and I have tons of the little guys cleaning everywhere.

Don' try to solve your problems with dosing and chemicals, solve them with a sustainable population of clean up!

 

[pugbug99]

I use the Kent tech part b magnesium and it works. most of that algae no one will eat and I have bought everything from a Bristle tooth tang called a Tomini and all kinds of crabs and a lawnmower blenny and none of them will touch it

 

[stiky]

+1 on mag levels. Raise them through the roof. It's easy to bump it up and very hard to overdose although it is possible. Just don't be a dummy. Sounds like she knows her tanks. Get those levels up plus cleaners. I have konch's that I have seen ripping algae apart. Old bulbs/no gfo could also be a factor. Sea hates are great but hate warmer temps. Same with turbos. Everytime I go to the lfs I buy 10 hermits. You can never have too many cleaners. Well maybe haha. Algae battles are tough but with persistence she shall be voctorious

 

[berbotty]

My lawnmower blenny eats every type of algae - cleaned my tank out in a week

 

[lsudiva]

I'll also give a +1 to a sea hare. As a LFS owner, we do an almost rental system on them because they're too efficient at handling various algae problems. They won't live for long in any one system.

That will help with the treatment, but not the cause, which you want to figure out ASAP. Lawnmowers are great, but they can be aggressive, particularly in smaller tanks, in my experience. I also like the idea of GFO, Chemipure Blue, or something along those lines, increasing MAG gradually never hurts, but most importantly it sounds like she's getting excessive phosphates from somewhere. Even in AIOs, it's possible to get some macro growing behind the scenes. I set up a 16 gallon IM nano (so my kids would stay out of Momma's tank, LOL), and my lighting happens to cover and leach into the back, so I crammed some varying macro into that. If her lighting doesn't allow for that, there are a few easy ways to cram some in there and get some light on it. Any and all phosphate export will help.
Chemipure Blue is kinda like Chemipure Elite on crack. I've swapped my systems, particularly the ones that I overfeed the hel* out of for my more finicky fish, and I've noticed a considerable difference.

Hope some of that helps!

P.S.: Although I'm new to R2R, I've been doing this off and on for 20 years, so I'm not a noobie throwing info off at the hip. Nothing against new people learning, just wanted to throw that out there too.

 

[fishroomlady]

a lot of great suggestions here.....check the age of the bulbs on the tanks, check the RO unit - all sections. Adding CUC will help I'm sure. From the pictures, the first definitely looks like bryopis but a couple of the other pictures look like dinos. I've read (I've never personally had them - knock on wood) that water changes can actually work against eradication. I would research how to get rid of dinos....perhaps the Kent treatment for bryopsis may help with the dinos. Definitely run some GFO or phosguard to cut down on phosphates - even if you don't test for them they're obviously there thus your algae. Good luck!

 

[wat67]

your top off water tank might be the cause!

You might want to test TDS level in your top off water tank. I had this problem and just found the cause was my top off water tank was contaminated.

 

[icsparks]

Emerald crabs will help. I had an issue with algae in my 20 gal. Added 5 crabs and algae was gone in two weeks. I could not believe how quickly they ate it. Now I have green slime in which they will not eat. Phosphate level about 1.0 but coming down with use of gfo.

 

[WhoKnew]

At this point something has to change. I would start with some CUC, turn lighting down, do a major water change. No more sharing rock with all the tanks, you are just spreading the problem. I got a powder brown tang, that keeps the alga at bay. Good luck

 

[DragKnee]

Okay so she got some CUC for each of the tanks, and she used my Red Sea Pro Test Kit to test phosphates in all 3 tanks and her brute.

She said all 3 tanks were 0.02 - 0.04

She also said the Brute was 0.02 - 0.04

So I know there should be 0 phosphates in the brute, but I find that 0.02 is so minimal, I don't know if I would be concerned? Don't people recommend their phosphate levels remain below 0.05, as some corals like just a little phosphate?
Now with her tanks also reading that, I don't get it. Does hair algae lock up phosphates like cyano does? She doesn't have any cyano in her tank btw.

She also bought the Kents Tech-M and is going to start raising her mag levels.