algae

[brotherd]

My tank is still cycling but this has shown up on a couple of rocks.If it's bryopsis what do I do about it? It's green,feathery and sways easily in the currents.

[ckmullin]

If you say it's feathery...good chance it is. Are you able to remove the rock and clean it outside the tank?

[brotherd]

Crappy pic I know but def feathery.I can remove the affected rocks if need be.

[ckmullin]

At the start I had a small rock with that...I took it out and gave it the acid treatment. Now the rock is nice and happy and back in the tank.

[Coralgurl]

Hair algae! Cut your lights, they dont need to be on during the cycle. This is normal, don't stress too much about it.

[brotherd]

Acid? No lights? Would vinegar and a toothbrush work? If I turned out the lights how would I stare at the big box o water? I tried to pull some off with my fingers but ended up losing some in the tank.Oops.

[Coralgurl]

What are your params at? You could add your cuc if it's done cycling!

Just cut the lights for a few days. I threw a couple of rocks in my 180 that were covered and my tangs devoured it!!

[ckmullin]

Acid? No lights? Would vinegar and a toothbrush work? If I turned out the lights how would I stare at the big box o water? I tried to pull some off with my fingers but ended up losing some in the tank.Oops.

Using acid is a final approach to remove this unwanted algae 100%. I used muriatic acid and it works like a charm. If you were to go this route i'll give you needed info on how to do this safely.

Vinegar won't do a thing...just kinda whacking an elephant in the ass...it won't move.

[asylumdown]

The fact that your tank is still cycling means you shouldn't do anything other than maybe cut your lights. Algae is a normal part of the process. Sterilizing your rock with acid will just take you right back to where you started, and should be used as a last resort for truly insidious species of algae that show up in stable systems and can't be removed any other way. You'll see many different kinds of algae pop up, spread, then recede as your tank matures.

Edit: I just looked at the pic, it looks like you have a mix of true live-rock mixed with marco rock, and that the algae is on the live-rock. This is completely normal, and the algae will very likely spread to the marco rock soon. Again, completely normal process of the tank cycling and becoming populated with an ecology. Dipping your live-rock in acid - which I assume you bought specifically to seed your marco rock - would be extremely counter-productive at this stage.

[brotherd]

Using acid is a final approach to remove this unwanted algae 100%. I used muriatic acid and it works like a charm. If you were to go this route i'll give you needed info on how to do this safely.

Vinegar won't do a thing...just kinda whacking an elephant in the ass...it won't move.
Thats funny! Ok no vinegar.My params are ng at the moment.As of this morning in the cycle my amonia is zero but nitrites are off the scale...I think I will try scrubbing it off and give that rock a stern warning...and ride it out.

[asylumdown]

Thats funny! Ok no vinegar.My params are ng at the moment.As of this morning in the cycle my amonia is zero but nitrites are off the scale...I think I will try scrubbing it off and give that rock a stern warning.

Honestly I think that's a bad idea. It's growing on your true live-rock, and it looks like you have a lot less live-rock relative to your marco rock. Taking the live stuff out of the water for any length of time and highly disturbing it is not what you should be doing at this stage. By now, that algae has already released enough spores to spread to every other rock in your tank, which it very likely will do over the coming weeks, so scrubbing it off now isn't necessary.

The algal spores were already on your rock when you got it, and are capitalizing on the fact that available nutrients (plants can use ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate for food) are sky high at the moment. Let it do what it's going to do. When things stabilize, it will very likely reach an equilibrium. If you have a good nutrient removal strategy in place, it will probably die out on it's own, or at least be kept in check by the herbivores you're eventually going to add to your tank.

Again, this is a totally normal part of cycling a tank the way you're doing it.

[ckmullin]

I do agree about not scrubbing...more of a chance to just distribute the unwanted. But not agreeing 100% when people say just let it be.

[asylumdown]

If this were any other condition than a cycling tank, I would agree with you. Unwanted algae growth should be dealt with in a mature system, and there's a myriad of tools available to do that. But the first step in dealing with an algae problem is figuring out why it's happening and addressing that. In a tank that hasn't even finished it's nitrite peak, the cause of the algae is clear - it's the tank cycling process. Scrubbing it now is likely to be a futile effort and will more than likely do more harm than good given the way the OP appears to be seeding his tank.

If after a month or so of the cycle being 'complete', that algae is either still spreading or hasn't receded, then I would look in to doing something about it. In that case I would first try manually removing as much of it as possible to see if it was just a hold-over from the cycling process, and if it continued to grow back at a rate that I found unacceptable, I'd look at a combined approach of appropriate herbivores and nutrient reduction strategies. But not during or immediately following the cycle in a tank with mixed live and dead rock like that

[Coralgurl]

If this were any other condition than a cycling tank, I would agree with you. Unwanted algae growth should be dealt with in a mature system, and there's a myriad of tools available to do that. But the first step in dealing with an algae problem is figuring out why it's happening and addressing that. In a tank that hasn't even finished it's nitrite peak, the cause of the algae is clear - it's the tank cycling process. Scrubbing it now is likely to be a futile effort and will more than likely do more harm than good given the way the OP appears to be seeding his tank.

If after a month or so of the cycle being 'complete', that algae is either still spreading or hasn't receded, then I would look in to doing something about it. In that case I would first try manually removing as much of it as possible to see if it was just a hold-over from the cycling process, and if it continued to grow back at a rate that I found unacceptable, I'd look at a combined approach of appropriate herbivores and nutrient reduction strategies. But not during or immediately following the cycle in a tank with mixed live and dead rock like that

+1

This is just part of the process. Leave it be for now.

[brotherd]

If this were any other condition than a cycling tank, I would agree with you. Unwanted algae growth should be dealt with in a mature system, and there's a myriad of tools available to do that. But the first step in dealing with an algae problem is figuring out why it's happening and addressing that. In a tank that hasn't even finished it's nitrite peak, the cause of the algae is clear - it's the tank cycling process. Scrubbing it now is likely to be a futile effort and will more than likely do more harm than good given the way the OP appears to be seeding his tank.

If after a month or so of the cycle being 'complete', that algae is either still spreading or hasn't receded, then I would look in to doing something about it. In that case I would first try manually removing as much of it as possible to see if it was just a hold-over from the cycling process, and if it continued to grow back at a rate that I found unacceptable, I'd look at a combined approach of appropriate herbivores and nutrient reduction strategies. But not during or immediately following the cycle in a tank with mixed live and dead rock like that
Fair enough.I'll leave it alone and monitor it.Thanks for all the replies. The live rock was indeed purchased to seed the marco.There is about 40 lbs of live and about 160 of marco.Quite the rainbow of colors starting to appear on the marco these days.

[asylumdown]

yah that's how i did mine too. 200 pounds of marco rock and 66 pounds of live-rock.

There was an insane outbreak of algae - started on the live-rock, then spread pretty rapidly to the marco rock. It was like watching a forest successional sequence at cheetah speed. The marco rocks got dominated by one species, then as the number of species on the rocks increased and coraline algaes moved in, it went from "AAAAAH OUTBREAK!!!" to something that looked more normal. That took about three months.

If you've got good nutrient management systems in place, this will pass. If it doesn't pass, you can start looking at why and then decide what to do about it. Human muscle power is probably the least efficient and most frustrating way to deal with algae. Your tank is going to go through a lot of changes in it's first year. My tank turned 1 a couple of weeks ago, and you wouldn't even know it was the same box of water from when it cycled.

[brotherd]

yah that's how i did mine too. 200 pounds of marco rock and 66 pounds of live-rock.

There was an insane outbreak of algae - started on the live-rock, then spread pretty rapidly to the marco rock. It was like watching a forest successional sequence at cheetah speed. The marco rocks got dominated by one species, then as the number of species on the rocks increased and coraline algaes moved in, it went from "AAAAAH OUTBREAK!!!" to something that looked more normal. That took about three months.

If you've got good nutrient management systems in place, this will pass. If it doesn't pass, you can start looking at why and then decide what to do about it. Human muscle power is probably the least efficient and most frustrating way to deal with algae. Your tank is going to go through a lot of changes in it's first year. My tank turned 1 a couple of weeks ago, and you wouldn't even know it was the same box of water from when it cycled.
Ripping through your amazing build thread and my tank is approximately at page 16:)