Still have hair Algae

petem

petem

Member
It's almost been 3 weeks with my uv sterilizer on, and I still have hair algae. I was told that it would have turned brown by now. I have cut down on the amount that my lights stay on. I have dual 96watt daylights and dual actinics. 10,000k and 6500k on the daylights. I also dont have any fish they eat the algae. All I have is a maroon yellow stripe clown, a dwarf angel and a snowflake eel. Also many crabs, and a few snails.. It's gotten to the point where the LR looks like Chia pets. I dont know what else to do. It's a 72g tank, skimmer (sucks) I'm in the market for a new one, two rena filstar cannister filters, turbo twist uv light (9w),
I dont overfeed, I use RO/DI water....
 
reefreak29

reefreak29

Active Member
i wrote this up a while ago this is what i did to get rid of hsair algea
GREEN HAIR ALGEA: who hasnt experienced this.this algea loves bright light and astablished reef tanks. Green hair algea consumes excess nutrients faster then any other algea.Below are measures and steps of riding this FOREVER
1.-make sure u have a protien skimmer and its suitible for your size tank, for proper working conditions make sure u clean out skimmer cup every other day to have 100 percent working capability also make sure your pump stays clean for maximum flow
2. decrease lighting just like with the cyono cut your light in half
3. perform regular water changes again i like 10 percent weekly, when doing a water change suck out as much algea as possible, use only di water or rodi.
never use tap , tap water has high nitrates, phosphates and nitrites.
4.phisicly remove the algea by riping it of the rock,keep a cup of di water next to u to rinse your fingers each time u put your hands back in the tank to insure all spores are off and your not reintroducing the algea to your water,after about 20 hrs of manually removing the algea your inverts aka cleanup crew should keep it under control.
in colclusion please do regular water changes, feed small amounts every other day, only use rodi or di water and dont keep your lights on for more then 10 hrs a day. everyone experiences algea blooms in there tank i hope this help in managing the problem algeas
 
susiestank

susiestank

Member
Cut back on feeding
Make sure there isn't sunlight thats directly on it from windows
Also what seemed to help me a lot was cleaning powerheads every other week.I take them out and take them apart - like completely and clean the inside with pipe cleaner, propeller , grates , etc. It takes me about 15 minutes for 4 and its well worth it.
Those are things that helped me
 
azfishgal

azfishgal

Active Member
What kind of crabs do you have? I had some hair algea and got three emerald crabs. I loved your description, chia pet. I had one rock that looked just like that, but one week after adding the emerald crab is was completely clean! They'll even take care of bubble algea.
I LOVE my emerald crabs.
 
cjml

cjml

Member
We had algea problems and religiously started doing weekly water changes and got it under control-phosphates were high - but its gone now! :happyfish :happyfish
 
ice4ice

ice4ice

Active Member
Get a sea hare. They'll mow through your hair algae in no time. Once that's taken care of, trade him off to your LFS (or other people here) because they'll starve and die when no food is present to them to feed on.
 
socal57che

socal57che

Active Member
Originally Posted by Ice4Ice
Get a sea hare. They'll mow through your hair algae in no time. Once that's taken care of, trade him off to your LFS (or other people here) because they'll starve and die when no food is present to them to feed on.
That doesn't really address the condition that caused the bloom.
Proteins, phosphates and incorrect light spectrum are the three things that green hair likes.
Overfeeding and underskimming are probably the most common mistakes.
Follow reefreak29's plan and you should see a decline...remember that your phosphates may still test low because they are being consumed by the hair...one more reason to remove it physically.
 
petem

petem

Member
To answer the crab question: I have many hermit crabs. I guess they dont like the algae as much as detritus on the bottom. My lights are on for about 6 hours. I had another thought, what if I turned off the daylights and left the actinics on only, would that help? If I do that, how would my "spaghetti leather" react to a lower intensity?
As I mentioned in the first post, my skimmer is the basic prizm skimmer. I'm constantly resetting it. I"m in the market for a new one...it needs to be a hang on model. I was looking at the turboflotor 1000 multi.
For my tank size, how many Emerald crabs should I get?
And finally....What's a sea hare????
 
petem

petem

Member
Susies Tank- I'm just curious as to what cleaning the powerheads would do? would it eliminate any spores from shooting around? I only have two both maxi jets..1200 and a 900.
 
C

cmaxwell39

Guest
I would look at replacing your 6500k daylight bulb with a higher spectrum bulb. 6500k is the spectrum that a lot of people use on their fuge for the purpose of growing macros so that I would think would feed the algae even more.
 
susiestank

susiestank

Member
Originally Posted by PeteM
Susies Tank- I'm just curious as to what cleaning the powerheads would do? would it eliminate any spores from shooting around? I only have two both maxi jets..1200 and a 900.
You'd be surprised to know whats in there. Sometimes you find food etc in there. So I clean them so that way the water isnt going through a dirty power head.
 
salt_water

salt_water

Member
The best thing I did for hair algae was get a Sea Hare. It is a snail/slug which has an inner, not outer, shell. I paided maybe $15 for this guy and he took care of all the bad algae in just two days. $15 isnt bad if you think about what chemical additives(which I dont use) would cost to remove this algae and possible kill things you wish to keep. These Sea Hares can release toxins into the water if they are caught in a powerhead or get stressed/frightend. Its a defensive measure, but as long as you keep an eye on them, its no biggie, carbon will remove the toxins. I took him out after the two days, since there was no more hair algae left and he would soon starve. I took him back to the LFS once I didnt need him any longer. Worth every penny IMO. I know someone is goning to say not to use these. FME they work very well. I took a few pictures of him in the short time I had him.

 
petem

petem

Member
Nasty looking things aren't they? Well if that worked. Great. I tested all of my parameters on Saturday and noticed that I did have higher than normal PO4. Surprise, Surprise. I did a 20% water change with RO/DI. I tried sucking up a lot of the algae. I also reduced my daylights to 4 hours while the actinics are on from 7am til 6pm. I also bought an Atlantic Blue Tang. Quite interesting thing. I'm hoping to get a few emerald (mithrax) crabs tomorrow or wednesday...Oh, yeah, and watch the overfeeding.
 
azfishgal

azfishgal

Active Member
Originally Posted by PeteM
Nasty looking things aren't they? Well if that worked. Great. I tested all of my parameters on Saturday and noticed that I did have higher than normal PO4. Surprise, Surprise. I did a 20% water change with RO/DI. I tried sucking up a lot of the algae. I also reduced my daylights to 4 hours while the actinics are on from 7am til 6pm. I also bought an Atlantic Blue Tang. Quite interesting thing. I'm hoping to get a few emerald (mithrax) crabs tomorrow or wednesday...Oh, yeah, and watch the overfeeding.
You might get some comments about the tang. It's recommended to give them 6' of swimming room, so that's a 125 gallon tank (which is why I got that big of a tank, I want my Hippo Tang
). Anyway, back to the Emerald Crabs, I think you could get three and see a big difference in your tank in just a few days. They are a lot of fun to watch. Also, changing your skimmer is going to help and of course getting your PO4 down.
Good luck, and I'm sure after you make those changes you will see a huge improvement. Be sure to take a "before" picture, so we can see the improvement. Those are always fun to look at.
 
baloo6969

baloo6969

Member
Dude, ICE is right, get a sea hare...there ugly as sin (they poop everywhere make sure you have crabs to keep up on it..it's funny to watch them do it too LOL!) 1 hare / 50gallons = in 3 nites cleaned up nice. They eat the most at night i found. Water changes and try reducing lighting too.
 
jasony

jasony

Member
my tank is starting to get a layer of green algae on top of my crushed coral.. its getting out of control (almost a green carpet)
tank is 150 gallon and i have 10 hermit crabs
do i simply add more and more crabs/snails/cleaner crew creatures or do i turn off my lights for longer durations?
the tank has 4 damsels in it now..
 
cowfishrule

cowfishrule

Active Member
pete,
the uv will do nothing for your hair algae.
you have to find the source and eliminate it.
this is what i did to beat my nasty case:
1- cut down your lighting- i went from 12 hours to 5.
2- cut back your feeding- i was feeding only 1x per week.
3- get some mexican turbos.
it might not be a bad idea to give a thorough cleaning to your p/h and/or filters the same day you do this (if you choose to)
it took 6 weeks, but every last bit of hair algae is gone.
i now feed 4x a week, and my lights are on for 9 hours a day with no problems.
i dont know how i feel about pulling out the large clumps. i didnt do it with mine- the mexicans took care of it.
 
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