Turf algae?

Z

zandriab

Guest
I have a tank that is going great right now, but my brother is not quite as lucky. He ha a 65 gallon with live rock which is covered in a short haired reddish brown algae. (very ugly) It is not red slime or anything like it as it does not blow off. In fact to get it off you have to scub hard for about 5 minutes to get down to the coraline it is covering. As far as I can tell I'm guessing it is a turf algae. We thought some crabs would help as all of his had either died off of been eaten by his wrasse.
:help: That's where the problem comes in. We put about 30 blue legs, 5 zebras, and 2 emeralds in his tank yesterday. Where everyone was active in the bucket during acclimation once they hit the tank they turned completely lethargic in the tank, hardy moving at all. After about 4 hours they all still lay in the same spot they had been dropped. (I added a similar number of crabs to my tank with the exact same acclimation and they are diligently cleaning everything in sight!) We captured all the crabs back into a bucket, used the water from my tank to see if we could save them and in about 10 minutes, they were crawling all around again.
His water quality is 0 nitites, about 30 nitrates, perfect PH, 0 amonia. Are there any other levels that would affect the crabs but not fish (they are fit as a fiddle) that we could check?
So summed up:
1. Why are all the crabs dying?
2. How on earth do you get rid of the turf algae!!!!!
 
guineawhop

guineawhop

Member
i'd do a 25 percent water change. also what kind of filter is he using. then test it out with a crab to see how he does. if he does good then my suggestion is to get some urchins for the algae. they are probably the best at cleaning algae of all the inverts. i got purple urchins, they sell them on this website, and they do too good of a job that when one of my tanks becomes overgrown with algae i take them out of one tank and put them in the other. oh and with ur brothers tank it doesn't sound right at all, i never acclimate my inverts except if they cost a pretty penny and i usually just drop them in and i've never lost any.
 
guineawhop

guineawhop

Member
the only problem i've heard of urchins causing when it comes to corals is they tend to knock over or move them a bit.
 
lizzard

lizzard

Member
His water quality is 0 nitites, about 30 nitrates, perfect PH, 0 amonia. Are there any other levels that would affect the crabs but not fish (they are fit as a fiddle) that we could check?
May want to check the salinity.
 
Z

zandriab

Guest
Thank you for all your input. He is in the process of a big water change (filtered the water, and is now heated) we'll try adding one in when it's done.
The salinity is his tank is at .024 - right where mine is! I have a shimp, 2 anemones, a starfish, one coral, cleaner clam, and crabs galore (otherwise known as about 30 or so, but in a 36 gallon it looks like a lot.) He can't keep any!
As to the copper - he can't remember if he coppered the main tank about 2 years ago or if it was just the hospital tank. The problem with the copper philosophy is that he has had inverts until about 4 months ago. If copper was ever added to the tank it would have been at least 2 years ago. He had a full crab population and a chocolate chip starfish until about 4-5 months ago. When the starfish died, we noticed a greatly diminished or almost extinct crab population. When he bought a new chocolate chip to replace the starfish, he died immediately. The algae also started about this time. At first we thought the algae might have killed them but in retrospect, I think the algae started because the cleaning crew died.
 
guineawhop

guineawhop

Member
Originally Posted by TeresaQ1
I would check the tank for copper. I have heard it affects crabs
good thought, i forgot about that. if it does have copper in the water than there is this stuff that will help dissolve the copper
 
scubadoo

scubadoo

Active Member
Once you identify what is killing the inverts try some mexican turbo snails. About 4-6 will do the job if it is turf algae. Be patient when you get them...they'll eat it up if it is turf. Not sure if the wrasse will leave them alone or not. If it is turf all the scrubbing in the world will only work for a brief periond. JMO
 
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