HELP! hair algae

[derrell]

i have a 150gal tank that i just started up and the live rock in it unfortunely is dead and soon will be covered will hair algae. should I ditch the live rock and start over new or just buy a lot of snails and algae eaters to clean the rock. I really don't won't to get rid off the rock b/c they are very nice and and unusual pieces. All comments are appreciated.

[six.line]

Your best bet is to begin growing macro algae, like chaeto, in the refugium. If you don't have a refugium for the tank, start growing chaeto in the main tank-- add the cleanup crew at the same time. Then get a sump, make a refugium out of it, and grow the algae.

The point is to have the controllable algae compete for the same nutrients that fuel the growth of the hair algae.

Good luck.

[marduc]

If the rock is dead, I would get a couple of pieces of LR and perhaps some live sand from local tanks/LFS tanks ect. to seed the bacterial and microfauna colonies.

If its a tank you just started up and it is just the rock/live sand, then you can get away with not lighting the tank, no light = no photosynthesis = no algea. Go through the entire cycle without light, and then wait another few weeks just for good measure. Make sure to maintain aggressive water changes, and remove any dead material/detritus, ect that you can.

After the tank is cycled and the lights come on you may get a tad of an outbreak still, but things should be stable enough that it will be nowhere as severe as otherwise. Continue a rigorous water change routine (weekly), run the lights on a reduced cycle for a while, then slowly ramp them up. Remove any and all algea growth you see, as well as continuing not to let detritus accummulate on the rock. Also when the lights are ready to come on would be a good time to add the clean up crew.

Hold off on adding fish to the tank!! Fish = waste = excess nutrients, which in your case you really do not want yet. Make sure you are able to maintain a full lighting schedule without major algea problems before adding fish. The longer you can hold off here, the better chance microfauna such as copepods and amphipods can get a strong foothold and help your cause a tad.

[derrell]

what if i do that and put micro algae in the sump. is chaeto a good micro algae. it seems to grow like wild fire.

[andrewr]

Why is the live rock dead? I guess I didnt understand that part

[marduc]

chaeto is the perfect candidate for this.. make sure to have it situated in a seperate chamber of the sump where it cannot get sucked into any intakes or clog anything, and throw some light on it. In conjunction with the darkened display, the chaeto will have plenty of opportunity to take the upper hand before the opposing team even hits the field :D

[derrell]

the live rock is dead b/c the person i bought it from neglected the tank and there was no coraline algae growing on it, so i took it and put in a trash can with a powerhead but the powerhead got disconnected and was off for 4 days.

[andrewr]

the rock is probably not dead at all, sure there may be some die off but it is not completely gone. I thought you might say somthing like this....the only thing that might happen is the tank may cycle, during the cycle you can turn your lights off if you neeed to keep the algae down. Also snails will prune the algae down for you too. HTH