green hair algee..arghhhhh

[Woogalie]

Ok, first off: DO NOT get the clowns yet. You've obviously got some sort of excess nutrient problem, the last thing your tank needs is more bio-load. Adding bio-load now could drag this out for months. Get it fixed, then get your fish.

After reading OP. I was about to say exactly this. Adding a pair of clowns will bring more hair algae.

Fewskillz saved the day again!! YAAAAA

[FlCandy]

Thanks guys for the help!

 

to answer some questions,

 

-only have use RO/DI water since the start. i cannot for the life of me find it in grocery stores, so i've been getting ro/di from my LFS.

 

-i've done about.....4-5 WC's since the tank was started? (that incluedes when i acclimated the CUC etc)

 

i went to my LFS today, no turbo snails. but they did have the red legged hermit. i diden't get them.

 

i did pick up a phosphate test kit, they only had the API brand. after work today i will test both the tank water and the ro/di water that i get from the lfs. i also picked up (since i was there) a bag of the phosguard, well, not the actual phosguard but the API brand of the same thing.

 

i also left the tank lights off today (only lunars, should i turn those off too?) the plan is to buy some hydrogen peroxide (hydrogen peroxide is what i use exactley? that i buy at the drug store?) and i'm going to pull that one top rock off, and do a peroxide dip of it. when i do that i was thinking about adding the phosguard stuff to keep the phosphates down so that it doesn't come back. sound like a plan?

 

i'm going to hold off on the clowns after this is all delt with, i just don't want to take the risk of them getting sick or dying.

 

YEah the stuff from the drug store. I just didn't want to put that in my tank, I did consider it but I got the GHA under control via manual removal and I tested and had PHO4 so I ran the Phosguard.

 

Make sure to rinse the rock well with RODI before you put it back to remove the peroxide and you should be good, OH and cut it back really short first. You'll see it turn white and then just go away.

 

I have lunars on 24/7 and with lights off except for those it also stunted it and helped me get it under control. I am doing another 2 day lights out just to finish this stuff off.

 

GL

[vash028]

I just had some myself and im almost done getting rid of it what i did was blackout my tank its been a week and in another week it will all be gone and when i mean black out newspaper taped on all the glass and some of the top is covered no light equals no algae

[FlCandy]

I just had some myself and im almost done getting rid of it what i did was blackout my tank its been a week and in another week it will all be gone and when i mean black out newspaper taped on all the glass and some of the top is covered no light equals no algae

 

Yeah I had a blanket over the tank for about 2 days and that made huge steps. LOL looks funny but it works.

[vash028]

ya after a week 90 percent was gone but i know it will come back so another week will be sure to rock it

[Flexin5]

ya after a week 90 percent was gone but i know it will come back so another week will be sure to rock it

 

so that's all you did? was the black out? maybe i should do that too for a couple of days.

 

now when you guys do all of these things to get rid of the GHA, does it stay gone? or grow back eventually?

[vash028]

all i did was a blackout and top off like normal and once its dead it should be gone but its algae but it should if you blackout tell its all gone like i said i had alot on a rock and after a week there was still a little left so another week

[Flexin5]

I thought i'd update this thread incase anyone ever searches for a GHA solution.

 

so i started out by testing for phosphates. yep, they were there. i think it was like .25ppm in the tank and my ro/di water from the lfs had like .05ppm. so it's obvious that i have phosphates. i've been on a serious hunt for ro/di water in alot of grocery stores but it seems like the only place i can get it is at the LFS, so i'm stuck with that. since that has phosphates, i decided to run the api brand of the phosguard. so i tossed that into the 110.

 

i took the top rock off, and hit it with some hydrogen peroxide. started to fizz alot, and i scrubbed it down with a new harder brissled toothbrush. most of the algae came off, but the stuff i missed turned all white this morning when i checked and doesn't seem to be growing back. i also cleaned out my power head, and surface skimmer that had alot of stray algee stuck in it from manually removing it.

 

for the stuff on the rocks that i coulden't take out of the tank, i filled up a syringe with hydro.perox. and squirted it on it in the tank. it seems to look about the same today, there's not much so i think i can manually remove it tonight. i'm still running with no lights, second day today, and after tomorow with no lights i'll turn them back on. in the process, my zoa's closed up but opened back up today and my skunk cleaner shrimp has been acting kinda weird and hasen't been eating when i try to hand feed him. (last night and this morning)

 

anyways, thanks everyone for the help, i'll update again when things progress.

 

before:

 

 

after:

 

[Trogdor447]

will continue to come back until you rid the phosphates

[Flexin5]

will continue to come back until you rid the phosphates

 

ya that's what i'm thinking. i have to find some other place to get ro/di.

[Trogdor447]

if you lived near me id make ya some cheaps

[FlCandy]

You can use Distilled from the grocery store.

 

Same thing happened to me I got my phosphates from the LFS water.

 

GL

[Flexin5]

You can use Distilled from the grocery store.

 

Same thing happened to me I got my phosphates from the LFS water.

 

GL

 

sooo..let me get this straight...distilled water is ok and doesn't have phosphates? i can get distilled water, but they don't have specificly ro/di water. same stuff? the water from the lfs has a bit of phosphates in it, but won't the phosguard take care of that?

 

btw ficanday cause of you i want a pom pom crab now

[FlCandy]

sooo..let me get this straight...distilled water is ok and doesn't have phosphates? i can get distilled water, but they don't have specificly ro/di water. same stuff?

 

Not the same but better then what your getting, and 1000x better then tap water.

 

A few reefers here use distilled for top offs and setup and have had no problem.

 

btw ficanday cause of you i want a pom pom crab now

 

How so?

 

LOL

[brandon429]

im several years on distilled its great and cheap.

 

Did the rest of the hair algae get removed off the rocks yet? update pic when you can

[Flexin5]

Not the same but better then what your getting, and 1000x better then tap water.

 

A few reefers here use distilled for top offs and setup and have had no problem.

 

 

 

How so?

 

LOL

 

 

ah gotcha, see the same chain of lfs, the one store near me ran out of it, so i went to another location and got it from them. the store near me now has their filter up and running so i was thinking about giving it a try, if it's crap then i'll get the distilled water.

 

I think i saw you talking about one in joel's thead so i googled it and they look cool

[FlCandy]

I want a porcelain crab different thing but pom poms are adorable! Looks like little cheerleaders!

[FlCandy]

 

Thats what I want! LOL

[Flexin5]

 

Thats what I want! LOL

 

 

that thing looks crazy..lol ya i got them mixed up, i was talking about a pom pom crab.

 

so it's been just about 24hrs since the peroxide dip. no lights on except lunars and the phosguard stuff in the HOB.

 

this is the rock that was taken out and dipped/scrubbed. has definatly not grown back, atleast at the rate it useto, by now it would be just as long as before in a day. alot of it is grayish/white too.

 

 

this rock wasen't dipped but was squirted with peroxide from the syringe. it's perfectly clean

 

 

and this is the longest bit of it, it's turning white as you can see a bit. i'm going to pluck this out tomorow and this also got a dose from the syringe.

 

 

so one more day with the lights off then i think i'm just going to run them for about 4hrs or so a day instead of 10ish hrs.

[brandon429]

peroxide is the best gha treatment hands down. The reason you don't have to strip your water of phosphates in order to have a perfectly algae free tank is because peroxide kills all GHA it doesn't matter what your phosphates are. You need to keep them in such range that they do not inhibit coral calcification but they do not have to be zero. they are not zero in any of my tanks, I do not manage phosphate directly and never have.

 

phospate removing media or activities must be repeated. there isn't a set and go way of fighting phoshpate in order to fight algae...it is repeat work just like the follow up treatments of peroxide every couple months to keep algae at bay. you are switching out gfo media, cleaning the filters that house them of detritus, all of that is work. peroxide is actually less work than fighting phosphate specifically.

 

algae belongs in our tanks, it comes from the air and spores are on the animals we place in our tanks that come from another aquarium. it will always be present, and our responses will be as well I say go for the simplest option. big water changes weekly and peroxide as needed, and you just removed algae as a tank crasher for you for the rest of your tank keeping career.

 

its a fine method, if you want to ues GFO or strip the water of it to fight algae or change a lot of water often, but if tank X can squirt a liquid into the tank every so often and accomplish the same ends, zero algae, who cares which way you go about it?

 

Glad it worked. repeat as needed, that initial growth was buried in the rock crevices it will take a couple rounds to get it, change water in your tank each time afterwards to lessen the effect of peroxide on the non targets. enjoy!

 

I believe in using GFO in tanks you want especially clean if you don't mind the work. it sure does make for nice algae prevention. my argument is simply that it doesn't make peroxide any less effective considering ongoing work is required in both approaches to algae management.

 

spot treatments of peroxide are safe for the tank, where you drain it and treat only the target. additions to the whole tank are most dangerous and should be a last resort only, or for heavy algae infestations that were allowed to progress far past the spot treatment stage when the growth is first seen.

[Flexin5]

^ah i see what your saying, will definatly keep that in mind if the GHA comes back. hopefully it doesn't but you never know.

 

thought i'd just update this thread, green hair algee is gone! however my skunk cleaner shrimp died RIP mr.bubbles. i was pretty pissed about that. now i don't know why he died, he died about 3 or 4 days after the peroxide treatment.

 

i also added 2 big scarlet leg hermits, i'm not sure if one of them got to him or my emrald crab, but it was kinda weird for him to die.

 

i did a large water change the day after the peroxide treatment when i acclimated the two scarlets. tank params are all great. the scarlets took care of all the short GHA that was left and now it's nice and clean.

 

so just to recap:

 

before:

 

 

After:

 

 

 

Thanks everyone for you help and advice!