Valonia deflated

[Seriak]

I had a large bubble algae in my tank for a few months. I just left it alone and recently noticed that it was completely deflated. Am I screwed? Did it just release spores into my tank or can it deflate for other reasons. Nothing has collided with it to pierce it that I know of.

[asylumdown]

just part of their natural life cycle, but yes, once they die (aka, deflate) they do release their reproductive spores. I'd hazard a guess that you were screwed anyway, since if you've got one one, there's almost a guarantee that you've got more.

Valonia has been my nemesis for nearly a year now. I introduced them by accident on a frag of frogspawn and they waffle between completely taking over my tank, and simply hanging out in the background. The number of times I've had to re-affix corals because valonia has grown between epoxy and the rock, or grown between to rocks and shifted the rock work, or simply shattered rock that a coral was on....

They seem to be able to grow off nothing more than the power of my hate for them. They grow in near blackness, directly under my lights, when there's so little nutrients in my water that my corals stop growing, or when I've ignored my tank and let things get dirty. The only plus is that some of my faster growing montiporas will actually grow right over top of them creating interest shapes in the coral.

Anyway, once you've got them they're very difficult to remove completely.