Is it okay to leave corner of tank over grown?

[BubbleTrouble]

As title says, I leave this corner of the tank alone cos there is a lot of rock and macro algae pushed up into it. The hermit crabs love it and I notice a lot of small things like I assume copepods and shrimp spawn here. Is it okay to leave it like this, like will it crash the tank?

[braaap]

It will eventually take over the tank. I'd remove it. That grape caulerpa is nasty.

[Tired]

No, having an overgrown corner will not crash the tank. You will need to regularly prune the caulerpa back into place, but it won't hurt anything to have a small patch there. 

 

If you'd like to swap the caulerpa out, you could put chaeto into that corner for the same pod-haven effect. 

[TheKleinReef]

it will not crash the tank, but caulerpa is a very invasive algae. It'll make it's way around your tank and be impossible to remove. I had to dip full rocks in hydrogen peroxide to remove it. it also can become problematic if/when it goes sexual.

[debbeach13]

30 minutes ago, Tired said:

If you'd like to swap the caulerpa out, you could put chaeto into that corner for the same pod-haven effect. 

I like this suggestion.

[BubbleTrouble]

4 minutes ago, debbeach13 said:

I like this suggestion.

I've been removing as much as I can every time I do a water change 😱 I definitely made a mistake of putting it in 

14 minutes ago, TheKleinReef said:

it will not crash the tank, but caulerpa is a very invasive algae. It'll make it's way around your tank and be impossible to remove. I had to dip full rocks in hydrogen peroxide to remove it. it also can become problematic if/when it goes sexual.

Oof okay I'll look into the caulerpa going sexual

[geekreef_05]

There isnt anything wrong with that, when it comes to the health of your animals. 

 

However its not an easy thing to manage. It can easily take over the tank and become a pain.

 

It takes regular hands in the tank to manually remove it in a nano. There arent any voracious natural nano sized predators for it

 

Thats why folks suggest having a fuge or replacing it with a managable macro algae like chaeto or even a mangrove.

 

Those will not afix to rocks and such. 

 

Something to consider!

 

[mxpro32]

On 2/9/2023 at 1:33 PM, TheKleinReef said:

it will not crash the tank, but caulerpa is a very invasive algae. It'll make it's way around your tank and be impossible to remove. I had to dip full rocks in hydrogen peroxide to remove it. it also can become problematic if/when it goes sexual.

yeah, my girlfriends tank looked like pea soup.  not fun

[Cyprinodont]

Idk about the macro but I let green hair algae grow freely on my back glass for a few reasons. It's a nutrient sink, basically an in-tank refugium, and will let me know visually if nutrients are out of balance if it's growing or dying back. Also it serves as food for fish, inverts, and microorganisms, as well as a habitat for those same microorganisms. My rocks and sand don't grow a single inch of algae besides Coraline because I let the GHA grow on the back and have a robust microorganism cuc.