I am in month 8 of the uglies and I'm getting worried/frustrated/pi$$ed off. Most of all, I'm wondering if my situation is normal. I've seen posts that say it's common to have the Uglies in the first year. So, how long did you have them?
This question will be answered differently by many folks off of their experience with their tank.
Having had too many systems to remember all of them in one sitting I can sure tell you its been different with many of them.
Generally you can expect the first year of your tank to be an up and down ride with uglies dominating the tank until your tank starts to mature and stabilize Though most importantly You get experienced enough to understand the hobby well.
Each tank's time with uglies will depend on several things not limited to but including...
Tank equipment, appropriately sized and how well it works.
Amount of live rock used or started with all dead rock.
Sand or no sand
Type of fish in system, how many , how fast you stocked them or how often you keep replacing or adding fish
Type of corals added, how many at a time, how may in total and what was added to the tank you did not see along with the coral.
Do you constantly add fish or corals either from loosing them or just adding more and not letting the tank settle with what you have initially or eventually.
What type of food you feed, how much, how often
Water changes, amount, how often or not at all thinking you have an established mature tank that is self sustaining to a point ?
Product dosed to tank, is chemistry and nutrient load balanced and stable ?
Husbandry over all and willingness to keep manually cleaning the tank of affected uglies along with natural critters to help.
Some personal tanks I have had held uglies or just hair algae for up to 2 years and had me pulling my hair out my head while others I've had lasted just a few short months.
Most often times we as humans will not admit to or even consider the possibility of ourselves as being a cause weather its due to being Lax on care of the tank, understanding of the ecosystem we are creating and including having undersized or ineffective equipment.
building a system for your ecosystem will determine a lot for sure as your tank can work with you Or Against you causing you to fight it and be frustrated all the time.
Evaluating these aspects can sometimes be the most difficult thing to do as we do not want to keep spending hard earned money on equipment ''upgrades'', being Brand , model or size and this is understandable to a point.
It takes time and lots of dedication on our part to learn what we need to know, get in tune with our tanks and develop that mysterious Eye for reefing that sometimes gets referred to.
My advise would be to first do not add any more living critters to the tank allowing the system to balance what it has now.
Evaluate your equipment on the system and how well it is or may not be working for you / tank.
Testing your parameters, evaluating / exploring possible root causes of your Uglies lingering and trying to eliminate or correct one at a time.
Keeping a log / journal of your daily testing, tank what evers will help you evaluate a good amount of information and notes in this process along with past . present and future issue or successes.
