How to get rid of Valonea algae?
 

Just wondering what methods have worked or not worked for getting this algae out of their tanks. I've heard urchins, emeralds, foxface, sailfin tang and yellow tangs can help. I haven't got too much of it in my tank as I manually remove it if I can but there are always a dozen or so bubbles that grow in places that are impossible to reach without dismantling the entire rockscape. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

emerald crab

Everybody under the Sun seemed to agree that a Mithrax Emerald crab would be the solution to Valonia problems in my 60g reef but to be honest I saw no discernable difference.

He probably ate some but not enough for it to be noticeable.

I still had to manually remove the algae.

Sorry to hijack a thread but is there any other way of getting rid of those pesky bubbles?

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I found manual removal worked best for me. You just have to careful not to allow spore dispersal when you do it. My method was to turn the pumps off, have a siphon going and use the siphon to physically pop the bubbles and dislodge it if possible. That way any debris or spores from the algae would be sucked up immediately.

Ive also heard that only female emerald crabs have a good chance of feasting on valonia (given that other food sources aren't as readily available). the males are more lazy apparently.

Blow torch :twised: Got rid of every single bad algae on my rock. Definitely a last resort but frick it works, lol. If you do this though there will be alot of die off and you will have to keep the rocks in a seperate area until they are "stable" again. Definitely don't do this unless you are prepared to handle the die off on the rock though.

lol yeah that one definitely works too. My version of the "extreme heat" method is to pour two consecutive kettles of just-boiled water over the rock, flipping the rock between the kettles and trying to get the water into every nook and cranny. try not to burn yourself. This is what i usually do for a bad patch of aiptasia, majano or hydroids. definitely cure the rocks separately after this though

BAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

All my live rock is currently ripped out of my tank sitting in a Rubbermaid in the dark with a powerhead and a heater for this same reason. I had three different varieties of Valonia...now it dies in the dark!!! Hehehehe...

We would agree with Justin that manual removal is very effective but generally only if the population is minimal. Our display in the Richmond location became quickly infested over a very short time. Manual removal proved futile. Emerald crabs failed miserably. The solution was a 10" Naso tang who has almost completely eradicated the problem. Being large he should be easy to remove afterwards.

Big Al's BC

I've never had luck with emeralds either. Seems to me it's 50/50 .. They'll either take to valonia, and then if so they'll eat darn near all of it ... or they won't touch the stuff.

I got lucky, my Red Sea sailfin tang eats the stuff.

I might try the boiling hot water trick that's been described for getting rid of bryopsis (which I just tried BTW, and man that's slick way to get rid of those stubborn patches!) .. You just turn your pumps off for a few minutes, then take a syringe or something and just slowly release the scalind hot water onto the errant algae ... and then in a couple days, it's gone.

I have to say my Naso tang loves to eat it. Kind of amusing to watch, he sort of bounces it on the end of his nose/mouth (like a ball) then pops it into his mouth and eats it. Needless to say I no longer have any valonia left. Our old foxface would also eat it.

Yup, I find the hot water trick works for any algae. For bubble algae I put a short piece of 1/2" tubing over the end of my baster and put the tube right against the rock with a bubble or 2 inside, then slowly baste. Bubble algae takes about a week to disintegrate after that.

my regal eats it...

my sailfin won't touch it, when it came time to reduce the patch on one of my rocks, i just plucked most of it manually, got a phosphate sponge, water changes and ....tried not to pop it when plucking!

So its sounding like emerald crabs are more of crapshoot than they are advertised to be. Has anyone had success using emeralds? By the sounds of it, most people had to resort to manual removal to get rid of this algae.

<<How to get rid of Valonea algae? >>

You don't...it slowly gets rid of you<g>

I have the same problem and bought 4 emerald crabs but they seem to eat all the other easily acessible algae first.

Yeah, that's what I have been noticing with my emeralds too, that they go after any algae (or coral polyps....) without touching the valonea.

A related question: How do you be rid of it when it is right on your coral? I have a small bubble that always comes back on my hammerspawn and am scared to try harsher methods due to it being so close to the head/polyps.

Is it far enough away to shield the polyps with a oyster shell, or even cut a piece of plastic as a shield.