Hair algea!

[venom00viper]

Hey I need to get a critter to take care of a little bit of green hair algea showing up. My red leg crabs don't even seem to notice. what are some other critters that will take care of this for me? Thanks for your help!

-Ben

 

[thor32766]

my blue leg hermits tore up mine.

 

[Flamehawk88]

Try a Spotted Sea Hare they will have it gone in no time!

 

[bluerug]

Well if you want a fish to get rid of it, get a starry blenny, but if just only inverts get some mexican turbo's, seem to be great for me.

 

[gatorolsen]

margarite snails did a great job for me and I have heard some blennys just love the stuff. Goodluck

Gatorolsen

 

[cham]

I have a starry blenny, a couple dozen blue legged crabs and I have a hair algea problem.

Partly because my skimmer was down for almost 2 weeks (combination of two fishes epoxy and broken ceramic shaft) and I think my fuge light was off for several weeks. Not sure how long but the switch on the clip light got clicked off.

But none of the above are touching the stuff. I had a urchin before that wiped the stuff clean out but he got stuck in the return pump.

 

[Me No Nemo]

Starry's will nibble, but won't usually get control of the stuff. Use a baster to blow off the rocks and get the detritious out. That's the fertilizer the algae needs to grow and blossom. Removing it won's solve the problem unless you remove the source as well. Check the phosphates; often they'll be high with hair algae problems. Some of the best cleaners are Mexican turbos, trochus grazers, cerith snails Red Sea Sailfin tangs (Cyndia is a hair algae fiend as is the new smaller Hawaiian sailfin I have), lettuce nudibranchs and, as Chris said above, the spotted sea hares. But don't neglect the detritious cleaners either as they will help keep the problem from reoccuring. GL, Marcye

 

[orb]

i've had good results with rowaphos. after about 3 weeks mine went away. i had a bad hair algae outbreak when someone else was feeding my tank for a week. i ran it in a phosban reactor. like what was already stated-you need to treat the problem=phosphate. rowaphos is great for that.

 

[cham]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8369560#post8369560 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Me No Nemo
Starry's will nibble, but won't usually get control of the stuff. Use a baster to blow off the rocks and get the detritious out. That's the fertilizer the algae needs to grow and blossom. Removing it won's solve the problem unless you remove the source as well. Check the phosphates; often they'll be high with hair algae problems. Some of the best cleaners are Mexican turbos, trochus grazers, cerith snails Red Sea Sailfin tangs (Cyndia is a hair algae fiend as is the new smaller Hawaiian sailfin I have), lettuce nudibranchs and, as Chris said above, the spotted sea hares. But don't neglect the detritious cleaners either as they will help keep the problem from reoccuring. GL, Marcye

I stand corrected. I just observed my starry munching on the hair algea.

Do you happen to have any mexian turbos and phosban in stock?

 

[Me No Nemo]

See pm.