brown algae problem

[Dave Crossland]

Anyone got any ideas on how to get rid of brown slime algae from my marine tank? I have tried water changes including TOTAL water change, changing substrate, replacing lighting tubes etc etc. The **** stuff is back in 24 - 48 hours. It is a slimy mess which covers everything except for my soft corals and breaks of strands to float around the tank.
My water quality remains excellent with zero nitrates. I use only RO water for changes. Fish, soft corals , shrimps, starfish etc are all in fine health but the tank is a disgusting mess. This has been with me for 8 months and I am on the point of throwing in the towel unless anybody has any good advice.
The tank is small with about 50 gallons water. lit by 3 corallife fluorescent tubes plus one blue actinic. Undergravel filtration, canister filtration with sintered glass and activated carbon, protein skimmer and regular 20% water changes. Had the tank for 2 years with no nuisance algae until this stuff arrived.
Help!!

 

[OrionGirl]

Got any snails? Snails are usually very good at cleaning up the brown algaes. However, with the age of this tank, I'd suspect a cyano algae, or a failure in the RO. Might be worth it to change the filters on your RO unit, in addition to adding a variety of snails. Increased water movement can also help out.

 

[D3adman]

Hmm drastic problems call for drastic measures...

Maybe try taking out your coral and high watt animals into a Qtank and turning the lights in your main tank off for 3 or 4 days straight.. then do a water change 50 percent with low silicate water ( good ROwater ) Algea need light and silicates too survive...no light + no silicates= bye bye algea

I admit I'm a relative NooB but...

I did it and it worked 9 )

 

[mogurnda]

Hmmm. I'm not so sure about that one. It would be stressful for the livestock and may not work. Diatoms need silicates, other algae don't.

One thing you might try is phosphate removal. Softies don't like the alumina-based products, but iron-based stuff like RowaPhos appears to work for some people. Reefscape recommends Boyd's Chemiclean; I've never used it.

 

[Dave Crossland]

Thanks for the suggestions. I do have turbosnails which help but cannot cope with the volume and the water turbulence is already high. I think the no light idea may be worth a punt - the algae are vastly reduced just after the overnight lights out period so a few days of darkness could be useful. I will have a look at the Rowaphos product although not keen on adding chemicals. However........ if it works I will be more than pleased.
Thanks again folks - just nice to have a few new avenues to explore.