The ongoing battle in your reef: Is there a nuisance algae that is hard to get rid of for you?

Peace River · Apr 9, 2024

The ongoing battle in your reef: Is there a nuisance algae that is hard to get rid of for you?

Those unwanted patches of algae in the reef tank. They may be there now or they may show up occasionally (even if you can’t see any at the moment). It could be green hair algae, red turf algae, Bryopsis, or an assortment of other nuisance algae. You may have found specific fish, manual removal, or clean-up crew that will knock it back for a while and lowering the organics in the tank may help. Adjusting nitrates or phosphates may even have an impact, but inevitably many tanks seem to have one or more types of nuisance algae lurking around the edges and may show up again and again. Some reef keepers have made peace with a bit of algae as long as it is under control. One approach has been to add a refugium or macroalgae to outcompete the unwanted algae. Whatever your approach, is there a nuisance algae that is hard for you to get rid of? Please share your experience and tell us about that algae that you struggle to beat once and for all.

Photo by @Myxini

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Sleeping Giant · Apr 9, 2024

always finding GHA, the neverending algae

doubleshot00 · Apr 9, 2024

Always bubble algae. Thankfully its easy to remove.

ieatbugman · Apr 9, 2024

Cyano has popped up twice for me but it is dying back quickly

Dburr1014 · Apr 9, 2024

Coraline will not stop.
Constant scraping the glass. I really wish I didn't have to do it all the time.

ieatbugman · Apr 9, 2024

I wish i had purple coraline algae in my tank, only the green stuff grows

JayM · Apr 9, 2024

I voted "Other" as I wouldn't sat I struggle with nuisance algae, but I do have to deal with it from time to time. My livestock does most of the heavy lifting, but I do occasionally pick, pull, siphon or scrub if they start slacking.

Tritie · Apr 9, 2024

I have this in my coral QT tank and nothing I do gets rid of it. It is single stranded like GHA but thicker, more coarse and attaches to everything. Peroxide does nothing for it and the crabs don't eat it. Neither do the snails. I've taken razors to the rocks and frag plugs, but it always comes back

shakacuz · Apr 9, 2024

recently been fighting off GHA in my DT/SUMP. i spent a good two weeks trying to catch a tang and 6line to make room in my tank for other fish and was feeding heavier than usual to get them in a fish trap. during this i was trying to fight off a suspected bacterial infection with cipro that tanked my bacteria population that allowed the nuisance algae to take off. my sump grew GHA that choked out my chaeto and basically turned it into mush. slowly getting nutrients in place while battling the GHA with manual removal and an increase of CUC. have been dosing bacteria and soon will be ordering copepods to help with the residuals.

occasionally i'll see a fern of bryopsis which is quickly kicked back with fluc. outside of this i have dealt with bubble algae very easily with pitho crabs. my 40B can't really house any bryopsis "eating" fish(apparently a species of rabbitfish can eat it?) other than inverts.

19Mateo83 · Apr 9, 2024

shakacuz said:
recently been fighting off GHA in my DT/SUMP. i spent a good two weeks trying to catch a tang and 6line to make room in my tank for other fish and was feeding heavier than usual to get them in a fish trap. during this i was trying to fight off a suspected bacterial infection with cipro that tanked my bacteria population that allowed the nuisance algae to take off. my sump grew GHA that choked out my chaeto and basically turned it into mush. slowly getting nutrients in place while battling the GHA with manual removal and an increase of CUC. have been dosing bacteria and soon will be ordering copepods to help with the residuals.

occasionally i'll see a fern of bryopsis which is quickly kicked back with fluc. outside of this i have dealt with bubble algae very easily with pitho crabs. my 40B can't really house any bryopsis "eating" fish(apparently a species of rabbitfish can eat it?) other than inverts.

I can’t seem to find pithos crabs for the life of me.

shakacuz · Apr 9, 2024

19Mateo83 said:
I can’t seem to find pithos crabs for the life of me.

reefcleaners.org usually carries them. if they're out of stock send them an email to see when next shipment is.

Sump Crab · Apr 9, 2024

I chose that I rarely struggle with it even though I have some gha that has popped up recently. I'm incredibly lazy when it comes to water changes and I have not had a skimmer for a couple of month so it's my fault. Algae never gets out of control in my systems though. Just a little patch here or there. I just completed a water change and added a new skimmer so I assume it will be gone soon. Plus my urchin does work!

Gha around xenia

Urchin chomping

Little bit of gha against glass and sand bed

Mechano · Apr 9, 2024

I posted other.
Tangs and foxface and maybe snails a bit deal with any nuisance algae in my system.
I actually grow bubble algae in my refugium along with caulerpa prolifera so I can feed the tangs once in a while as they love it.
The tangs never touched the stuff until the foxface basically showed them that it tastes good

littlehermit0 · Apr 9, 2024

I have a Loooot of algae, but I don't struggle with it, I enjoy it actually because it makes my aquarium look more saltwater and it also provides food for my CUC, maybe cyano isn't my friend, but I rarely see it.

Marquarium · Apr 9, 2024

The entire back wall of my 300g right now is covered in GHA. Started to spread to rocks fast. It's gotten super out of control. Would love some advice. All tank params are where they should be except nitrate will not go above 20 and phosphates mega low. Definitely know it's because of the algae nutrients are low but this problem is only seeming to get worse

Fish_Fry · Apr 9, 2024

In the approximately two years my tank has been set up I’ve struggled around 2/3rds of the time.

I went slow and had very few problems in the beginning, but since then it seems I’m always battling something. From tuffs of GHA, to diatoms, to having the wrong species of decorative macro algae, (spreading instead of branching), to the occasional cyano bloom, & dinos I’ve delt with it. Heck, as others have said even coralline spreads everywhere.

Most of the major outbreaks have been tied to being out of town for 7-14 days. I try to keep things very easy for my wife and / or our pet sitter. Initially I tried having our pet sitter put the return pump in ‘feed’ mode but one time it was accidentally switched to ‘pulse’ mode. After that I figured it would be easiest for her to feed the tank with the return on. I tend to overfeed the tank, knowing a lot is going to end up in the sump. I also remove the filter socks. This way they won’t worry about why, after a few days, they hear running water, as the filter overflows into the sump.

When there is a major outbreak, the nutrient levels tend to be all over the place. Either they are higher than normal, or they have bottomed out from being consumed by the algae. Numerous water changes, plus manual removal usually helps. But once algae has set in, it's much harder to get rid of it even with correct parameters.

I know most of this is self-inflicted. I plan on installing a controller soon. My goal is to have a simple push button to activate a feed mode. This will make it easier for someone to correctly feed the tank when I'm out of town. This will also prevent the skimmer from overflowing, which is something I’ve done more times than I care to admit.

I’m also switching from filter socks to floss. I believe this will make it easier for myself and / or whomever is watching the tank. Lastly, I plan on setting up an AWC system. I expect this will help with overall stability, especially when I’m out of town.

Fingers crossed this helps.