What is this growing on my live rock ?!?!
- Thread starter martin3490
- Start date
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It is a form of green algae. Not sure which as I cannot make out the filaments of it on my phone.I have what seems to look like grass growing in my live rock can anybody help and let me know is this is safe ? If not how to treat it ?
Typical new tank uglies. If you do not have a clean up crew yet, now would be the time for a few snails and hermits.
Forgot to add, if you have a clean up crew and they do not eat it, manual removal of it is ok.
Tired
2500 Club Member
A close-up picture would be good, to figure out exactly what it is.
You should definitely add your cleanup crew about now. They can't eat long stuff like that, though, so you'll want to just pull it out by hand. Do NOT scrub the rock- just pinch the algae and pull it off, with the rock still in the tank. That way your cleanup crew can eat the short stuff left behind.
You should definitely add your cleanup crew about now. They can't eat long stuff like that, though, so you'll want to just pull it out by hand. Do NOT scrub the rock- just pinch the algae and pull it off, with the rock still in the tank. That way your cleanup crew can eat the short stuff left behind.
Dark_Knightt
Valuable Member
Hermit and an emerald crab will do a beauty on this. Just make sure the crab doesnt eat any corals if you have any. Mine never touched any.
Tired
2500 Club Member
Yep, hair algae. Don't get a tang or urchin unless your tank is large enough, and don't add either to such a new tank. Like I said above, pull it out by hand, let your snails handle it. Hair algae usually goes away on its own as other, non-pest algaes get established.
You have lots of empty space on your rock, so you're going to have lots of algae grow. Keep some snails, pull out long tufts of algae so the snails can easily eat them, and let all the algae grow. If you keep your nutrients reasonable (not zero, that starves the non-pest algae) and just let everything go how it wants to, the non-pest algae will gradually take over and the pest algae will mostly vanish. Until then, your tank is in the "ugly stage", and you should just expect to have a lot of algae.
You have lots of empty space on your rock, so you're going to have lots of algae grow. Keep some snails, pull out long tufts of algae so the snails can easily eat them, and let all the algae grow. If you keep your nutrients reasonable (not zero, that starves the non-pest algae) and just let everything go how it wants to, the non-pest algae will gradually take over and the pest algae will mostly vanish. Until then, your tank is in the "ugly stage", and you should just expect to have a lot of algae.
