Hair Algae Hell

[Oceans Ferevh]

Hey, I've been having a real problem with hair algae lately. My tank is a 65 gallon and I use power compacts. Would better lighting help? I've been looking at MH for a while now. My skimmer is a stupid Prizm. I would like to upgrade to a LifeReef brand some time because this one sucks. Would changing lighting or skimmer help more? I do use Phosban and Purigen in my canister filter. All readings are good but the stuff keeps growing. Any ideas?

 

[holry7778]

Well, Ffrom what I know, which isn't all that much, the algae is there for a reason..as unpleasant as it is, it is helping keep your nitrates low. There are a couple of suggestions that help. The new skimmer makes the most sense as it helps remove organics (nitrates) from the water column, ago less food for hair algae. Second suggestion...add a marco algae that is easy on your eyes. This will feed on the same food and hopefully out grow and kill out the hair algae.

I wouldn't change the lights. The algae needs the lighting to grow, so you would actually be helping it and not necessarily change it existance in your tank, if you went to brighter lights.

 

[joekr]

I don't think that new brighter lights would help the hair algae problem (unless your bulbs are old, then it could be an issue). A new skimmer may be a good choice (I just upgraded mine to an AquaC remora). What does your cleanup crew look like? How many turbos do you have? I find mine mow down hair algae very quickly if any pops up. How long is your light cycle?

Also, manual removal helps a great deal.. I bought a new toothbrush one night when my tank was still pretty new and scrubbed alot of it off the rock. It took a while, but the scrubbing + turbos + shorter light cycle fixed all my woes.

Good luck!

 

[Anonymous]

Get the better skimmer.

How many fish do you have?

How much do you feed them?

Toothbrush the rocks and do water changes until it's gone.

When my 75 was about a year old, I had a terrible hair algea outbreak. Do you think the 14 fish, 30 crabs, and 30 snails had anything to do with it? 8O Now I have 3 fish and a few snails and a couple of crabs. No hair algea at all. I do a 25% WC every couple of month.

It's all about bioload and the amount of work you are willing to do to keep the water clean. I could have kept all those fish if I were willing to do weekly WC's.

Louey

 

[hillbilly]

When you get a "real" skimmer, I'm sure that will help a great deal. The more nutrients you can remove the better the water quality. Jeff does flawless acrylic work, I'm sure you'll be pleased with the Lifereef. All my tanks have lots of corals, few small fish, no cleanup crews to speak of, and no problem algae. I do weekly water changes and have oversized skimmers. The tanks also have lots of flow and are BB to help keep them cleaner. I never found a need for macro. Everyone does it their way, but this works for me.

 

[Anonymous]

expanding you existing plant life you desire or adding a refug with plant life you desire will control or eliminate the unwanted plant life.

 

[Oceans Ferevh]

I have a farely long light cycle. The blue Acintics go on at about 7:30AM followed by the power compacts at 8:30am. The compacts go off at 7:30pm and the acintics at 8:30. Yeh, a little long What should I scale it back to? 8, 10hr? I have 4 wanted and 1 unwanted fish. 2 b/w perculas, one flame angel, one Bellas angel, and one stupid hawkfish I can't catch. I have 2 turbos, 10 Nerites, 15 Nessarius, 6 red-legged hermits, 15 blue-legged hermits, 1 abilonie, one sand-sifting star, and 2 mystery hermit crabs (peach legs? small. got them for free). I feed my fish a thumb sized amount of freeze dried plankton enriched in a vitamin/garlic/selcon mix. Then I feed my angels a small triangle of Julian Sprung sheet algae daily also. I use a a turkey baister to stir up the sand and the crap off the rocks about twice a week. I have four power heads in the tank, so my flow is pritty good. I try to do about 15% water dhanges every week or every other. The compacts are not that old. I got the fixture in August. Isn't it every 6mo you need to change them?

 

[ClarkiiClown]

How is your phosphate level?

What kind of water do you use?


Have you considered a LMB or something of the sort?
Emerald crabs?

 

[Oceans Ferevh]

My phosphates are at .1 and I use Di water from my Kent system. I have one emerald crab right now. I would love to get about 4-6 more along with a crap load more snails and hermits.

 

[hillbilly]

A good, powerful, oversized skimmer will really help with the nutrient export, making "a crap load more snails and hermits" unecessary. I think prevention of bad algae by nutrient export is better than the "bandaid" method of macros, sand beds, snails,crabs, and etc. I don't want to change the nutrients, I want that poop removed from my tanks before it rots and becomes food for algae. LOL! Heck, I even soak fish food and carbon in RO DI water to release any phosphates before adding them to the tank. Works too. :wink:

 

[Oceans Ferevh]

Yeah, a new skimmer is a good idea. I still like my critters and macros though I've been aiming for a balanced meathod between science and nature, but I think the sience end hasn't been doing it's job. Prisms really are crap Thanks for all the advice folks.

 

[Anonymous]

Water-change water is RO?

 

[Tackett]

Yeah the one thing that I learned with my 55 adventure is not to skimp on the skimmer (no pun intended.) The next skimmer I get is going to be a mammoth.

 

[Oceans Ferevh]

"Water-change water is RO?"

My water is DI. I don't have an RO attached to it.

"Yeah the one thing that I learned with my 55 adventure is not to skimp on the skimmer (no pun intended.) "

No kidding. One thing I've learned it to buy quality equipment from here on out. The only prob is that I didn't know that when I bought that peice o s..t Prism Oh yes I have plans for the future and they include a sump, new skimmer, and MH lighting

 

[Anonymous]

I had been battling the dreaded hair algae for over a year. Its about gone now.

You DONT need a fuge. IMHO it is a way to mask a bigger problem. Yes they are good for nutreint export but a skimmer should do the same if tuned right plus water changes.

This is what I did, I don't know what exactly did it but the combination worked.

I removed my DSB - I don't think it was that but who knows.

I scrubbed the LR in a tub.

Did weekly 15 gallon water changes. Twice a week I took a power head to the LR adn blasted all the detritus off. Since the tank was barebottom it was easy to siphon all the detritus out.

I increased flow in the tank.

Ran my Euroreef skimmer wet.

Stopped adding any additives to the tank.

After 3 months i noticed my Alk was low. I strated adding reef builder and got the Alk to 10 DKH.

A few weeks later the alsge started disappearing.

When was the las ttime you changed your RO membrane? TDS increasing?

You skimmer could definetly use an upgrade.
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