Algae farm... anybody want some?

I believe the green leather-like one I mentioned is codium arabica or halimeda discoidea. I may actually have both of these.... :/ But the vine still perplexes me. It looks like bright green, plastic, crinkly easter grass.

 

does it look like this? If so there is some options for remove in that thread as well. As for the other algae, do you test the water you are getting from the LFS for nitrates and Phosphates? What i have found to that really helps with any kind of algae is do a 10% WC every other day for a few weeks I know its alot of work, but I worked for me when i had GHA and Bryopsis.

http://www.3reef.com/forums/algae/vine-like-algae-73545-3.html

 

what do you mean by you run carbon?

I have a 29g tank and i battle with red bubble algae, i've noticed tiny tiny red spots appearing on top of the rock closest to the light, i have some GHA on one side of my tank that gets most of my indoor lighting, i'm assuming my apartments PC's contribute to that, and red bubble algae which i don't really mess with because its never been that bad and it looks cool along the purple coralline algae.

very interested to learn how you've dealt and handled all these algae probs

 

Thr RO/DI water could be bad at the LFS where you buy it from. I would have that checked out if possible. If you dont have any corals I would do a total blackout. If you have corals I would do it for about 4 - 7 days depending on the type of corals you have.

 

Your phosphate sitting at 0.25 is most likely the problem, especially since you stated you are only running carbon. Couple of things:

- Deal with the nutrient source... feeding. Given your stocking list, I dont see a reason to feed twice a day. Maybe scale back to feed lightly once/day. You could also up your waterchanges to 20% weekly until the problem is resolved.

- Get rid of the phosphate. Run some GFO. If you dont want to invest in a reactor, some GFO in a filter sock stuffed in your HOB filter will work fine. Change it out once a week until you see postive results concerning the algae. Given that this is a small tank, GFO shouldnt be that expensive to change out weekly.

- Remove the algae manually as often as you can. This will inhibit growth, and directly remove nutrients from your tank. If you let the algae simply die off, it will release the nutrients back into your tank.

I also agree that you should check your RODI from the LPS. Alot of places dont replace their filters as often as they should, and might be selling you "bad" water.

I'm sure you might know by now, bryopsis is best dealt with by dosing M-Tech and raising mag to 1500-1600. Bubble algea by manual removal without popping the bubbles. And caulerpa by removing the rock/coral immediately... dont let it spread!

Good luck!

 

No, it has no leaves. I'm going to try to get a picture of it here in a few. I have one on my phone but it's new and I can't figure out how to get the pic off the darn thing.

 

So far, lots of water changes and hand picking. Just got done with a 20% WC. I've yet to scrub my rocks and I think that'll be the next thing I try. Maybe sometime in the next couple of days, don't wanna shock the fishies too much. I'm going to post some pictures sometime tomorrow, maybe I'll keep this thread going with progress shots or something to try and help people out later. I've got a pretty gnarly problem here and I think it'd be awesome to be able to look back on how things went. Plus, it'll give me another reason to keep this tank going especially on the frustrating days.