Mat of algae

[Tinyfish]

Of my 4 tanks, the one that is doing the worst is the SPS tank. About a month ago I noticed a new kind of algae growing. I changed out my PhosBan and thought that would fix the problem. This stuff is like a carpet that is covering my sand. It is thick and I am sure it is preventing the sand from doing its thing biologically. I added a bag of ChemiPure Elite also. I am using a 5 stage RODI unit that gives TDS=0. I feed once a day usually flakes. Lighting period is 8 hours. I don't get a lot of stuff in my skimmer.

Do I need to vacuum the sand? Cut back the lighting period to 6 hours? Change bulbs?

Why this stuff is in only one tank is kind of weird to me.

 

[DoctaReefer]

What kind of Algae? Pictures would help

 

[Tinyfish]

I think this must be green and red slime algae. It just covers everything.

 

[TheReef]

How old are your lights ? I had a tank set up and the bulb were really old , I got a thick build-up of this dark green algae coating all the sand , plants , rocks .

 

[Tinyfish]

Well I had to look up to see how old my bulbs were. It turns out that they are several months older than what I thought. One year old in August.

I never got the colors right with the first setup so I will be looking to change the bulb colors for 175w MH and supplemental color bulbs I will switch to T5 or LED.