Sea lettuce?

Cflow · Dec 7, 2019

Anybody use ulva sea lettuce? I got some from algae barn with some chaeto. The problem is it grows a lot faster than chaeto and it floats so it starves the chaeto of light. It also turns slimy when it dies and breaks off clogging my skimmer.

Crabs McJones · Dec 7, 2019

I bought a combo from algae barn. I got sea lettuce, chaeto, and red ogo. It all seems to be growing very well, I do agree the lettuce grows at a considerably faster rate. Try to keep it to a minimum. I pull some out every couple days. That way it helps keep nutrients low, but doesn't outcompete the chaeto completely (and shadow it as you mentioned above)

Paleozoic_reefer · Dec 7, 2019

This is "Godzilla" my sea hare. I rotate him between the display tank and sump. He mows down the chaeto and other macro algae when the refugium gets out of control. Once it eats 25% of it I put it back in the display tank until I need him again in the sump. I hated throwing out good macro algae (and the pods with it) and this has been a great solution.

Cflow · Dec 7, 2019

Paleozoic_reefer said:
This is "Godzilla" my sea hare. I rotate him between the display tank and sump. He mows down the chaeto and other macro algae when the refugium gets out of control. Once it eats 25% of it I put it back in the display tank until I need him again in the sump. I hated throwing out good macro algae (and the pods with it) and this has been a great solution.

that’s a great idea. Sea hares are very effective algae eaters.

Cflow · Dec 7, 2019

I haven’t had a sea hare in a while. Do they climb up the glass? I have a few patches of green algae growing up the back of my overflow but it’s to high.

Paleozoic_reefer · Dec 7, 2019

@Cflow it does on occasion climb the glass but it's not very effective. It seems like any algae on the glass is its last priority or food source. It really prefers to comb the rocks and floor for food...

Samina · Dec 7, 2019

I rubberbanded a bit of the Ulva to a chunky piece of rock rubble and kind of put it in a corner and it grows in that area sort of anchored down instead of free floating. Maybe you can try that or if you want to put like a piece of egg crate in your Fuge to create a separation so the Ulva doesn’t cover up the Chaeto that might work too.

MPS · Dec 10, 2019

I use only ulva in my fuge. I have a few tangs and they love it. Fully sustainable food source. The floating part is a pain. I have to roll it over every day to keep it from drying out on the top.

JumboShrimp · Dec 10, 2019

I had sea lettuce from Algae Barn in a refugium with some flow and about 16 hours of dedicated refugium light. After about 4 months the quantity seemed exactly the same— meaning it didn’t seem to have grown, and it didn’t seem to have died. Ironically, at that point I decided to give up on it and took it all out and just stuck it in a bucket with a little bit of tank-water. It’s lasted there a month, looking the same, without even any flow to provide oxygen to the water. Go figure?!?

Cflow · Dec 10, 2019

Algae barn recommended tying it to some substrate but that isn’t something I want to do. It sure does keep my nutrients low. I can’t even measure NO3 and PO4. This is lower than my zeovit system! And it has a lot more fish.