The tank is a year old and I had a light go out on one side a few weeks ago,well turned out it was the ballast and not the bulb but I broke one of the bulbs getting them out so I replaced both bulbs with new ones. I got a diatom like I expected but then it changed,At first I thought it was hair algae because it looks like hair but it is brown and ugly,comes off the rock and glass with minor rubbing with a tooth brush.But then comes right back.I have not seen diatom do this before so I am not sure that is what it is.It is on my sand in clogs and you can pick it up.It is driving me nuts..I cleaned everything yesterday and it looks sooooo pretty but I don't wont this back so any ideas..
What is this algae
- Thread starter missc4
- Start date
wait, sorry I dont really understand why you got this algea... b cuz ur lights went out? but anyways, I think that it is a type of hair algea like you said. I havent seen any brown one b 4, but I used to have a hair algea problem and there would be green clumpsd of it on my sand, and it was a real pain get get rid of. For me, it turned out that I had the lights on for too long, and there was a slight level of phosphate in there. then, I scrubbed everything down, and my live rock has a nie purple coating of corraline algea. no hair algea what so ever.
Catpicklesdog
Hindsight is a wonderful thing!
Yes a pic would be nice. since you got new lights why dont you try making your lighting scheduel shorter? If you have sessile inverts that need light, slowly make the lighting shorter so that you dont put too much stress on them. i shortened my lighting by alot! and my corals are fine too. I keep the regular white light on for 5 hours and the actinic light on for about 3 gours. I have a bunch of mushrooms, a frog spawn, and some zoo's. They are doin fine. I have been on this schedule for about two years nowe.