Need help getting rid of Macro

[azkass]

I've tried everything short of turning off all the lights for an extended period. It's growing all over my live rock and scrubbing, pulling etc...is only a short term fix. It's a small tank (30 gal) so herbivores I don't think will work. Aside from bleaching the rock and putting new rock in, is there anything else someone can recommend.

Thanks

 

[criticalencore]

Do you have a picture of it? Mexican grazer snails maybe or hermits. Depends on the type of algae though as to how to get rid of it. A picture would help a lot or at least a description of it

 

[mic209]

It won't hurt to throw a small tang in there short term.

 

[azkass]

I'll post a picture when the lights come on. I have hermits in there but they do nothing. Tangs IMO are hit or miss. It almost looks like a weed, kinda bushy and thick. I might just pull the rock and put some new pieces in. A fellow reefer told me to kill all the lights for 48 hours which should kill most of it off but I don't feel comfortable doing that.

 

[azkass]

Algae pic...

<a href="http://s919.photobucket.com/user/azkass/media/algae_zps6f5fc48a.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="http://i919.photobucket.com/albums/ad36/azkass/algae_zps6f5fc48a.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo algae_zps6f5fc48a.jpg"/></a>

 

[johanasu]

Scrub the rocks then run a media reactor with GFO? I found that my green hair algae went away by scrubbing but would come back. Then I tried scrubbing + GFO and it never came back.

 

[ech0o]

thats not green hair algae, looks like caulerpa to me

 

[johanasu]

Yeah, I wasn't trying to infer it was GHA, just that I had a similar problem and elimination of nutrients helped for me.

 

[spider1218]

+1 on gfo and a tang

 

[azkass]

It's not caulerpa and I'm not sure using gfo will help since my phosphates are at or near zero. I had a similar problem in my other tank, a 75 gal that I use a HOB refugium with cheato that I'm thinking May have helped eliminate the Macro in the DT. Since I am not running cheato on my 30 I'm wondering if the competition for nutrients will eventually be absorbed by the cheato and the display macro will die off.

 

[Kobashi]

It is probably a species of dictyota. (See about 3/4 of the way down within the link page below) I've been battling it recently. Good luck. Manual removal seems to be the only viable option.

http://www.reefcleaners.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=54&Itemid=60

 

[vincent92]

I have some too on one rock tho, it seems to grow fast but I haven't had it for too long so its not an infestation. Should I avoid it And get rid of the small rock? But then again I have multiple macro types so maybe I'll be OK?

 

[m-six hundred]

Toss the rock, buy some of Stolireef's rock to replace it with.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2354596

 

[johanasu]

I know in the past I've always tested at 0 phosphate but that is usually because it is bound in the algae, or so that is my understanding. I would think a phosphate export (chaeto) or absorption would help.

 

[azkass]

What if I place the rock in an aerated sealed bucket with no light. Wouldn't the algae die off fairly quickly??

 

[gcfiend]

Toss the rock, buy some of Stolireef's rock to replace it with.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2354596

+1 with Mark.

You'll spend more time and effort trying to kill that algae in the tank and stressing the entire time wondering if some of your changes is going to effect the inhabitants ($$) in the tank.

Not sure how much rock your talking about in the 30, but I would take the rock out and apply whatever remedy in containment (you have lots of stress free option there).

 

[azkass]

Agreed, I'm going to do a tank reset and scrap the rock. I have some other rock in another system that I can use. I'm going with a low light low flow LPS system with primarily acans, blastos, favia and mushrooms.

Thank you all for the input.