New Tank - Hair Algae

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reeflover2

New member
I have a 84" x 72" x 30" reef setup that has been running for about a month now. It is in my basement and my basement windows have been allowing direct sunlight into the tank for about a week which caused a real bad hair algae outbreak as well as the rock cycling and being a new setup. To try and solve this problem and kill the algae I have put carboard over the basement windows for now and have not turned the lights on in the tank for about a week. I have also done about 150g water changes and another 100g tonight. I have been running carbon and added rowaphos the other day as well. I do not have any livestock in the tank and my nitrate test kit shows really low less than 1ppm. I am assuming that the algae has most of the nutrients binded up in it. All of the things that I have done have not seemed to start seeing the hair algae deplete at all even without the lights on. Is their any other suggestions of what might help get rid of the hair algae.
 
Seriously - patience. Do a search on new tanks and algae - for a year the majority say you will go thru various stages of various algaes - this was my experience, and that kind of problem subsides - enjoy the positive transitions - just do reasonable husbandry not radicle fixes. This is JMO and JME
 
Make sure that your bulbs are fairly new and I wouldn't run my lights for at least a few days and through another water change. after that 8-10 hrs a day.
 
My bulbs are brand new. I will take your advice and leave the lights off until the end of the weekend and I will change about 350g and then start the lights back again and hopefully that will start the process of the hair algae dyeing off as well I will keep the rowaphos in the reactor and that will help as well. Thanks for your help.
 
My 225g tank has been running now for three weeks and I have hair algea also. I added 100 snails and 50 crabs three days ago and they have already cleaned up over a third of the hair algea. You should think about adding around 200- 300 snails and crabs.
 
Astrea, Ceriths, Mexican Turbo, Margerita, Blue leg hermit, red leg hermit crabs.
A variety is best.
 
I had a HUGE hair algae break out about two weeks ago. I bought about 15 or so mexican turbo snails. did about 55gl water change and got some sand shifting gobies and it is pretty clear now. Hermit crabs would tank 2 months to clean it if it was as bad as mine. I took the lighting down to 3 hours a day.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7610889#post7610889 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by pmeninger
Make sure that your bulbs are fairly new and I wouldn't run my lights for at least a few days and through another water change. after that 8-10 hrs a day.
Click to expand...

The photoperiod recommendation is useless absent knowing what kind of light system there is.

With a new tank, and no livestock, I would just wait it out before adding something like snails which don't address the underlying problem. The nutrients that are feeding the hair algae should eventually run out.
 
My lighting is all T5. I have 24 48" T5 lamps. A mixture of UV lighting super actinic and a couple of actinic white and some coralvue 10K's and actinic blue's. They are all running on IceCap ballasts with the SLR reflectors. It is funny but I would say this stuff is still growing and spreading with the lights off. My water topoff is RO/DI. My rock is cycling a little I think but there are no traces or ammonia or nitrite. My nitrates read below 1.0 but that is probably due to the hair algae. I have changed approx 350g over the last week. I also have about 2000ml of rowaphos in my deltec reactor. Any more suggestions would be appreciated.
 
How much current do you have in your tank?

When i had a hair algae problem i bumped up my flow and it cleared up in a day or so.
 
I have about 15000gph of circulation. A little and working on it. I still have no livestock and the hair algae seems to be growing even faster since I turned the lights back on again. Is this something I am just going to let grow out and then wait for it to die off. I tested my phosphate levels and the RO/DI water read .008 and my tank also reads .008 on a D&D test kit. I assume the tank reads that low because the algae is eating it all but I am not adding anything to the tank at all. As stated earlier I have changed about 350g in about a week and a half.
 
I had real bad hair algae when I started my tank up. When I started the tank I used tap water and cheap salt to fill it (new to salt tanks at the time). I drained all my water and refilled my tank, got better salt, left all the lights off and the hair algae all went away in about a month. This is just what worked for me.
 
I have two ways to go as I have no livestock of any kind in the tank. I think my rock which is all from Haiti is still having a little die off on it as it is very porous rock.

1. Leave lights off until the algae is all gone and keep skimmer running wet and rowaphos to absorb all the nutrients that the algae releases back into the water. Then keep testing to see when the nitrates are all gone. I have no ammonia or nitrite as well.

2. Run the lights for about three hours a day and let the algae grow until there is nothing left for it to consume and then the skimmer and rowphos will absorb what the dieing algae releases back into the system.

What would you do?
 
I would run the lights as if the tank was stocked, if you turn the light on more after you think you have the algae under control it may come back. It well also help the Coraline algae adjust to the lighting. Do a search on hermits, some say lots some say not so many. Mexican turbo snails or Mexican bulldozer's as I call them work well, just make sure your frags are attached good. Pull the algae that is growing out by hand and use filter bags to catch the floating prices. If you let the algae release the nutrients back into the water it well take more time to get under control.
 
Turbo snails (large ones) cleaned my tank of hair in a matter of a few days ... I suggest 6 turbos for every 100 lbs of live rock.
 
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