Hair algae out of control on my rocks...

T

trey85stang

[The hair algae on my rocks is getting out of control.. I still have not got my cleanup crew yet.. but I do not think they will be tackling all of this stuff on the rocks...

There is one rock the hair algae is about 3-4 inchs long now, it started getting darker a few weeks back and i thought it was going to die.. but it keeps getting longer, the same rock now has to red algae (cyano?) growing on it as well...

also

and the second issue I am facing ever since setting my tank back up I have a film on the top of the water.. nothing is differen't from the previous setup and it never had a film.. PH's and what not are all in the same places any ideas how to get rid of this???

last,, I am going to upgrade my powerheads to a little higher flow... what is more recommended Rio or Maxi-Jets??

Thanks]
 
[Maxi Jets by far... I switched to Maxi-jets to use with the wave maker and you never hear them turn on or off.
Rio's are really bad and I have had plenty of those and IMO would not use them to even drain a water bed.

Hair algae is from minerals in your water. Are you using RO/DI water? if not start. I hope you are not using TAP water.]



Edited By Nautilus on 1098239178
 
@Nautilus wrote:
[Maxi Jets by far... I switched to Maxi-jets to use with the wave maker and you never hear them turn on or off. Rio's are really bad and I have had plenty of those and IMO would not use them to even drain a water bed. Hair algae is from minerals in your water. Are you using RO/DI water? if not start. I hope you are not using TAP water.] said:
[I am using 100% RO Water, Now.. the rock was in my tank orginally with all tap water, this is when the hair algae started.. I made a mistake when adding sand to my tank.. so i drained it and "started over,"

With the start over I used 30 Gallons of cycled water from the LFS, and 40 gallons of fresh mixed RO Water. So the tank went through a 2 day mini-cycle after the water and rock was added back.. and then everything went back down to 0 except for nitrates, which are however, hovering around 20ppm (could be the problem?) Also the hair algae is only on the rocks.. not in the sand.. not on the power heads... not on anything but the rock where it had always been.]
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[TREY i have hair algae too. BTW red slime algae is an incorrect name people use. It isnt algae. For that i used CHEMI CLEAN and it was gone within days and hasnt returned, yet (knock on wood). I would just take the rocks with hair algea out. Thats what i just did tonight. I dont want to take the chance of it spreading throught the other rock. ONce i take care of it in the temp tank. Ill put it back in. I have seen horror pictures of other tanks covered in it and dont want to risk it.]
 
[Is the tank receiving any sunlight? For the hair algae, get a lawnmower blenny. They go to town on hair algae and mow over that stuff. You may want to run carbon for a little while. Gets some maxi-jets for sure...and for the surface skum, try directing a powerhead towards the surface of the water or siphon it out.]
 
[The hair algae will turn yellowish when it is dying off. And you really need to get the nitrates down to nill, they are just converting to nitrogen and just fertilizing your hair algae. A good Lawnmower blennie will really be worth his weigth. Are you adding any food for anything? And you really need to get some good turbos anf other snails in there.]
 
[My Lawnmower Blenny doesn't eat hair algae nor do my 20 blue legged crabs, or any of my 15 various snails. I even tried lettuce nubibranches. Nothing I have tried has even touched the stuff. My nitrates are zero and I use RO water.

Not sure what else to do...]
 
[Hair algea can only become a problem like this if you have phophates, nitrates or bad lighting. Find out what you have and take away the hair algae fuel and the hair algae will disappear. You say your nitrate is high. Rick is right on in what he told you. You may be feeding too much. Maybe you food is high in phosphate. Maybe your RO source of water is bad. Maybe your lights have shifted out of spectrum. Clean up crews and algae eating fish are great but until you fin out what is fueling your algea in your tank your just throwing money away.]
 
[Same here rocketpop. I have nudi's, turbo snails, and many others that aren't touching it. It could be because it's dying off. My rabbitfish isn't working either. Nobody likes the crap.]
 
[Well, I think I should tackle the nitrates... Any idea's how I would go about that.. do a big water change?

also I think I will take the problem rocks out and actually pull it all off and put it in a holding tank for a while??


As for the above mentioned.. my lights are only a month and a half old... if that makes any difference]
 
[Dang I thought everyone had good luck with Lawnmower blennies eating hair algae. Must be BAD tasting hair algae! Are you sure its hair alage? I would think if you stopped feeding the blennie he would eat the stuff.]
 
[I read an article a good while back stating that hair algae can become toxic to fish the more it grows. This would certainly keep them from munching on it. MAybe if you can get its growth stunted and some of it pulled off, your crew will do the rest of the job for you.

Yes water changes and efficient skimming should help lower your trates. How much biological filtration is in the tank? Sandbed depth?]
 
[@Amanda wrote:
I read an article a good while back stating that hair algae can become toxic to fish the more it grows. This would certainly keep them from munching on it. MAybe if you can get its growth stunted and some of it pulled off said:
I dont have the filtration that I should (hind-sight :rolleyes: ), I have a canister filter thats good for 250 gallons (I think it is 380 gph).. It has a few "sponge" type filters in each tray as well as carbon bags in each tray... As for the skimmer it is rated for a 125 gallon tank (it is being run by a 500gph intank pump).. and I currently only have it pulling out about 4-6oz of junk a day, i could set it to more.. if that might help...

As for the sand bed it is only about 2 inchs, and it is pretty much southdown sand w/ no live sand. I dont have much rock, probably just under 30lbs.

Lastly as for feeding.. I feed a small chunk of frozen food (from Fish Paradise) every 2-3 days. Also I have a cleanup crew that I should be getting on friday.]



Edited By trey85stang on 1098282383
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[Gee. my suggestions are goners. I have a bi-color blennie, and he eats algae of all kinds, as does my emerald crab and rabbitfish. But I don't have any algae for them to eat - I have a clean tank.....

Have you tried an emerald crab? Do you have one in the cleaner crew that is coming?]
 
[Great! Then I would do like Amanda suggested - pull the rock, get off as much as you can, and then let the emerald crabs / snails go at it. It might take a few days, but I bet that rock will be CLEAN! And then move the crabs to other tanks - as long as there is enough for food for all of them, they will not fight, but once it is gone....I would just leave one or two in that particular tank.]
 
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