Randy Holmes-Farley
Reef Chemist
Staff member
Super Moderator
Excellence Award
Expert Contributor
Article Contributor
R2R Research
My Tank Thread
For what? What brand?
trying to rid algae with black out
- Thread starter peter fumo
- Start date
- Tagged users None
For what? What brand?
OP
OP
peter fumo
Active Member
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2015
- Messages
- 103
- Reaction score
- 15
thought it was the salt turned out it wasn't
OP
OP
peter fumo
Active Member
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2015
- Messages
- 103
- Reaction score
- 15
thought it was the salt turned out it wasn't
Paul B
10K Club member
Excellence Award
Reef Tank 365
Reef Of The Month
Article Contributor
Rock Pool Reef Keepers
Blacking out a tank will not work for eliminating algae. It will kill it temporarily but it will come back. Eliminating nutrients will also not work contrary to popular opinion. You can try that, as everyone does, but if the algae "wants" to grow, it will grow. Nutrients will just make it nice and green. Algae grows on every healthy reef in the sea and if it didn't there would be no tangs, slugs and the hoards of urchins that cover the reefs at night.
A lighted refugium or some other place that grows algae is the best, and most natural way to go as the algae grows, but it doesn't grow where you don't want to see it.
I recently took this on one of the outer Islands in Hawaii, not a tourist Island and there was hair algae all over the place because for some reason, the tangs disappeared (as well as the sharks and all large fish and urchins)
Your tank is not as pristine as the water in the South Pacific.
You can also see algae all around this spotted moray eel which is one of the few fish left on this reef besides Moorish Idols that eat sponge.
This is another Hawaiian Island where there are still urchins as you can see in every hole. Notice, no algae.
I realize 100% of the people here (including Randy) will disagree with me here, but it is what it is and if you have been diving all around the world, you will see what I explained.
A lighted refugium or some other place that grows algae is the best, and most natural way to go as the algae grows, but it doesn't grow where you don't want to see it.
I recently took this on one of the outer Islands in Hawaii, not a tourist Island and there was hair algae all over the place because for some reason, the tangs disappeared (as well as the sharks and all large fish and urchins)
Your tank is not as pristine as the water in the South Pacific.
You can also see algae all around this spotted moray eel which is one of the few fish left on this reef besides Moorish Idols that eat sponge.
This is another Hawaiian Island where there are still urchins as you can see in every hole. Notice, no algae.
I realize 100% of the people here (including Randy) will disagree with me here, but it is what it is and if you have been diving all around the world, you will see what I explained.
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2014
- Messages
- 30,220
- Reaction score
- 24,063
- Location
- tejas
- What state or country do you live in
- Alaska
I saw macros and light hair algae in most areas of the caymans in the 90s as well, interesting to see the range and distribution of primary producers in waters that test on our kits acceptable nutrient ranges for each nutrient we aim for
