A "Hairy" situation

[adova]

I have noticed over the past couple of weeks that my tank is growing a lot of hair. This does not look like GHA. It is more reddish in color.

About the tank:

The tank was recently rebooted about 2 months ago and everything was done from scratch again. The tank currently has inverts only and only one rock. There is about a 2 inch sand bed. The hair covers some of the sand bed and the gyres (pictured). I run carbon, GFO and an algae scrubber. Tested water parameters are spot on (Ammonia - 0, Nitrate - 0, Phos. - 0)

On filter sock after 2 days:

 

[adova]

A couple of additional notes:

Automated water changes M - F about 3 gallons per day - total tank volume is about 200g.

Running Kessil's (x3) from 8 am - 9 pm (ramping up and down over 2 hrs). Running 8 x 36" T5 HO from 11 am - 6 pm.

I throw 1/2 cube of Mysis shrimp every 3 days or so for the inverts.

Flow has not been significant since the snail kept getting into my gyres - am putting them back online today...

 

[Bent]

I bet it's cyano. Especially given that the flow is less now.

Testing is kind of useless in my mind. What the cyano needs to grow its absorbing out of the water column anyway so your going to get false negatives.

How's your detritus situation? socks collecting much? Cleaned out the sump recently?

Most of my cyano outbreaks have resolved after I've ran some socks and cleaned things up.

 

[adova]

I though about cyano, but it just does not look like what I am used to dealing with. I am going to turn the light period down a bit and increase the flow and see what happens.

The sump and socks have remained spotless since I brought the tank back up...

Shawn

 

[adova]

Interesting - I never got a chance to change anything and now all of the algae on the sand is gone as fast as it appeared. Still a little on the gyres, but not much... I hate mysteries