HELP!!!!!!!! Red algae prolem

[Sam1son]

I have a 75 gal fish only aquarium(4 fish) that I am changing to reef. I bought a T5 6 bulb light fixture and 15 gallon sump filtration refugium with light. The problem is there is constant red algae on the live rock. I tried turning off light for 3 days, did some good but as soon as I turned back on it got bad again. Nitrates and phosphates are zero. Feed once a day and eaten in seconds. I also have 1 purple mushroom in for about 1 month, doing fine but I don't want add anymore yet. What am doing or not doing?

 

[Dr. Reef]

run some gfo, test results for nitraes and phos are not true as algae is getting to them before ur test kit. if there is only fish in the tank kill ur lights out for longer days. maybe a week. starve the algae from light and do good amount of water changes.

 

[Sam1son]

thaxx, I'm going kill lights for 7days see what results I have.

 

[bertoni]

[welcome]

How much food is going into the system? How quickly the food is eaten is less important, since most of what goes into a fish comes back out with about the same nutrient content. I think the algae will come back quickly unless the underlying problem is fixed.

 

[Motish]

Is your tank less than six months old? Does the algae look like red rounded balls scattered around the tank?
If both of the answers are yes then I've had the same thing when my tank was young. It simply went away slowly without me doing anything special...

 

[Sam1son]

The tank has been going for ten years fish only,I never had this problem until I put the t5 6 bulb light in. I only put a very small amount, maybe a pinch once a day.

 

[bertoni]

I suspect that you'll have to run some GFO at some point, or do something similar. The live rock might have adsorbed a lot of phosphate over the years.