red algae on glass

[kona]

Red algae grows on my glass and it becomes very apparent about every 2 weeks. It is maroon in color, flat against the glass, and spotted/scattered. (I attached a really bad picture of it - in the picture, its hard to tell the difference between the algae and the coraline on the back of the tank and on the rocks).
I have 2 questions about this algae, the second being of more importance:
1) What causes such outbreaks? Is this what coraline algae looks like at its beginning stages?
2) When I scrape this stuff off, with a razor blade, is it harmful to the tank and the inhabitants? Large, wavy, flakes of this stuff come off - and tons of it circulates the tank, sticking all over the place. After 15 mintues, its either all filtered up or dissolved or something.

 

[rpick]

i'm new to this but from what i read, it sounds like coraline.

 

[schadiest1]

it all looks like coralline algae to me..... how is the texture of it? Is it a hard algae? The only other thing would be red slime algae i would thing, but that grows in the sand bed and is soft.

 

[kona]

Here is a picture of the hard coraline algae in the back:

 

[kona]

Here is a picture of the algae on the front, that is similar in color, but is flat and smooth against the glass, and when scraped, is not slimy like liquid, but very maleable and.....well, like.....pieces of shredded sandwich bags floating in the water:

 

[schadiest1]

what type of substrate do you have? is any of that growing in your substrate?

 

[kona]

I have crushed coral substrate - the type where each piece is of equal size. And yes, it appears that it grows on the substrate, but at a much lesser degree. And the color of the algae on the substrate is browner.

 

[kona]

Strange. When I search for posts using the "search" function, I cannot view any of the attached pictures to any of the posts. Is this because of the change to the new system?

 

[schadiest1]

i would say it's red slime algae aka Cyanobacteria. does it grow on your rocks also?

 

[schadiest1]

yeah these changes are frustrating....it'll probably be a lil' while before they get everything working right again.

 

[italianwjt]

Originally Posted by kona
Strange. When I search for posts using the "search" function, I cannot view any of the attached pictures to any of the posts. Is this because of the change to the new system?
how long have u had your tank up and running? whens the last time you did a water change? what are the parameters?

 

[who dey]

that's a hellofalot of coraline!!! :jumping: it's desirable but i wouldn't want that much

 

[kona]

The algae on the front glass only really appears to be on the front and side glass - not on the rocks and not really on the substrate.
This stuff begins to appear about 1.5 weeks after a water change in my 10 gallon.
As far as water parameters, I really couldn't say for sure. I actually had a quesiton about that. I bought myself a Red Sea test kit, which has various testers in it. What I don't understand is, how in the world is this thing accurate? You base the parameter by matching it up to a color chart, which has like 3 blocks of color - how is that accurate?
Needless to say, I tried it once, found that there was no way to distinguish the actual paramters, and haven't used it again. Anyone know of a very accurate testing kit?

 

[who dey]

salifert, swf.com

 

[swman]

To help control that start using some ro water.