bubbles.... and there green...

[Chef Reef]

*sigh* I'v heard about the green bubble algea before and now i finaly have it.. Where did it come from? How do i get rid of it? I'ts a small cluster of it and i are about the size of BB's.

i also have a few other types of algea that i have no idea what it is and haven't seen anyone else with it.. I can try to discribe them..

-Small version of a red monti cap coral, layers it self in the same manor, bright redish maroon. about the size of cequinse (SP?)

- Red hair? It's stringy, but firm. small cluster

- Green hair? same as the above. not hair algea, very firm i can bend it but goes back in place..

- some brownish plant like stuff... its growing like a plant off of one of my rocks.. its weird..

also i'll try and get some pictures of this stuff tomorrow to help ID it..

[bawla47]

theres no drop in formula to just get rid of it, but i would ty and get rid of all your phospates as much as possible. emerald crabs are known to chomp down on that stuff, as well as select foxfaces. i would just try and manually remove them(dont pop em!) and keep your phospates in cehckc

[TorryRx]

I've had great luck with emerald crabs and foxfaces.

I have an emerald crab in my 36 and he's pretty good at keeping everything in check, and he doesn't bother anyone. I have a foxface in my 90 FOWLR (which I'm upgrading to a 150 today!!!) He's great as well, but remember they do get fairly big eventually so a foxface wouldn't work well in a small tank.

But Bawla's right...usually nuisance algae means that there is an overabundance of nutrients, so I would try to solve that while getting a little help from the critters.

HTH!

[Felix1021]

If possible (I would take the rock that has it) out of the tank
scrape it off...then put the rock back in...

Only other option that i could think of is EMERALD like everyone is suggesting.

Good Luck!

Felix

[Bernie21]

I love foxes, they eat anything!! Also you can try a lawnmower blenny, they spend all day working.

[ReefWreak]

I like foxfaces, but my Dejardini Sailfin eats bubble algae with a vengence. I had emeralds, but I ended up catching them eating my mushrooms more than I saw them eating bubble algae.

[Chef Reef]

Ok heres the pics of some stuff in my tank that i dont know what it is, can anyone help? also theres a pic of the small cluster of bubble algae..

- Red plating algae?






- Red wire algae?



- Green wire algae?

[Chef Reef]

- Green fuzz (On the right, the dark green.)


- Green hair (On the left, the light green)


- Pink sponge???



- Brownish green plant?




- Bubble algea

[Chef Reef]

The Pink sponge used to be white but lately has started turning pink like if coraline was growing on it. Is this a sponge?

The light green algae grows to about 2 inches (probably more but i pull it by then)

The Dark green only grows to about 1/4 of an inch and is a lot darker then the longer hair algae.

[Evenfall]

The brownish plant you have in the last few pictures looks like Caulerpia algae. Given enough time and good water conditions it will grow in strands all the way to the surface of your tank.

My understanding is that it isn't bad. I eventually removed the stuff from my tank after it grew 12 or so inches long. This was about 6 months ago and I haven't seen any since.

[Evenfall]

The last picture looks like green bubble algae. This stuff is bad and will spread. If you pop these in the tank they will release spors and spread. I think emerald crabs will eat these pretty quickly.

[Chef Reef]

ya that plant stuff has been growing like crazy, before it was barely noticable when i got the rock.

if the crab eats the bubbles, doesnt it pop it in the proccess?

[itzyroe]

i had the before and i used redslime and it went away ...SO FAR

[Chef Reef]

is there such thing as red bubles to? becuase i swear these red things (no picture) look like small bubbles..

[Anemone]

The brownish plant is sargassum. It can gow pretty tall, and most fish won't touch it. However, it's usually only present in fairly new setups or on new rocks, and once removed, doesn't generally grow back. It seems to have a need for higher nutrients (new tanks) and is pretty easily pulled out (once it gets long enough to get a hold of).

Personally, I like having it in my tanks, and will keep it around as long as I can. I do thin it out though - I've had 20-30, 8"-12" plants growing at one time, and that's just too many.

Kevin

[Chef Reef]

cool thanks. its a newer rock and has been growing for awhile now. so far i like it and looks cool so i think it will stick around.

id really like to know what the red ones are though..

[ninjamini]

Bubble algae can be trouble. I suggest taking out the rock and scraping it off. Then wash it with RO. If you cant get the rock out then I hear of success with rigid airline tubing...making a point out of it and using suction to suck the spores out of the bubble. The spores are the liquid inside the bubble.

Remember that all algae grows because it has food. These are nitrates, phosphates and light.

[Chef Reef]

well i know why i have some many different types of algae. iv been using tap water for about 1 year and finaly have my RO/DI unit up and running. i did a 40% water change when i got some water from it to help take out the junk from the tap water. my TDS from my tap was only about 150ppm not as high as most but still. i also added 3 emrald crabs yesterday and 2 astreia(SP?) snails to help clean up too.
My photo period probbly has alot to do with it as well becuase i run my lights twice a day for 5 hours each. On 5 hours off for 6, on for 5 hours off for 8. (getting pretty good zoa growth like this.) i only feed my tank twice a week and only very little.

im trying to fix alot of my newbi mistakes still :/

on the good side of things i started RO/DI water, added a better clean up crew, less fish, less feeding, adding more LR (only have about 10-15 lbs in a 30 gal tank) and i also added a sump. :/ i think im getting there.

[norwall]

The red "twig" algae is Amphiroa tribulus. My tang would just love to eat that. I dont think the red algae you pictured is bad at all, I would love to have some of that in my tank.

[Chef Reef]

its really pretty i swear it looks like mini monti caps. thanks for the ID.