tdannhauser30 Posted October 27, 2014 Share Posted October 27, 2014 So ive been battling mostly what i believe is hair algae but will occasionaly have red cyano blooms, and have had little success. My paramaters are all in check, and i do a 20-25% water change every 2 weeks. Im guessing the problem is mainly coming from the fact that i use tap water so i just started using distilled for my water changes to try and dilloute the old water and slowly phase it out. However i am trying to just take every precaution against the alge now, as i am good and thoroughly sick of it and i was wondering if a UV sterilizer would be a helpful tool in a tank of this size. Some sources seem to say it would do more harm than good but im not sold on that ideology. please let me know what you think. Link to comment
gus6464 Posted October 27, 2014 Share Posted October 27, 2014 UV will not kill hair algae. UV kills green water. What's your magnesium at? If the tank is new the hair algae will sort itself out eventually. Link to comment
tdannhauser30 Posted October 27, 2014 Author Share Posted October 27, 2014 not very new, coming up on the one year mark in 3 months or so. so it doesnt have any effect on algae that grows on the rocks? like it doesnt slow the spread of this algae? would a phosphate reactor or even a canister filter be a more efficient use of my money? sorry forgot about magnesium, i have no idea what my mag. levels are. Not even sure lfs tested for that actually Link to comment
CronicReefer Posted October 27, 2014 Share Posted October 27, 2014 Do you know your phosphate levels? I've noticed green hair algae tends to grow when in the presence of phosphates. Link to comment
tdannhauser30 Posted October 27, 2014 Author Share Posted October 27, 2014 phosphates are at zero but ive read that can be because the algae is leeching it up faster than i can test for them. Link to comment
CronicReefer Posted October 27, 2014 Share Posted October 27, 2014 You would need a lot of algae for that. Turbo snails eat hair algae extremely fast if you want to pick up one of those. You could try using seachem seagel to remove phosphates and silicate and dissolved organics Link to comment
tdannhauser30 Posted October 27, 2014 Author Share Posted October 27, 2014 ok, ive actually got this algaecide stuff i have been dosing, think its API but not positive and not home right now. It seems to help somewhat but not very impressed. Could this be because i run poly filters in my filter and could those be taking the algaecide out of the water? Link to comment
gus6464 Posted October 27, 2014 Share Posted October 27, 2014 Also check and see if it's actually hair algae and not bryopsis. 3 months is not a terribly long time to have a tank setup so it could still be in it's settling stages. I had a huge bryopsis outbreak at around month 2 in my tank and now it's starting to sort itself out. One thing you can do is dose Kent or Continuum magnesium if your mag is low and it will eventually eradicate the hair algae for sure. Link to comment
tdannhauser30 Posted October 27, 2014 Author Share Posted October 27, 2014 Also check and see if it's actually hair algae and not bryopsis. 3 months is not a terribly long time to have a tank setup so it could still be in it's settling stages. I had a huge bryopsis outbreak at around month 2 in my tank and now it's starting to sort itself out. One thing you can do is dose Kent or Continuum magnesium if your mag is low and it will eventually eradicate the hair algae for sure. no im 3 months away from being a full year old. so the tank is about 9 months old Link to comment
IThas2Bme Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 Did you look into dosing hydrogen peroxide? Google that and green hair algae and you'll find lots of success stories (and instructions). It killed off all of mine in less than 2 weeks (very small outbreak). Or here: http://www.nano-reef.com/topic/268706-peroxide-saves-my-tank-with-pics-to-prove-it/ Link to comment
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