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Innovative Marine Aquariums

Coraline algae question


Dave MN Nano

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My tank is about 1 year old. All my snails and hermit crabs are covered in beautiful coraline algae. All my frag plugs are beautiful red/purple also. I am starting to get coraline algae on my back glass also. My main display rocks - nada. Gray. I don't even know what they are. I bought dry rock at my LFS (for my first tank) because I liked the way they looked. Did I pick some bad stuff? Are some rocks hard to grow coraline algae on??? What about the stuff you can buy to dose coraline algae? Does it work? Would you recommend it? Thanks much.

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Intresting observation. I have the same thing. It's in spots on my walls some spots it's quite alot and I have to scrape it off prety frequently its all on my snails and it shows up on plugs but none grows on my rocks or coral skeletons that I incorparayed onto the scape. But I hardly see it on the rocks.

 

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If the rock you're talking about is not calcium-based rock of some kind (e.g. aragonite, calcite, etc) then it won't adsorb phosphates like real rock does.  Same if the rock is painted with something that's not calcium-based.  (Aragonite and other calcium-based minerals work more-or-less just like GFO.)

 

IMO, this is one of the main things that algae (and everything else) likes so much about live rock....the phosphates.

 

(If your rock is calcium based, then I dunno.  Also, I'm not sure if cement qualifies.)

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Give it time. It took my larger tank almost 3 years to get somewhat of a decent coverage on the rocks. Even then, it only grows where the light can reach. It grows on glass and plastic very quickly, however. 

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44 minutes ago, TheKleinReef said:

I started with dry rock from BRS, and I noticed a grey hue before the purple came almost 2 years later. Might just need some time?

Just under a year for my Marco Rocks, I'm mostly a hue of green where it gets light.  The unlit rock is covered with DINO that from wall next to it ( blech !! ) I recently added a rock from LFS with a sponge and corraline algae, and I'm seeing the color show up in areas of my tank ( back wall, filter, powerhead ).  Hoping it makes it's way onto the main rockwork.

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