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View Full Version : How to get rid of red algae


pascalsimpson
02-17-2010, 04:17 AM
It's starting to grow like crazy, any tips

globaldesigns
02-17-2010, 04:19 AM
I would first suggest posting your parameters and test results. Also please explain your setup, water flow. Then we can maybe try to help you better.

Seamazter
02-17-2010, 04:25 AM
reduce its food source
increase your flow
siphon all you can see out of your tank daily till its gone.

Normaly redslime grows in areas where dead foods rest, stop overfeeding and making sure no food makes it to the bottom of your tank.
increase your tanks flow to keep deadspots from acumilating, uneaten food and waste collects in these spots and gives fuel to the redslime.
Siphon as much as you can out, when this bactiera starts to die it poisons the water and can affect your fish, removing as much as you can stops it from growing and helps stop it from polluting your tanks.

I and many other canreefers have used coralsnow and it removes or slows the growth of redslime.

If you buy the redslime remover from the store shame on you, sure it works, but in the end it kills much more in your tank then the redslime, from good bactieria to smaller pods and even posibly your fish or corals, a side affect of these is they lower the oxegen content of the tank to aid in the killing of the bactieria and inturn damage your bio filter that also requires oxegen.

The Grizz
02-17-2010, 04:27 AM
Coral Snow and reduced feeding worked for me.

RuGlu6
02-17-2010, 04:33 AM
It's starting to grow like crazy, any tips

.
http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/tf-reactor/Two+Little+Fishies+Phosban+%28Phosphate+Removal%29 +Reactor+150.html
.

phosphates are the main reason as well as not adequate flow, nitrites, general overfeeding, food leftovers, overstocking.
reduce Po4 (http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/rw-phos0250/RowaPhos+Phosphate+Removal+Media+-+250+mL.html) and No3, water changes, reduce bio load, increase flow, reduce light, get live oolite sand (http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/cs-albo10/Caribsea+Arag-Alive+Bahamas+Oolite+Substrate+-+10+lbs..html) 1.5" deep instead of large particle sand.
Buy Coral snow (http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/zv-csnow02/ZEOvit+Coral+Snow+-+250ml.html) and zeo bak (http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/zv-bac010/ZEOvit+ZEObak+Micro-organism+Solution+-+10ml.html) use at 25% recommended dose.
hth.

imcosmokramer
02-17-2010, 06:55 AM
+1 on needing a little more info
________
LIVE SEX WEBSHOWS (http://livesexwebshows.com/)

pascalsimpson
02-17-2010, 10:00 PM
I would first suggest posting your parameters and test results. Also please explain your setup, water flow. Then we can maybe try to help you better.

Phosphate 0.5-1.0
PH 8.2
Nitrate 4.54
Nitrite 0.1
kh 180mg/L
Calcium 430
Salt 1.024

I picked up some ChemiClean today and I'm not sure if I should use it or not.

globaldesigns
02-17-2010, 10:25 PM
Hey,

I got your PM, also noticed you posted your param's here.

All looks pretty good. Of course you can do some extra water changes to try and bring down things like your ammonia and nitrates.

I would look at getting some more flow in your tank. I don't know what you have, but alot of red slime is due to overfeeding and not enough flow. What do you have for powerheads and pumps?

Grizz is also correct, Coral Snow is a good product that helps in the fight of this stuff. I recommended it to him and it worked for him.

Let us know how it goes.

pascalsimpson
02-18-2010, 05:47 AM
I got 2 powerheads of 1189 g/hr each today and some Coral Snow. We'll see how it goes

burrows14
02-18-2010, 06:09 AM
Coral snow worked well for me too. I also cut back my lighting for 5 days. I would also recommend running the coral snow when the lights are at their dimmest/actinics. I read in the zeo manual that if dosed during peak lighting after the snow disapates the clarity ofthe water could burn your corals.

Lampshade
02-18-2010, 04:36 PM
I just got over a pretty bad red algee takeover. Reduced the lights to 6 hours a day, sucked what i could while doing water changes, and now its nearly all gone with only a few small patches left that i'll hopefully get this water change. I'd also moved my powerheads around a lot to try and get more flow in those area's. The algee was actually a pretty good indicator of area's that had low flow. Theres apperently many different causes, too much light, phosphates, dirty water, etc. But mine seemed to be a flow issue after i'd moved some rock around. I didn't use Coral Snow, but.. if i had SPS or coral that was more dependant on light i probably would have.
What my LFS told me that actually made a lot of sense was that even using Coral Snow or any other remover, if you dont' get rid of the original problem, it'll just come back.

Reefer Rob
02-18-2010, 05:16 PM
Is it cyanobacteria or red algae?

If it's cyano and your tank is new just chill, it should eventually go away on it's own. It is naturally occurring in all tanks and blooms when there is a change (good or bad) it can take advantage of. Stability is the key to a clean tank, it should disappear when you tank balances out.

Red algae requires a more aggressive approach.