Tiny White Stringy Algae or Dinos? Or snail trails??

[Prezpreston]

Hey guys,

 

So I’ve got two things I would love to have ID’d, if possible. They’ve been present in my tank for a few weeks now, but really haven’t expanded. If anything, they may have receded a slight bit.

 

There are some tiny, white, stringlike substances growing on a tiny corner of my back wall, as well as some hairlike something growing over my liverock. The hairlike something and the white something on my back wall differentiate in that some have bubbles and some don’t. I’ve tried just about every ID site, and looked through that stickies thread in this forum, and still can’t identify it. At first I thought that some of my filter floss somehow broke through into my tank but I don’t think that’s the case any longer.

 

Thanks guys!!

[Clown79]

The only way to properly diagnose dino's is under microscope or the jar test(jar test will not determine strand)

 

It's hard to tell in the pic. Can you get a clearer one with less blue

[mcarroll]

1 hour ago, Prezpreston said:

This looks more like hair algae nubbins to me.  Most algae should be able to generate bubbles when photosynthesis is really kicking.

 

Still, a closeup with daylights on or with the camera flash would be helpful.

[Prezpreston]

2 hours ago, mcarroll said:

This looks more like hair algae nubbins to me.  Most algae should be able to generate bubbles when photosynthesis is really kicking.

 

Still, a closeup with daylights on or with the camera flash would be helpful.

 

2 hours ago, Clown79 said:

The only way to properly diagnose dino's is under microscope or the jar test(jar test will not determine strand)

 

It's hard to tell in the pic. Can you get a clearer one with less blue

Here are some updated pics with the daylights on.

 

If these still aren’t great I’ll turn the whites on at 100%

[mcarroll]

Yeah, we need a pic either with whites on or the camera flash (or both) so that it looks real and not blue-washed.

 

Otherwise we get false colors, which is one of the main things we use to ID algae.

[Prezpreston]

On 1/3/2020 at 4:50 PM, mcarroll said:

Yeah, we need a pic either with whites on or the camera flash (or both) so that it looks real and not blue-washed.

 

Otherwise we get false colors, which is one of the main things we use to ID algae.

Sorry it took so long - here are some updated pics (last two are just silhouettes of the hairlike thingies). On pic 99B1, the little hairs can be seen on the rock in the very front of the pic. 

[mcarroll]

That does kinda look like the structure of algae, but the way it's growing on the glass it pretty peculiar.

 

The rest looks to me like film algae or maybe a type of rock-boring algae.  No big deal either way.

 

I suspect that when we get the alkalinity/chemistry issues resolved on your other thread and nutrient levels have been good for a little while and you have a full cleanup crew, this might no longer be an issue.

[Prezpreston]

3 hours ago, mcarroll said:

That does kinda look like the structure of algae, but the way it's growing on the glass it pretty peculiar.

 

The rest looks to me like film algae or maybe a type of rock-boring algae.  No big deal either way.

 

I suspect that when we get the alkalinity/chemistry issues resolved on your other thread and nutrient levels have been good for a little while and you have a full cleanup crew, this might no longer be an issue.

Awesome - thanks mccarroll!

[Clown79]

You can do a simple jar of tank water test for dino's.