Multiple forms of nuisance algae

[Cooper924]

So as the title says, I currently am battling multiple forms of nuisance algae. I know one of them is GHA, but I do not know others and I can't seem to get rid of any of it. Ive removed a few pieces of live rock at times and used a tooth brush to scrub them down in some rodi water, but then a day or two later its right back. Ive also added a piece of rock covered in coralline algae about a month ago but it does not seem to be spreading and is getting covered in nuisance algae. Should I remove a couple pieces of rock at a time and scrub them down. my parameters were a little out of whack for awhile but I think I got them under control now. Really need some advice on how to handle this because I'm tired of my tank looking like a swamp. Thankyou! I also have a wavelike dc 1500 flow pump, that I can't seem to find the right setting for if anyone has any experience with these. Tank is a 20g long and I just got an Ai prime 16hd reef about 3 weeks ago, currently using David Saxby preset
Tank Parameters:
Salinity- 1.026
Temp- 78
Calcium- 520
KH- 9
Mg- 1320
Nitrate- 0 (it was high, at about 20-40ppm for awhile, but I've added a protein skimmer and it seems to have brought them to 0)
Nitrite- 0
Ammonia- 0
Phosphate- 0.25 ( this was high as well at about 1, but I added phosguard and tested after 4 days and its been 0.25 for a week now)
Inhabitants:
2 clowns
1 scooter dragonet
1 emerald crab
1 blood red fire shrimp
2 astrea snails
Corals:
1 deep water Aussie torch
1 ricordea
1 GSP
1 Fire and Ice zoa
1 Pandora paly
plus a couple more unknown zoas

 

[sixty_reefer]

Hi no3 is too low, you will need to bring it up to detectable levels

 

[flchamp89]

2 snails is that all? Tank looks new? Does not look that bad. I see GHA and what looks like diatoms. Manual removal and a larger cuc should help.

 

[Cooper924]

Hi no3 is too low, you will need to bring it up to detectable levels

They’ve only been 0 for about a week though and the algae was there before that so I don’t think it’s nitrates being to low?

2 snails is that all? Tank looks new? Does not look that bad. I see GHA and what looks like diatoms. Manual removal and a larger cuc should help.

Yeah I just have 2 plus an emerald crab and fire shrimp, I’ll get more snails though, do you have any recommendations? Tanks total about 4 years old, but I broke it down and moved about a year ago and started to turn from fowlr to reef about 3-4 weeks ago. Would it be okay to take rocks out scrub them all down?

 

[flchamp89]

You could take rocks out and scrub them. If that's easy I'd scrub them with a toothbrush and h2o2. Check out reef cleaners and beef up your cuc.

 

[Hyde2406]

Not an immediate fix but I have a small 1.2x drop santa monica Algae scrubber for my 34 gallon red sea and I love it, I'll never run a tank without one again...

 

[Cooper924]

Not an immediate fix but I have a small 1.2x drop santa monica Algae scrubber for my 34 gallon red sea and I love it, I'll never run a tank without one again...

Does that go in a sump? I don’t currently have one

 

[Cooper924]

You could take rocks out and scrub them. If that's easy I'd scrub them with a toothbrush and h2o2. Check out reef cleaners and beef up your cuc.

Will the h2o2 kill the coralline though?

 

[Hyde2406]

Does that go in a sump? I don’t currently have one

I have mine in the sump but it's a small black box it could hide anywhere, back of the tank behind live rock, just make sure you can get to it, you will need to clean it once a week or so, once it gets going. Takes anywhere from 3 weeks to 3 months to get growing hair Algae but once it does everything in the display will be out competed (so no green in the tank you didn't put there) , and it will only grow in the scrubber.... Unless you have Broapsis... I can't spell... It will only weaken that beast of an Algae a little.... I put the food there so you could get an idea of size, they have smaller ones too

 

[Hyde2406]

I have mine in the sump but it's a small black box it could hide anywhere, back of the tank behind live rock, just make sure you can get to it, you will need to clean it once a week or so, once it gets going. Takes anywhere from 3 weeks to 3 months to get growing hair Algae but once it does everything in the display will be out competed (so no green in the tank you didn't put there) , and it will only grow in the scrubber.... Unless you have Broapsis... I can't spell... It will only weaken that beast of an Algae a little.... I put the food there so you could get an idea of size, they have smaller ones too

I need to vacuum my sump.... But you get the idea

 

[Hyde2406]

Your tank is really only a few weeks only though it isn't gonna get really pretty until it hits about 8 months - 1 year and even then it is never perfect. Give your tank time to mature. Are you feeding the scooter blenny pods? if not you need to buy a ton of them or he will starve. I've never had any that would take normal food, only pods and baby brine. Your tank looks like all of our tanks looked like at that stage. Don't try and bandaid anything get what you want from the start, save up for a good skimmer, good Algae scrubber and great lights.... I cheep out on everything else... But keep an eye on Craigslist and Facebook market place I've seen great deals on lights and skimmers from people who couldn't wait the year, they wanted the perfect sps tank from day one and gave up after 6/8 months... Find people around you with mature tanks, get rock coral etc from them if you like the way their tank looks find out what they do and why. Everyone does it differently and you'll find your groove. But if you go to get anything wet, coral rocks or fish and the tank doesn't look well taken care of say thank you anyway and move on.... You don't want to pick up any bad hitch hikers. I'm by no means an expert even though I've had saltwater reef tanks since 2008 but experts are here on reef 2 reef just ask and you will usually get a ton helpful responses. Have fun, your gonna learn a ton!

 

[Cooper924]

I have mine in the sump but it's a small black box it could hide anywhere, back of the tank behind live rock, just make sure you can get to it, you will need to clean it once a week or so, once it gets going. Takes anywhere from 3 weeks to 3 months to get growing hair Algae but once it does everything in the display will be out competed (so no green in the tank you didn't put there) , and it will only grow in the scrubber.... Unless you have Broapsis... I can't spell... It will only weaken that beast of an Algae a little.... I put the food there so you could get an idea of size, they have smaller ones too

Thanks for all the help! I will definitely look into getting one of them maybe after the holidays but I did just spend a bunch getting my light and skimmer plus a few other things. Im just also worried my tank will have too much equipment being seen, since I don't have a sump to hide it.

Your tank is really only a few weeks only though it isn't gonna get really pretty until it hits about 8 months - 1 year and even then it is never perfect. Give your tank time to mature. Are you feeding the scooter blenny pods? if not you need to buy a ton of them or he will starve. I've never had any that would take normal food, only pods and baby brine. Your tank looks like all of our tanks looked like at that stage. Don't try and bandaid anything get what you want from the start, save up for a good skimmer, good Algae scrubber and great lights.... I cheep out on everything else... But keep an eye on Craigslist and Facebook market place I've seen great deals on lights and skimmers from people who couldn't wait the year, they wanted the perfect sps tank from day one and gave up after 6/8 months... Find people around you with mature tanks, get rock coral etc from them if you like the way their tank looks find out what they do and why. Everyone does it differently and you'll find your groove. But if you go to get anything wet, coral rocks or fish and the tank doesn't look well taken care of say thank you anyway and move on.... You don't want to pick up any bad hitch hikers. I'm by no means an expert even though I've had saltwater reef tanks since 2008 but experts are here on reef 2 reef just ask and you will usually get a ton helpful responses. Have fun, your gonna learn a ton!

Ive only started to convert it from a fowlr to a reef a few weeks ago though. My tank is in total 4 years but like I said I moved a year ago. My scooter blenny is actually about 2- 2-1/2 years old and I never added pods before, I feed him shrimp pellets twice a day and he loves them (once in morning and once at night) plus I always see him picking at the sand and live rock. He's very active, and I love how he buries himself in the sand at night to sleep, sometimes its impossible for me to find his little eyes sticking up. I did just pick up an Aquamaxx HOB 1.5 skimmer and an Ai prime 16hd reef light (I know I really should have 2 Ai primes since my tank is 30" long but budget wouldn't allow right now) a couple weeks ago. The skimmer has been pulling a lot of waste out of my water, it dropped my nitrates from 20-40ppm to undetectable. I have been on this forum for about 2-3 months now and I've gotten a ton of help from everyone on here! if anything is wrong or even if I just have a question this is the first place I go to and always get an answer! thankyou for all the info everyone, really is appreciated! I did have high nitrates (20-40ppm) and phosphates (1) for awhile but now for the last week, testing everyday I am getting 0 nitrates and 0.25 phosphates. Maybe this was my problem the whole time?

 

[Hyde2406]

Thanks for all the help! I will definitely look into getting one of them maybe after the holidays but I did just spend a bunch getting my light and skimmer plus a few other things. Im just also worried my tank will have too much equipment being seen, since I don't have a sump to hide it.

Ive only started to convert it from a fowlr to a reef a few weeks ago though. My tank is in total 4 years but like I said I moved a year ago. My scooter blenny is actually about 2- 2-1/2 years old and I never added pods before, I feed him shrimp pellets twice a day and he loves them (once in morning and once at night) plus I always see him picking at the sand and live rock. He's very active, and I love how he buries himself in the sand at night to sleep, sometimes its impossible for me to find his little eyes sticking up. I did just pick up an Aquamaxx HOB 1.5 skimmer and an Ai prime 16hd reef light (I know I really should have 2 Ai primes since my tank is 30" long but budget wouldn't allow right now) a couple weeks ago. The skimmer has been pulling a lot of waste out of my water, it dropped my nitrates from 20-40ppm to undetectable. I have been on this forum for about 2-3 months now and I've gotten a ton of help from everyone on here! if anything is wrong or even if I just have a question this is the first place I go to and always get an answer! thankyou for all the info everyone, really is appreciated! I did have high nitrates (20-40ppm) and phosphates (1) for awhile but now for the last week, testing everyday I am getting 0 nitrates and 0.25 phosphates. Maybe this was my problem the whole time?

Sorry I didn't realize you just moved tanks, I miss understood, that's awesome your scooter eats food so well, I hatch baby brine for my Mandarin, but every one loves them I have a huge pod population too but I like to keep it big and add the baby brine because I want to find my female Mandarin a mate.... I had a mated pair before Erma wiped out everything I had... 8 year old clown pair... Everything it sucked so much...