Canreef Aquatics Bulletin Board - HA is getting me down

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- - HA is getting me down (http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=56611)

I, too, am having a brutal hair algae outbreak. We bought a sea hare but he died before he got even halfway through the algae. Our tank is only 28 gallons so a tang is out. What is the best small fish for eating this stuff? We could turn him shark-size with all the hair algae in the tank!

I would agree with the "bio-organic phosphate leaching from the rock" theory.....how old is the tank?.....also PCs are great at growing algae.....try disconnecting the 10k pc for a while

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pier Pressure (Post 453151)

Mexican turbo snails?

Does anyone know who might have these Mexican turbo snails in stock?

Well RC does of course:biggrin:....have seahares too.

I have been trying to help KoreSample for probably 3 or 4 weeks via PM, and I told him to post here to see if someone can figure something else out. I also came to the conclusion of the rock leaching - at least that's the only idea I have left! :lol:

i just did another 50% water change (oh my aching back!) and i noticed the algae came loose much easier this time, so maybe i am making progress. I think you and Mindy are right, its probably leeching from my rock. My tank looks very similar in algae growth to what you posted. When you say 'cooked in tank' what did you mean by that?

I want to post a big THANKS! here to Mindy as well, you have been a huge help in trying to understand what is going on and your articles were great to get a handle on things!

Quote:

Originally Posted by michika (Post 453146)

And we have a winner!

I also did battle with hair algae, and ultimately the source was that phosphates were leaching from the rock and feeding the algae. The two options you have are a) let it cook in your tank, or b) remove and swap and either cook elsewhere, or dry it out.

I personally ended up letting it cook in the tank. I just did weekly maintenance of removing the hair algae and doing a regular waterchange shortly there after.

The best clean up crew I had, and still have, is a long-spine urchin. Great choice for a clean up crew, but they do grow very large.

Just so you have an idea of how bad it was in that tank:

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0120.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0110.jpg

I just let it stay in the tank and I waited it out. It all vanished in about 3-4 months. Bigger water changes don't help, FYI.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Koresample (Post 453302)

I want to post a big THANKS! here to Mindy as well, you have been a huge help in trying to understand what is going on and your articles were great to get a handle on things!

You're very welcome. :)

You can probably cut back on the water changes since the algae is growing so well, it will be absorbing all the nutrients that are leaching out anyway, and you're removing it with your scissors.

EDIT: Ooops, michika beat me to it. Bigger water changes do help if you're dealing with high nutrients in the water column, but your readings are all low, so the algae is eating it up well for you.

Thanks for all the tips, i will go back to weekly 10% changes and just watch my garden grow.....well, make that die lol. I keep a detailed journal so it will be interesting to see how long this goes on for.