Ugly brown algae taking over my tank

sandl215

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Dec 17, 2002
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I post this on General Marine also, in hopes of getting a few replys.

I have this brown algae on my rock, glass and sand. I just awful.

I do not know what eats it, (I have a couple of conches but they eat to slow)

How do I stop it from growing?

I hate it.:mad:
 
i had the same problem.first don't run your lite so long it(algea)thrives on it.second if you are still cycling the tank its a good thing it means your almost done.just clean it all off and keep the lites on for only a few hours a day.ever since i did that its been all good.one more thing i did was stop feeding everyday and you will see the fish feeding on some spots.well,give it a shot and good luck.one more thing yellow tangs love algea.
slugs
 
Hermit crabs=alegea

From what I expect that alegea is red alegea. It can come from too much light, waste, not enough water changes and not totally sure but I think nitrates play a big role creating red alegea.

The best way I know how ot control it safely and cheaply is buy several hermit crabs. I would go with the scarlet hermits, since they seem to be more duriable and are fairly cheap, like 2 bucks. The blue hermits are another option and are usually more cheap but never seem to live long for me.

Hope this helps!:p
 
If you don't have algae eaters then you may be able to use an algae remover product. But use wisely and carefully since you are adding chems to your tank. I once had brown algae very badly in a 20 gal and eventually just ended up removing everything {but reserving the same water from the tank} and cleaning it all. You may lose fish. And it was a good chance that my fish would have died either way since the algae was so bad but I lucked out and didn't lose any much to my amazement. I have heard that if you cover the tank and leave it in total darkness and add no food for a couple days it may kill the algae. Fish can go a day or two without food. Good luck.
 
It's most likely diatoms. VERY VERY common in new tanks. Bascially it's an algae that utilizes silicates to build a glass shell around itself. Once the algae dominates and "sucks up" all of the available silicate, it just starts to disappear as fast as it came. Give it about 2 weeks and the bulk of it should be history. You can wipe the glass daily if ya wish, but it will just keep coming back.
 
Originally posted by sandl215
I still have it. It;s been 2 months. I HATE IT.

I put Macro algae in the tank but it did'nt do anything except plug up my maxi jets.

Well how long is this garbage supposed to last? I for one HATE algae with a passion!

Does anyone have pics of what this looks like? I'm only now considering a FOWLR SW tank and my previous experience has been FW.

Thanks
 
Ahhhh.....love that marine algea. The brown stuff if very common in newer tanks as fishbait said, and normally will clear up soon as they use up their food sorce, however, it will only be replaced by another color...:D The best way to combat being over grown with it, is to keep up on the water quality. I've recently set my 125g back up with nothing more than live sand, a couple bits of live rock, and the bottom of my tank is a lovely shade of accorn brown, and it showed up in less than a week!! At any rate, one of the best critters I've found for keeping the bottom of the tank looking nice are dragon gobies. They dont eat it all, but they churn it up enough that the substrate stays mixed, and lookin' good. HTH

"J"
 
Originally posted by rift-n-reef
Ahhhh.....love that marine algea. The brown stuff if very common in newer tanks as fishbait said, and normally will clear up soon as they use up their food sorce, however, it will only be replaced by another color...:D The best way to combat being over grown with it, is to keep up on the water quality. I've recently set my 125g back up with nothing more than live sand, a couple bits of live rock, and the bottom of my tank is a lovely shade of accorn brown, and it showed up in less than a week!! At any rate, one of the best critters I've found for keeping the bottom of the tank looking nice are dragon gobies. They dont eat it all, but they churn it up enough that the substrate stays mixed, and lookin' good. HTH

"J"

But this stuff DOES go away, correct? After a certain amount of time? Even if you use tap water instead of RO/DI water?
 
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