How to get rid of Valonea algae?

[Big Al's BC]

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

[Delphinus]

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.

[fishoholic]

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.

[Reefer Rob]

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.

[4ptbuck]

my regal eats it...

[bv_reefer]

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!

[Stones]

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.

[Bryan]

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

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

[rdnicolas]

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