Is it Coraline?

[Superdud]

Hi, my first post so nice to meet you all. I did some reefing about 20 years ago for about 10 years, man have things changed!

I've dived through many many searches both here and on Google in general and I can't find any picture or experience that gives me confidence as to what's growing ALL OVER my rocks.

The tank is a 40G breeder with a 20G sump. It's been up just about 3 months. On advice from videos, I bought some copopods right after cycle. Whether by luck or that actually made the difference I haven't had any of the "ugly phase", so I'm unsure if this is just that finally occuring?

What makes me think it might be coraline is I can't scrape it off with my nail and there's no extra growth such as hair for the past couple weeks when it started. My doubts are it seems early for this kind of explosion of coraline. Also it occurred with a bacteria bloom that lasted a couple weeks. Finally, all the pictures and descriptions I've found it looks very flakey and patchy. This literally exploded over the course of 5 or so days.

Most parameters are "normal". Nitrates are at 10ppm, a little high but I think thats in the acceptable range? My phosphates are around .1 to .2 so a little high there as well maybe. All other readings are in line with what you would want. Has anyone seen or heard of this kind of coraline growth so suddenly?

 

[NonstopSoda]

hmmm looks like some type of green algae, coralline is usually either light - dark purple/maroonish sometimes.

 

[Rjukan]

Hi, my first post so nice to meet you all. I did some reefing about 20 years ago for about 10 years, man have things changed!

I've dived through many many searches both here and on Google in general and I can't find any picture or experience that gives me confidence as to what's growing ALL OVER my rocks.

The tank is a 40G breeder with a 20G sump. It's been up just about 3 months. On advice from videos, I bought some copopods right after cycle. Whether by luck or that actually made the difference I haven't had any of the "ugly phase", so I'm unsure if this is just that finally occuring?

What makes me think it might be coraline is I can't scrape it off with my nail and there's no extra growth such as hair for the past couple weeks when it started. My doubts are it seems early for this kind of explosion of coraline. Also it occurred with a bacteria bloom that lasted a couple weeks. Finally, all the pictures and descriptions I've found it looks very flakey and patchy. This literally exploded over the course of 5 or so days.

Most parameters are "normal". Nitrates are at 10ppm, a little high but I think thats in the acceptable range? My phosphates are around .1 to .2 so a little high there as well maybe. All other readings are in line with what you would want. Has anyone seen or heard of this kind of coraline growth so suddenly?

Hi and welcome to R2R!

While there definitely is green coraline algae, my feelings are this isn't it. This is very similar to the bright green algae that comes out during the maturing process of new rock, it should start mixing in with browns and other shades of green. It looks great though, and it's a good indicator that your tank is heading in the right direction.

Coraline will usually make it's first appearance on plastics or the corners of the glass. And it grows in circle type patterns, very slowly I might add.

 

[mh0ward]

That's pretty much what my rock looked like at about 2-3 months in... shortly after came a lot of hair algae. Based on my experience, as soon as you start to see hair algae, add some Turbo snails. I waited probably 3-4 wks before doing anything outside of trying to syphon it thinking it would clear up any time now, but it just kept coming until I added a couple Turbo snails. Within a couple of days, the Turbo's had the hair algae cut back to half. The second half took a little longer, but they kept/keep it mostly in check since then.

 

[Superdud]

Thank you all for the input. From what I recall from the past, I never saw this so I appreciate the responses. I'll keep an eye out for the hair algea! Thanks again.