180 - Hair Algae

scottkel · #1 10/02/2007, 01:26 PM

Okay - i have a breakout of hair algae happening and its just about covered my rock...

i have tested for phosphates and nitrates - both zero... and I am not overfeeding the tank...

skimmer is skimming good...

any other ideas?

thanks...

advice1 · #2 10/02/2007, 01:30 PM

your phosphates and nitrates are 0 because your hair algae is abosrbing them.. try turning off the lights, and covering up the tank so htere is no light for 2-3 days, should do the trick.

scottkel · #3 10/02/2007, 01:32 PM

is this going to hurt my corals...?

rdnyva · #4 10/02/2007, 02:12 PM

Only h ting that worked for me was contantly pulling it out by hand, pulling accessable rocks to scrub them, frequent water changes and run a phosphate absorber (even if your tests say zero). Do everything you can think of to remove nutrients from the water column. Even with all of that it took me 3 months to get rid of it. Perserverance is the key.

Fiziksgeek · #5 10/02/2007, 02:49 PM

How long has the tank been set up? What kind of flow do you have? What kind of substrate? The more details you can give, the better advice you will get about how to kill the hair algae and how to prevent its return!

seapug · #6 10/02/2007, 03:05 PM

I had an identical experience as rdnyva. I spent June through September battling an outbreak and it's finally on the way out. My tank was 9 months old and pristine when it started so it can happen at any time. I thought I would never win.

The bottom line is hair algae can't grow without nutrients. If you are having a hair algae outbreak you don't really need to test-- you can assume there is a problem. 99% of the time it's an organic phosphate issue and most aquarium phosphate tests only show inorganic phosphate.

Manually remove all you can and follow it with a water change a couple times/week. Keep doing that for a few months and it will eventually subside. Keep close tabs on your Alkalinity as well. Might also be a good idea to add some more snails and hermits.

scottkel · #7 10/02/2007, 03:38 PM

Additional Information...

Upgraded to new tank from 75g approx 6 months ago...
Aragonite substrate - approx. 180-200lbs
Had 90 lbs live rock and added approx. 80 lbs Marshall Island about 3 months ago...
2 - Hydor #4's for flow plus a quite one 6000 return pump split to 4 return spouts...
Octopus Skimmer - 8" diamater - NW-200

Hope this helps...

WorldNation · #8 10/02/2007, 03:56 PM

do you have a cleaning crew? have you tried the many different natural critters that eat hair algae?

mg426 · #9 10/02/2007, 04:24 PM

I would suggest as big of refugium as you can fit, Fill it with Chaeto and mabe a DSB.

scottkel · #10 10/02/2007, 04:39 PM

i have several turbos, snails, goby, starfish but i know i need to increase this...

scubajsm · #11 10/02/2007, 04:46 PM

I added a foxface to my tank and my HA was gone in less than 12 hours. This guy loves to eat.

gillies · #12 10/02/2007, 04:54 PM

For immediate help, pull out and scrub off as much as you can. Then buy about 20 Mexican Turbo snails, keep an eye on them, and remove when they die.

For long term, do as mentioned above.

scottkel · #13 10/02/2007, 05:51 PM

i have a foxface already - along with a yellow tang, lemonpeel angel, lawnmower blenny, creaner wrasse, clown, 3 green chromis and a scooter blenny...

no one seems to eat any of the HA...

AMIFL · #14 10/03/2007, 07:15 AM

Turn off the lights for a couple days. Use a toothebrush to brush it off. Then do a water change. Good to go.

WorldNation · #15 10/03/2007, 12:01 PM

have you tried urchins? i have pencils in a few of my tanks, they work miracles ;p

there are also sea hare's, wonderful lil buggers ;p

OliverM3 · #16 10/03/2007, 12:22 PM

Looks like I'm in the same boat.
Started my battle with GHA Friday with the delivery of my two phosban reactors. One filled with carbon one with phosban.

GHA started a month after the addition of 50 more pounds of live rock that I cured for about 3 weeks.

Mine is covering most of my base rock so removal isn't an option.
And it really doesn't pull off.
So I just scrubbed it last night with a tooth brush till it disintegrates.
After the tank cleared I just changed my filter sock.

We'll see if the addition of phosban, scrubbing and frequent water changes win out over the GHA.

conorwynne · #17 10/03/2007, 12:56 PM

You may also want to increase the magnesium level -- read somewhere on this site that the hair algae just goes white and dies. Also, phosphate remover to keep it dead.

Elevated levels of mag don't seem to harm corals either. I had a terrible HA outbreak from an unscrubbed LR piece I got from a friends tank.

http://archive.reefcentral.com/forum...readid=1154028

I'm gonna try this since I can see that after two months of cooking, two small strands of HA is starting to grow. The tank is very new though -- three weeks old, so its going through the algal stage anyway, running phosban as we speak, gonna elevate mag tomorrow, when I remember to stop by the LFS on the way home!

Regards
Conor.

babogart · #18 10/03/2007, 07:08 PM

Hello All,

I started my 90 gal reef last January. It was pristine until about two months ago. Then a green hair algae problem.
I figure that it started due to the type of water I was using during my water changes. I got lazy ans started usng some boxed "real" ocean water I bought at PetCO. I have since stopped using this and only use Instant Ocean.

I tried turning the lights off for three days and that worked well. While it did not clear it all it removed 75%. I now only run the light for about 4 hours per day. The corals don't seem to be bothered by it. However, I do not have any SPS.

Still a bit of the algae. Though no where close to what it was before I shut the lights down for three days.

OliverM3 · #19 10/12/2007, 07:41 AM

Not Bad it's been 11 days since hooking up the two little fishies phosban 150. My phosphates are now holding at 0 down from 0.15. And The GHA is turning white.
Occasionally I see a clump of the GHA being blown around the tank.
So it looks like this may do the trick.

Great product I wish that I would have tried one sooner.
But I always thought they were a gimmick like some of the other media/devices on the market that are suppose to be magic cures.

strittmatter · #20 10/12/2007, 09:22 AM

You need to test your source water too. Where are you getting the water from? You can do a 100% water change every day but if the water you are using has Phosphate you are not going to help a thing. make sense?

IMO lights of 2-3 days is not going to do a thing. You kill it my getting rif of it's food source like others have said.

Clayman · #21 10/12/2007, 10:17 AM

I also just finished a battle with GHA, It took several months but I found manual removal and time were the two best things. Urchins help alot too aslong as u don't mind losing coraline. Seahares are good too but my shrimp would not leave them alone and ened up killing one before I could get it out.

OliverM3 · #22 10/29/2007, 12:36 PM

I'm amazed at how long it really takes to get rid of.
I thought mine was going away after a month of phosban.
It was all starting to turn white.
But I did a couple target feedings of DT's Oyster eggs
And the beautiful(sarcasm) green color in the hair algae came right back.
I guess this isn't going to be as easy as I thought.

psyrob · #23 10/29/2007, 12:46 PM

I fought a long losing battle with hair algae, until I added a DI canister to my RO unit. Algae went away for a year. Then it came roaring back. I broke down and bought a TDS meter and found my DI was exhausted. TDS readings were 7 after the RO unit and 7 after the DI unit. Tap water is 264, indicating the RO unit was at about 97% and the DI was ineffective. Just bought a new one DI canister from filter guys and I'm doing weekly water changes.

Taking a long time, but I'm learning that doing things right the first time is the best! I should have bought the more expensive RO/DI with TDS meter right off the bat...