Brown stuff on coral bed

[paul]

I have had my tank set up for 21/2 weeks and I am getting brown alge on my coral bed and LR

 

Is this normal if not what can I do??

[Aiptasia]

Read up on the FAQ's about new tanks. It's a diatom algae bloom and it's very common. It's usually the result of silicates in your water that you've used to make your seawater. Don't worry, the bloom will eventually crash after turning your tank brown for a week or two.

 

Tank Janitors (different kinds of algae eating snails specifically) love to eat diatom algae, so go ahead and add one snail per gallon, and mix up the snail species if you can. A good LFS will have a mix of snails for you.

 

Add 1 snail per gallon of water.

[fboye]

My tank has been running for a bit over two weeks. On friday, I took a H2O sample to my LFS. I was told that my Nitrites were high and to come back in two weeks. I tested on that day and it was elevated.

Today, I ran a Nitrite test and the result was >0.3 mg/L which I think is good. I've got a lot of diatom algae. So I guess the question is:

Is it safe to put in snails?

Also, I've got a lot of green hair algae. It's becoming a forest!

What can I get to remove it?

 

Many Thanks!