Hair Algae and light

[Kennetht]

I have a horrible hair algae problem....I ahve gotten more snails, some more hermits and a lawnmower blenny, but it keeps growing. I have ran straight actinic for the past 3 days and it's still growing.....how can I get rid of it? The rocks are all epoxyed (sp?) together, so they can't be removed. Can I run with no lights for a couple days with no ill effects? Thanks.

PS- I'm using RO water from my LFS for now, with reef crystals salt

[imsqueak]

Kenneth, I had lots of problems with red algae and medium problem with hair like algae until I added more rock that I got from Joe. And, ran phos-guard for a month. I run 4x96 pc 2 ac, 2 10K, and have also cut the 10K to 4-5/day. no more red, and hair is about enough to feed the clean up critters. the snails keep to the glass now; where there's food preditors go, so that tells me more is on the glass than the rock (although my eyes disagree).

Have you asked your LFS to run a tds on the water? Looking at your experience your only up and running sw 6 mos so your bulbs shouldnt have gone bad yet unless they were used. When does the ro/di arrive?

[Kennetht]

That's the thing....when I went to a 20L from a 10....I got all new lights. I have 2-55W actinic, 2-55w 10K, 1-36w actinic, and 1-28w 50/50....the actinics run from 8am to 10pm.....the 10k's run 9am to 4pm.....and it's getting worse. There are no outside light sources as my windows now have black curtains. I'll try some phos-guard and see if it helps. As for the RO/DI system...I'm still deciding on one. Joe sent me some good sites, and I just have to pick the one that is right for me.

[Sir Knight]

Kenneth,
Don brings up some excellent points (rock, nutrients,TDS and phosphates), Also keep in mind that RO water may have a TDS reading of about 5 - 15 TDS where as a RO/DI will have a TDS reading of 0. More rock more bacteria to eat the nutrients.

How about a good skimmer to remove nutrients.

Try pulling out as much of the algae as you can by hand.

Lighting shouldn't be a problem unless you are on the red side. Which I don't think your bulbs have shifted at that age.

I had a greenhouse that only used natural sun light and I didn't have an algae problem. I would look into the nutrients and phosphates as the cause. Also you could be overfeeding, again nutrients.

Remember as Don stated it may take a month or so to be rid of your problem. the cure will not happen over night

[imsqueak]

I suspect it's the water and phos-guard will help lots as a bandage. It did for mine after I started the 55 with tap and sw mix. It took like 6 mos to get it all out~ran phos at abt 4 &6 mos. And agro-crete rocks leaching (even though I did 2 mos cure) must have added to mine. I say it's time for you to @#%^ or get off the pot with the ro/di. Why dont you send Ed, the guy on ebay, an email to see if he has the manual switch(?) (oh boy, floyd, drinks, and I'm getting lost ~ I'll edit that come tomorrow) and the other stuff Joe recommended.
He really seems to know what he's doing and probably could do "more" if asked. Ebay's too competive to put on all the gadgets we need for a nice system in the low 100 price range~you'll pay 2-300 for one that you'd really love and he may be able to do it at the low end. I'd be interested to see if he could get clear housings myself. That would probably be the make or break if I was to buy from him again.

[EvilMel]

Try raising your alkalinity.

That helped me a bit.

Leaving your lights off for two days won't put a dent in the hair algae. If it did a little bit, the stuff would just grow back in full force as soon as you turn them back on.

I would do this (if you haven't already):
1. pull out as much as possible
2. scrub all the rocks like mad with a toothbrush
3. water change to remove all the bits floating in the water
4. raise your alkalinity if it's not high already.

In my experience this is what worked for a while.

[cee]

Kenneth:

All good advice here, but let's not forget the nitrates. Do you have a heavy fish load or feed a lot? Both can be done (with care and monitoring) provided you have sufficient protein skimming. I have almost 800 W of lighting over my 90 gallon, but am able to keep phosphate at 0 and nitrates <0.5 because of heavy skimming. Also, a sand bed will help with the nitrates. But I babble, as I'm sure you know all this already...