coralline algae: Why does everyone want it?

[Aqua Keepers]

miwoodar, I tore down the 125 and set up this 55g because of costs. So, I have to test my water to see if it's through it's cycle yet, but yes I would be interested.

liveforphysics, any clue as to what was killing of the coralline? I was planning on adding a coupl tuxido urchins, but not sure how many to get. Would urchins need supplemental feeding if there's not enough coralline.

 

[djneedledamage]

I have a rock burrowing urchin. Works for me, but wouldn't recommend for acrylic tanks. Awesome urchin Red with black spines.

 

[Aqua Keepers]

miwoodar, I forgot to ask how much sipped to 44515

 

[miwoodar]

Let me check what kind of rates I can get out of my office - will need to be tomorrow though as the mail room is closed for the day.

 

[Reefer_Tommy]

ok this may seem weird our out of place but I remember when I first got into salt about 7 years ago. I had a 75 gal. with 75 lbs. of dead sand that I bought from lfs. I used red sea salt. Not the reef salt. I placed a few plastic corals and about 5 large volcano rocks in the tank. Well this tank was set up for about 6 months before I moved out of my parents house. when I drained the tank the back was covered in a dark green coraline algea. I was young and stupid at the time and didn't know what it was. Oh yeah I used straight well water no filtering back then. So my question is do this algeas live in the water colum?

 

[RicksReefs]

you bought fish at the LFS and their water likely had spores in it.

 

[in2deep]

When my calcium gets much over 400 the corraline really starts to take over. At 450 it spreads incredibly in just a week. Also noticed when the corraline algae covers everything the hair and other nuisance algaes algaes seem to dissapear and when I drop the calcium vice-versa. It really does seem to compete with other algaes at least in my tank.

 

[RicksReefs]

weelllll kinda.
coraline algae thrives with good reef conditions and nuisance algae thrive when conditions get out of whack.
phosphate= food for the bad algae, inhibition of calcification for the good.
nitrate= food for the bad, including dinoflagellates, only trace amounts may be used by coraline.

 

[tmorford]

The asterina stars are the way to go if you dont want coraline they also make a great food source for harliquin shrimp if your looking to get rid of them later.

 

[Chihuahua6]

I personally don't like coralline. The purple rocks are pretty but the scraping of the glass sucks. The only thing that would get stubborn coralline off of the glass of my old tank was a razor blade.

I have a new acrylic tank now and I'm worried about removing stubborn coralline.

 

[ReefKeeperRob]

+1 for liking coralline. I actually found this thread while searching how to promote the growth of mine

Sounds like scraping the glass is a pita but there doesn't seem to be anyway around it so basically all I can do is try to keep up with it.

 

[dots]

When you first start a tank, you don't want to be the "newbie", a tank without coralline to them screams "FNG". Accelerating the transfer to purple allows one to blend into the crowd better.

At least that is my theory on why this is such a common fixation for newer reefers. Which is a clear sign of impatience that needs to be corrected for thier longterm success in the hobby.

 

[aaron1987]

I like it well enough, but it doesn't put serious strains on my Ca, etc consumptions...

 

[Maunus]

pink algae on glass

pink algae on glass

Hi All!

Merry Christmas!

I have a 75 gallon, lots of pink HARD algae trying to take over the glass. is that coralline? Is a razor blade best to remove it? I was using that just now and one of my cute little clowns

BIT ME! Ha!

I need to remove it from the front glass to see in. glass tank, not acrylic. How best to remove algae?

bob

 

[RicksReefs]

if it's hard and crusty, then it's most likely coraline. I have pink, 3 shades of purple, blue, green and yellowish coraline.
I use razor blades to keep the glass clean. I break out a fresh blade every time and inspect it as I go as a stubborn crust of coraline can bend the blade edge and then possibly scratch the glass. many people use a plastic edge (old credit card, etc) to avoid this.

 

[Schwe]

Scraping corraline off of glass SUCKS! It is handy to cover my overflow since it is partly see-through, but everywhere else it's a nuisace.

After

I use an "algae scraper" from petsmart. The blade comes out of the handle in the little blue piece if you need to use it in tighter areas.

I am rebounding from a tank crash right now due to power outage and just scraped off a whole lot of it... the whole back pane of my 90 gallon tank. :mad2:
http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2752195

 

[manuelink]

woooow it looks much better! i dont know why people want coraline algae on the glass, i hate it!!
god job Schwe!!!

 

[OwenInAZ]

I don't like coraline on my glass because, as the pictures above suggest, it's hard to see through

But I do like it on the back, overflow, and rocks. Even if it drains some calcium and magnesium, I feel like it adds to the look of the reef. But it is totally an aesthetic thing I guess.

 

[chrisstie]

I have seen coralline in pink, red, purple, and even a beautiful seafoam green. if I could have all the colors except the pink I'd be happy!

But that which grows on the glass (everyone says purple maybe I'm colorblind?) is quite a pita. I don't mind it on the rocks but my rockwork has those other colors mixed into it.

I'm not sure how to keep it out of a tank except to QT /remove any from items you are bringing into the tank.

 

[aquaman67]

IMO I think of a coralline covered tank as a heathly tank. Kinda like having a tan.

Sure, some people like the white and pasty "Goth" look, but others like a nice tan to look heathly.

To me a tank without coralline is equivalant to the "Goth" look.