Help!! Red bubble algae outta control!

xokarmaxo

xokarmaxo

Member
I posted over a month ago about having red bubble algae in my tank over one of my rocks. I posted these pics:


I did what some suggested... I removed the rock from my tank, had 2 batches of my tank water in buckets... one to scrape and remove the bubble algae from and one to rinse the rock off before it went back in my tank. It came off fine using a scrub brush and I was able to pluck the bubbles off with a surgical tweezer.
After 2 days, the bubble algae was back. Now, 3 weeks later, it is back worse than ever! It is all over that one rock, plus my middle rock, the front and back side of it. The guy at my LFS who maintains our office 225 gallon tank told me to just leave it alone. He told me that the more I try to remove it, the more it will come back. I even suggested totally removing those rocks and getting new ones and he told me that it would return and cover those rocks as well. What in the world?? He told me that the ONLY way that I would be rid of it would be to totally break down my tank and start over with new everything. But then again... it wouldn't guarantee that it wouldn't come back. :mad:
What do I do?? I heard that emerald crabs may eat the green bubble algae... but this is red. I don't want to get one of those and it end up not eating the red bubble algae and the possibility of it killing my blenny. I have 2 astrea snails that look like they MAY be interested in it, but hasn't done enough to convince me.
Has anyone else ever dealt with this? This bad?? Help? :help:
In case anyone asks....
Temp: 80.9
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 0
PH: 8.2
Calcium: 450
Phosphates: 0
Salinity: 0.125
Thanking you in advance for your help. I am extremely frustrated by this!
Is it harmful if I just "leave it alone"?
ETA: 4/14/07: Took these pics today of how bad it's gotten:
On two rocks...

The middle rock...

The back/side of the rocks

Full tank shot...
 
darthgoby

darthgoby

Member
I've been dealing with bubble algae for the past two months and there is a lot of improvement lately in my tank. I tried a bunch of things and here is what seemed to make the difference:
1.) Going from weekly to bi-weekly water to weekly water changes seems to help a lot.
2.) Cut down on feeding to every other day seems to help a little. I also cut down on the frozen food which I think was causing a lot of problems.
3.) Increasing water flows with small powerheads seemed to help a lot. I got 2 of the small rio powerheads and 1 maxijet and I was able to arrange them to cover most of the tank. That really cleaned up my sand a huge amount.
4.) I also installed a small refugium on the back. I don't have any algae for it yet so I don't know if that helped or not.
5.) I got some phosphate reducing chemicals (Phosphate sponge) and ran it for a day in my canister filter.
6.) I cut back on the lights from 13 or 14 hours a day to 8.
To start with, I would check your water flow and add some powerheads as necessary. The red slime can't grow in an area with a lot of water flow.
Also, a lot of people get red slime and I've never heard of anybody tearing their tank down to get rid of it.
I did get 4 emerald crabs who are completely uninterested in the algae. There is little evidence that any crabs or snails eat the stuff. They may in fact make it worse.
 
xokarmaxo

xokarmaxo

Member
I don't have the red slime algae.... just the red bubble algae. Hard, solid bubbles on the rock only.
I have my lights on a timer here at work... simulating the sunrise/sunset thing, with my actinics coming on at 7am, going off at 6pm, and my others coming on at 8am, going off at 5pm, and then the moonlights come on.
I am thinking that I need to get a small maxijet (I have a 14 gallon Biocube) anyway to increase my flow and surface agitation. Maybe that will help, but I'm told that it won't stop it.

This is the only algae that I have a problem with.
 
darthgoby

darthgoby

Member
The red bubble algae is the same as the red slime algae. It started in my tank as bubbles on a single rock, then bubbles on 3 rocks and then exploded all over the tank. Be grateful you have only the bubbles now. Here is what I would do.
1. I would get a really small powerhead and see if you could increase the water flow in the tank. That might take care of it by itself.
2. I would look at what you are feeding the fish. I was told that in many cases one of the main contributors is phosphorus which can come from some frozen or flake foods. Can you reduce your feeding schedule?
3. Can you increase your water changes? You might be able to cut down on some nutrients in the water as well.
4. I would think about cutting down the lighting hours a bit. Maybe from 10 AM to 5 PM. That might help as well.
A lot of people get this type of algae and there are any number of things you could do. You can also go the chemical route, which I have not done.
 
xokarmaxo

xokarmaxo

Member
Originally Posted by Darthgoby
The red bubble algae is the same as the red slime algae. It started in my tank as bubbles on a single rock, then bubbles on 3 rocks and then exploded all over the tank. Be grateful you have only the bubbles now. Here is what I would do.
1. I would get a really small powerhead and see if you could increase the water flow in the tank. That might take care of it by itself.
2. I would look at what you are feeding the fish. I was told that in many cases one of the main contributors is phosphorus which can come from some frozen or flake foods. Can you reduce your feeding schedule?
3. Can you increase your water changes? You might be able to cut down on some nutrients in the water as well.
4. I would think about cutting down the lighting hours a bit. Maybe from 10 AM to 5 PM. That might help as well.
A lot of people get this type of algae and there are any number of things you could do. You can also go the chemical route, which I have not done.
Thanks so much for the help/information.

I will see about getting a maxijet this week to increase my water flow. I've always felt that the stock one doesn't seem to give out enough.
Right now, I am doing my water changes every other Saturday. I'll start weekly water changes and see if it will help.
I am feeding my fish twice a day. They eat frozen brine, mysis, emerald entree, and marine cuisine soaked in zooplex. (Not all of those at once... I mix it up from day to day) So should I feed just once a day, and try that?
I can definately cut the time down on my lights and see if that will help also.
In fact, I will do ANYTHING that I have to do to help stop this red bubble algae! I'll take updated pics tomorrow and share what it looks like now.
I definately don't want to chemically treat it in my tank because I have inverts and corals along with my fish, and I don't want to risk killing any of them.
 
joyfnp

joyfnp

Member
The slime may kill your corals by blocking light. I went the chemical route, using Chemi Clean. how I've traded red slime for green hair and now have Turbo snails. They are the best!! Do you use RO water? The RO water and phos-sorb is the answer, along with good clean up crew.
 
tx reef

tx reef

Active Member
Originally Posted by Darthgoby
I've been dealing with bubble algae for the past two months and there is a lot of improvement lately in my tank. I tried a bunch of things and here is what seemed to make the difference:
1.) Going from weekly to bi-weekly water to weekly water changes seems to help a lot.
2.) Cut down on feeding to every other day seems to help a little. I also cut down on the frozen food which I think was causing a lot of problems.
3.) Increasing water flows with small powerheads seemed to help a lot. I got 2 of the small rio powerheads and 1 maxijet and I was able to arrange them to cover most of the tank. That really cleaned up my sand a huge amount.
4.) I also installed a small refugium on the back. I don't have any algae for it yet so I don't know if that helped or not.
5.) I got some phosphate reducing chemicals (Phosphate sponge) and ran it for a day in my canister filter.
6.) I cut back on the lights from 13 or 14 hours a day to 8.
To start with, I would check your water flow and add some powerheads as necessary. The red slime can't grow in an area with a lot of water flow.
Also, a lot of people get red slime and I've never heard of anybody tearing their tank down to get rid of it.
I did get 4 emerald crabs who are completely uninterested in the algae. There is little evidence that any crabs or snails eat the stuff. They may in fact make it worse.
This has nothing to do with red slime or excess nutrients. Research before you answer.
 
tx reef

tx reef

Active Member
Originally Posted by joyfnp
The slime may kill your corals by blocking light. I went the chemical route, using Chemi Clean. how I've traded red slime for green hair and now have Turbo snails. They are the best!! Do you use RO water? The RO water and phos-sorb is the answer, along with good clean up crew.

It is not red slime........
 
tx reef

tx reef

Active Member
Originally Posted by Darthgoby
The red bubble algae is the same as the red slime algae. It started in my tank as bubbles on a single rock, then bubbles on 3 rocks and then exploded all over the tank. Be grateful you have only the bubbles now. Here is what I would do.
1. I would get a really small powerhead and see if you could increase the water flow in the tank. That might take care of it by itself.
2. I would look at what you are feeding the fish. I was told that in many cases one of the main contributors is phosphorus which can come from some frozen or flake foods. Can you reduce your feeding schedule?
3. Can you increase your water changes? You might be able to cut down on some nutrients in the water as well.
4. I would think about cutting down the lighting hours a bit. Maybe from 10 AM to 5 PM. That might help as well.
A lot of people get this type of algae and there are any number of things you could do. You can also go the chemical route, which I have not done.

This will not help at all.....
 
xokarmaxo

xokarmaxo

Member
I didn't think that it had anything to do with red slime either. These are little red/burgundy colored hard, round bubbles.
 
tx reef

tx reef

Active Member
Sorry for the above posts but I am tired of people posting misinformation. If you don't know what you are talking about, don't post.
This will end up causing the original poster to do un-needed work and spend money on crap he/she doesn't need.
I have this exact same crap in my 55 SPS reef. I am setting up an entire new tank because of it. The only way to permantly get rid of this stuff is to tear the entire tank down and get new live rock and sand and clean the heck out of every piece of equipment in that tank as well as the tank with bleach and water and start over or start a new tank. Your tank is really to small for this, but the only..and I mean ONLY way to keep it under control is to keep a foxface in the tank. A foxface would have that stuff taken care of in about 2 days. If you get rid of the foxface, it will come back worse than before.
Since your tank is small, your only option besides tearing it down is to buy a small foxface and trade it in for another small one when it gets too large.
The red bubble algae will eventually begin to take over corals (it started choking out some of my SPS corals that cost $150+) so yu need to take action
 
xokarmaxo

xokarmaxo

Member
Originally Posted by TX Reef
I have this exact same crap in my 55 SPS reef. I am setting up an entire new tank because of it. The only way to permantly get rid of this stuff is to tear the entire tank down and get new live rock and sand and clean the heck out of every piece of equipment in that tank as well as the tank with bleach and water and start over or start a new tank. Your tank is really to small for this, but the only..and I mean ONLY way to keep it under control is to keep a foxface in the tank. A foxface would have that stuff taken care of in about 2 days. If you get rid of the foxface, it will come back worse than before.
Since your tank is small, your only option besides tearing it down is to buy a small foxface and trade it in for another small one when it gets too large.
The red bubble algae will eventually begin to take over corals (it started choking out some of my SPS corals that cost $150+) so yu need to take action
Oh wow... this is what I was afraid of. We do have 3 foxfaces in our 225 gallon tank in the lobby here at work, but all 3 of them are too big for any one of them to go into my tank. I guess my only real option is to tear my tank down and start back over with new rock, new sand, water, everything. This seems easier for me to have to do in the long run instead of having to keep trading in a foxface, because I couldn't add one to the tank because I already have a percula, sixline and midas blenny that I am attached to.
So how in the world do I do this?? My tank is only 14 gallons. Do I just siphon out all of the water and dump out all of the sand, etc... I don't have an extra tank to temporarily place my tank inhabitants and corals in while I do this. Then I would have to cycle all over again.... Ugh!
Will the corals be okay to put back in?
What causes the red bubble algae? How do I make sure that it doesn't come back again if I were to start over again?
And thank you SO much for your help and looking out for me.
 
tx reef

tx reef

Active Member
I inspect every rock I buy very closely now for red bubbles. I got a rock with a little on it because I thought it looked cool.....

If you got this rock from your LFS, then I would buy it somewhere else next time.
You could get a rubbermaid container (wal mart for about $10). Transfer everything to that and keep a powerhead in it and lights of some sort over it.
You said you had corals...could your LFS hold them for about a month?
Find a store that has cured live rock and that way your cycle will be short.
 
xokarmaxo

xokarmaxo

Member
Originally Posted by TX Reef
I inspect every rock I buy very closely now for red bubbles. I got a rock with a little on it because I thought it looked cool.....

If you got this rock from your LFS, then I would buy it somewhere else next time.
You could get a rubbermaid container (wal mart for about $10). Transfer everything to that and keep a powerhead in it and lights of some sort over it.
You said you had corals...could your LFS hold them for about a month?
Find a store that has cured live rock and that way your cycle will be short.
Ugh! Looks like I have my work cut out for me next weekend. I have my tank at work and it would be impossible for me to do it during the week and my LFS is closed until Tuesday, so I will have to wait until next Saturday to start this over.
Oh, you bet I will be looking at every new rock for red bubbles! But you know, my rock never even showed anything until 2 months ago.
So how will I know?
I am sure that my LFS can hold my corals for me for a month, but what do I do with my other livestock? (Fish, inverts) I wouldn't want to put them in my tank again and have them go through the cycle and I don't have another tank to put them in and I wouldn't let the LFS keep them there for me because I know that something would probably happen to them there.

Have I mentioned that I REALLY hate this red bubble algae????

Do you know what causes it?
 
aztec reef

aztec reef

Active Member
If it was me i would take out all the live rock ,Kill it (boile it or bleach it or however you wanna kill it). then put it back in the tank, it will be pretty much base rock but it will become live again..That's what i would do..
 
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