The Ugly Stage - How to win

[Sdoutreefer]

You have hair and wire algae growing. Seeing no coral on this rock, I would place it in a container of tank water and pull off as much as you can by hand and scrub the rest with a firm toothbrush and some 3% hydrogen peroxide.
Return to tank, reduce white light intensity and number of hours of white lighting and add some snails such as :
Astrea
cerith
turbo grazer
trochus

A Pencil urchin

8-10 Caribbean blue leg hermits

Are you using RODI water or tap water from the faucet ?
What is your phosphate level?
Is tank at or near a window?

I unfortunately have some corals. They haven't encrusted to the rock yet so I MIGHT be able to pull them off. Only issues with that is I have no where to put them. I'm just going to keep doing water changes and watch nutrient import.

My tank is still incredibly young, about 3 months. I realize I pushed it getting the SPS into the system, but thankfully they're happy and growing. I just have the uglies going on.

I use RODI water.
Phophate was undetectable via Saliftert (tested 2 days ago).
Tank is near a window but heavily shaded and does not get direct and/or indirect sunlight.

CUC consists of 10 hermints (5 blue legs, 5 mexican scarlets), 10 ceriths, 3 nassarius (they're worthless), 10 trochus and 1 large white footed trochus (HE is new to the tank, but doing exactly what I got him for. Just doesn't move around much, which I guess is a good sign?

If I can't get a handle on it, I'll have to figure out something to do with my coral and get more aggressive.

 

[Sdoutreefer]

Healthy green algae is green. There seems to be a rather more complex collection of colors and filaments covering the rocks. Overall impression is a sickly algae growth that might not be appetizing. The pale filaments could be starving. The bright green areas might be cyanobacteria, but focus not good enough to tell.

Thank you for the input!

The bright green is not cyano, at least it's not the cyano I'm used to. It does not wipe/turkey baste off the rock. It is actually incredibly hard, and not slimy... Green Coraline? You can see in my photos there is some pink/purple popping up near those bright green spots.

As for the pale stuff, I do believe it is starving, which I'm OK with. Since the pictures were taken, I've had quite a bit of that pail stuff slough off the rock and head down into my filter. There is plenty of green stuff around the tank, for the tank mates. I just want to make dang sure I don't have dynos. I don't believe it looks like dynos, but @goosemans above made me paranoid

I'm down with having patience. If not, I would not be in this hobby. With that being said, I think I just need to wait it out, and stay on top of weekly WCs. I believe I stated previously, but my tank is incredibly young. My diary app says the tank is 65 days old (+ a week or two).

The algae bloomed big time when I was out on vacation and had the in-laws looking after the tank. They overfed big time. I was only gone for 5 days. When I got home, I barely recognized my tank.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I unfortunately have some corals. They haven't encrusted to the rock yet so I MIGHT be able to pull them off. Only issues with that is I have no where to put them. I'm just going to keep doing water changes and watch nutrient import.

My tank is still incredibly young, about 3 months. I realize I pushed it getting the SPS into the system, but thankfully they're happy and growing. I just have the uglies going on.

I use RODI water.
Phophate was undetectable via Saliftert (tested 2 days ago).
Tank is near a window but heavily shaded and does not get direct and/or indirect sunlight.

CUC consists of 10 hermints (5 blue legs, 5 mexican scarlets), 10 ceriths, 3 nassarius (they're worthless), 10 trochus and 1 large white footed trochus (HE is new to the tank, but doing exactly what I got him for. Just doesn't move around much, which I guess is a good sign?

If I can't get a handle on it, I'll have to figure out something to do with my coral and get more aggressive.

The power of UV will penetrate shades-blinds curtains and may be part of the issue. You can place black construction paper from walmart on the side of tank that faces window, and you will get a good reduction.

 

[Doctorgori]

I’m no algae expert, but I can tell you healthy coralline algae is somewhat resistant to being over run by most green algae’s…
“somewhat” with emphasis
Actually anything that gets on the rock first sorta has “dibs” moving forward
The more sponges, coral, or whatever, the better

 

[Sdoutreefer]

The power of UV will penetrate shades-blinds curtains and may be part of the issue. You can place black construction paper from walmart on the side of tank that faces window, and you will get a good reduction.

That's good feedback.
I'll give it a try! Thank you

For what it's worth, there is ZERO sunlight hitting the tank at all times of the day.

 

[Sdoutreefer]

I’m no algae expert, but I can tell you healthy coralline algae is somewhat resistant to being over run by most green algae’s…
“somewhat” with emphasis
Actually anything that gets on the rock first sorta has “dibs” moving forward
The more sponges, coral, or whatever, the better

I somewhat agree with that statement. I've had coral colonies in the past, with zero visible algae, all of a sudden get overran by GHA.

The hard, bright green stuff is starting to either turn, or get overran by pink coralline, where the coralline has populated. I'm hoping that by keeping my "3 big" elements up and stable, the coralline will continue to propogate.

 

[Doctorgori]

Tank is near a window but heavily shaded and does not get direct and/or indirect sunlight.

I wouldn’t worry about sunlight per se from a spectral thing as I’ve had many tanks directly in front of open windows…
Besides all natural reefs are lit @ daylight 5500k ish

the issue is I didn’t pay enough attention to PAR and the reflective nature of a glass box to focus sun rays as the light angles change as the season progress… I was zapping corals @ PAR levels over 500 depending on the time of day

I moved my tank and didn’t pay attention to this detail
…also daytime heating resulted from the same issue

 

[Reef By Steele]

I do realize that. I've had a few tanks in the past, I just didn't recall if there was an efficient way to beat it.

I don't feel like waiting lol BUT that's the best medicine in this hobby... Patience, young grasshopper.

Here is a thread I put out. The right pods, and even rotifers will really help. It is better for the GHA to be harvested first as pods don’t walk it down a lot but will keep it at bay and eventually eat it to the root.

Dosing live phyto will out compete the nuisance algae if used daily and the right amount.

 

[shanetech77]

I reduce the intensity and time of lighting and added Mexican Turbo Snails.

 

[Sdoutreefer]

Ya know, I didn’t even think about it until you said something, but while I was away from the tank, nobody dosed live-phyto!

Here is a thread I put out. The right pods, and even rotifers will really help. It is better for the GHA to be harvested first as pods don’t walk it down a lot but will keep it at bay and eventually eat it to the root.

Dosing live phyto will out compete the nuisance algae if used daily and the right amount.

I completely spaced that I am dosing Live-Phyto daily. When I went out of town, nobody was feeding live-phyto, and that is when my algae popped up. Makes sense as to why it got so bad so fast.

On a side note, a lot of the algae is dyeing off, and becoming more manageable for the CUC. I did find a couple of sprigs that almost look like dynos in the sand. Hopefully it isn't.

 

[Sdoutreefer]

I reduce the intensity and time of lighting and added Mexican Turbo Snails.

I've reduced the photo-period but it hasn't really helped. In lieu of a turbo, I got a white footed trochus. Looks pretty close to a turbo, but will eat anything and everything, and it can flip itself over if it falls.

I don't plan on using any sort of turbo snail... Have not had any luck with them in the past.