Bad Hair Algae

[Myka]

Originally Posted by likwid

I do not add any additives to my tank. I do a 15% waterchange every week using instant ocean salt and RO water. Feed hikari mysis shrimp twice a week, presoaked in water. PH: 7.8, ammonia: 0, nitrite: 0, nitrate: 10, phosphate: 0, Salinity: 0.023, temperature: 78 degrees. Photo period is 7 hours actinic, 5.5 hours actinic+daylights. Bulbs are each 36w coralifes, changed in october.

What brand test kits are you using?

Do you not test for Calcium, alkalinity, and magnesium? These are very important for the health of your corals, and is used by them on a daily basis. Calcium and Alkalinity usually have the be supplemented. Hair algae LOVES low Calcium, Alkalinity, and magnesium. Considering you are using IO salt, and not supplementing, then it is very possible that your Cal/Alk levels are low. Calcium should be 400-425 ppm, and Alkalinity should be 8-10 dkh (err on the high side). Magnesium should be 1350-1400 ppm. Your low pH leads me to believe that your Alk may be low as well (see below).

When you do waterchanges do you siphon off as much detritus from the rocks and sandbed as possible? This can definately help lower the waste in the tank. Hair algae traps detritus in it (which is how it helps itself to grow), and using a turkey baster daily to blow any detritus out of the hair algae may help as well.

When you say you "presoak" your food, do you pour the water off, or do you just soak it in water and dump the whole thing in the tank? I would suggest you feed your fish at least once every second day. Twice a week is pretty tough on a digestive system (smaller fish) that is designed to constantly be eating.

How often do you clean your skimmer? How much skimmate do you get in the cup each week?

That's all I see provided the information you gave.

Originally Posted by midgetwaiter

Alkalinity also plays a part in this. You said your pH is 7.8 which seems low for a tank with a skimmer. Do you test for this? Try and keep it at the high end of the safe range (200ppm / 7dkh / 4meg/l) hair algae hates that.

This is exactly what I was thinking. Low pH is often related (although not necessarily directly) to your Alkalinity level, so your low pH makes me suspect low Alkalinity. 7 dkh is not the high end - that is in fact the low end. Alk should be 6-12 dkh, with 8-10 dkh considered "normal". I keep my Alk as close to 10 dkh as I can. Many people who run ZEOvit keep their Alk in the 12-14 dkh range.

[BC564]

I am using Calgary tap water for my aquariums and here is the water parameters. I have had one bout with hair algae. It seems odd to have a battle with this for so long esp. using RO water. There must be something in your source water...

http://www.calgary.ca/portal/server....Parameters.htm

[likwid]

Originally Posted by Myka

What brand test kits are you using?

Do you not test for Calcium and Alkalinity? These are very important for the health of your corals, and is used by them on a daily basis. Calcium and Alkalinity usually have the be supplemented. Hair algae LOVES low Calcium and low Alkalinity. Considering you are using IO salt, and not supplementing, then it is very possible that your Cal/Alk levels are low. Calcium should be 400-425 ppm, and Alkalinity should be 8-10 dkh (err on the high side). Your low pH leads me to believe that your Alk may be low as well (see below).

When you do waterchanges do you siphon off as much detritus from the rocks and sandbed as possible? This can definately help lower the waste in the tank. Hair algae traps detritus in it (which is how it helps itself to grow), and using a turkey baster daily to blow any detritus out of the hair algae may help as well.

When you say you "presoak" your food, do you pour the water off, or do you just soak it in water and dump the whole thing in the tank? I would suggest you feed your fish at least once every second day. Twice a week is pretty tough on a digestive system (smaller fish) that is designed to constantly be eating.

How often do you clean your skimmer? How much skimmate do you get in the cup each week?

That's all I see provided the information you gave.



This is exactly what I was thinking. Low pH is often related (although not necessarily directly) to your Alkalinity level, so your low pH makes me suspect low Alkalinity. 7 dkh is not the high end - that is in fact the low end. Alk should be 6-12 dkh, with 8-10 dkh considered "normal". I keep my Alk as close to 10 dkh as I can. Many people who run ZEOvit keep their Alk in the 12-14 dkh range.

I believe the kits I am using are salifert. I am not testing for Calcium and Alk right now, I will have to run out and grab those kits. I'll grab some calc/alk additives as well and make sure those are in the correct range.

I do siphon everytime I do a waterchange, and baste the hair a few times daily into my skimmer.

When I presoak my food, I just pinch the frozen mysis in my fingers and run tap water through it to melt it and rinse away gunk from it.

I clean my skimmer every couple weeks, and only get around 1/8 of a cup a week. Seems really low to me.

I did a waterchange last night and ripped out as much hair algae as I could, and when I hooked my skimmer back up it was going crazy. The collection cup would overflow with bubbles in like 30 seconds. I turned it off and tried again this morning and it is still going nuts. Any ideas why it would be doing this?

[likwid]

bump

[Slick Fork]

Clean your skimmer weekly. Make sure you get the neck clean, I find mine skims best about a day or so after a good scrubbing. Being that prolific, I'm thinking your algae may be a bryopsis strain rather than straight hair algae. Could we get some close up shots?

I'll second the boiling RO water suggestion. Just do a small bit at a time.

[BC564]

can you add pump your ro water from one container to another ...and put a UV sterilizer in the flow?

[likwid]

Originally Posted by Slick Fork

Clean your skimmer weekly. Make sure you get the neck clean, I find mine skims best about a day or so after a good scrubbing. Being that prolific, I'm thinking your algae may be a bryopsis strain rather than straight hair algae. Could we get some close up shots?

I'll second the boiling RO water suggestion. Just do a small bit at a time.

Ya it definately looks like hair algae, but has the bulletproof characteristics of bryopsis. I can try to get some close ups, but my camera really sucks.

What do you mean by boiling RO water a small bit at a time?

[Reefer Rob]

The key to basting with boiling water is to get the end of the baster right next to the rock, and squeeze the baster very slowly while doing small circular motions. If it's done right nothing can live through it. Sometimes I push a short piece of 1/2" tubing over the end of the baster to cover a larger area with a slower flow.

[Slick Fork]

I meant baste a small patch of algae at a time. If you try to nuke it all at once you'll run the risk of a mini cycle as I'm willing to bet that at this point the algae is absorbing large amounts of the ammonia produced by the critters.

[Myka]

Originally Posted by likwid

I believe the kits I am using are salifert. I am not testing for Calcium and Alk right now, I will have to run out and grab those kits. I'll grab some calc/alk additives as well and make sure those are in the correct range.

I do siphon everytime I do a waterchange, and baste the hair a few times daily into my skimmer.

When I presoak my food, I just pinch the frozen mysis in my fingers and run tap water through it to melt it and rinse away gunk from it.

I clean my skimmer every couple weeks, and only get around 1/8 of a cup a week. Seems really low to me.

I did a waterchange last night and ripped out as much hair algae as I could, and when I hooked my skimmer back up it was going crazy. The collection cup would overflow with bubbles in like 30 seconds. I turned it off and tried again this morning and it is still going nuts. Any ideas why it would be doing this?

Awesome! I am interested to hear what your Cal/Alk readings are. Kent Liquid Calcium is very good and easy to use. It is expensive when used on large tanks, but your tank shouldn't go through much, I use it on my 33, and it's cheap. I use SeaChem Reef buffer (not the pH one!!!) for Alk...it's a good product as well. Don't buy any products that directly alter your pH. Even though yours is low the last thing you want is a swinging pH level, and that's exactly what you'll get with pH altering additives.

That is low production of skimmate. You have a Remora Nano right? Does it have an adjustment screw like the regular Remoras and the Remora Pros? If so, play around with it (turned off!! lol it sucks when it's on and you accidentally unscrew it all the way). I find the more I screw mine in the more skimmate it produces. So I have mine screwed in all the way, and then the skimmer cup propped up as high as I can get it. I seem to get the best skimmate this way.

Not sure why it would be going crazy since what you said you did doesn't correlate to it freaking out.