Its one thing or another lol

[blackhemi35003]

Ok now I am having hair algae starting to come. It started about a week ago so I have stocked up on a range of snails I have been doing water changes every week. And I came home today and found that it is growing pretty quick on the sand. I have 5 large handfulls of Grape algae already in there (for about 3 weeks now) its growing but I guess not fast enough. I have a Kent Marine Phosphate Sponge in there right now and have been changing it out about every couple days. Still have no idea what else to. Any ideas will be helpfull.

 

[mskohl]

Have you tested your water? What are your phosphates and nitrates reading?

How old is your tank?

I would try and find critters that eat it, otherwise, you may have to scrub.

 

[kpk]

Daniel I think the best thing to do is let your system mature and do plenty of water changes to help.

The worst thing to do is get worried about something (unless there is a real problem) considering your tank is still very young it needs time for the bacteria etc to grow and mature to filter the system.

Believe me I have had the worst of the worst hair algae and the worst thing I did was take rocks out and scrub etc trying to get it gone, but it was really a matter of letting it take care of itself. The beneficial bacteria will take hold, export nutrients and the HA will burn out more than likely.

 

[blackhemi35003]

Thank you KPK. Yeah I just never have had this problem before but oh well.

 

[captbunzo]

I definitely agree with much of KPK's thoughts here. I would like to add, as well, that you do need to make sure the tank does not have other issues going on with it.

My question would be to ask you to describe the tank in detail for us. How are you providing water flow, filtration, etc? What is your feeding schedule, what do you feed, etc?

And one note, you'd be better off using a GFO (Granulated
Ferric Oxide) phosphate remover then the Kent Marine stuff. The Kent Marine stuff is Aluminum based and has been show to leach into your system. This can cause issues with corals, fish, etc. A common GFO used in the US is Phosban.