Hello everyone,
I’ve had a reef aquarium for several years now. It’s a Red Sea 350L.
It is maintained using the Jaubert method (deep sand), but I also use a skimmer. There are about 6 fish and a variety of corals, including LPS and SPS.
For a few months now, I’ve noticed the appearance of a macroalgae in my tank. At first, I was quite pleased because it didn’t look bad, but now I see it’s becoming increasingly invasive. It has colonized all my rocks at an alarming rate, and one of the problems is that it’s growing even against some coral bases, and even in the middle of my zoanthus. It has completely taken over two heads of my Caulastrea, and I’m afraid it might smother them as they’re starting to regress.
It’s very difficult to get rid of it. There are clusters I can harvest by hand, but the broken stems drift around the tank and continue to grow on the sand or in other areas of the aquarium. Using tweezers to remove them is an enormous task.
I’ve also resorted to a more radical method by boiling some of the live rocks without corals, as well as the upper layer of my sand bed (I’ve included photos showing before and after boiling). This method is the only one that slows down the algae’s regrowth because when I trim it, the base quickly grows back.
I’m looking for advice, but unfortunately, in France, I haven’t found any satisfactory information — neither in the literature, nor from my local fish store, nor on French-speaking forums. So, I’m trying my luck here…
Do you have any idea what this could be? Based on my Google searches, it seems like it could be a species of Codium, but I’m not very convinced as it doesn’t match all the photos I’ve seen.
Another question: do you have any advice on how to get rid of it? I’ve added snails, hermit crabs, two urchins, and a foxface rabbitfish (Siganus vulpinus), but none of them seem to eat it. My local fish store doesn’t have any suggestions for species that might feed on this algae.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Wishing you all an excellent 2025 from Paris! Thank you in advance, and see you soon!
I’ve had a reef aquarium for several years now. It’s a Red Sea 350L.
It is maintained using the Jaubert method (deep sand), but I also use a skimmer. There are about 6 fish and a variety of corals, including LPS and SPS.
For a few months now, I’ve noticed the appearance of a macroalgae in my tank. At first, I was quite pleased because it didn’t look bad, but now I see it’s becoming increasingly invasive. It has colonized all my rocks at an alarming rate, and one of the problems is that it’s growing even against some coral bases, and even in the middle of my zoanthus. It has completely taken over two heads of my Caulastrea, and I’m afraid it might smother them as they’re starting to regress.
It’s very difficult to get rid of it. There are clusters I can harvest by hand, but the broken stems drift around the tank and continue to grow on the sand or in other areas of the aquarium. Using tweezers to remove them is an enormous task.
I’ve also resorted to a more radical method by boiling some of the live rocks without corals, as well as the upper layer of my sand bed (I’ve included photos showing before and after boiling). This method is the only one that slows down the algae’s regrowth because when I trim it, the base quickly grows back.
I’m looking for advice, but unfortunately, in France, I haven’t found any satisfactory information — neither in the literature, nor from my local fish store, nor on French-speaking forums. So, I’m trying my luck here…
Do you have any idea what this could be? Based on my Google searches, it seems like it could be a species of Codium, but I’m not very convinced as it doesn’t match all the photos I’ve seen.
Another question: do you have any advice on how to get rid of it? I’ve added snails, hermit crabs, two urchins, and a foxface rabbitfish (Siganus vulpinus), but none of them seem to eat it. My local fish store doesn’t have any suggestions for species that might feed on this algae.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Wishing you all an excellent 2025 from Paris! Thank you in advance, and see you soon!
