Please advise what will consume this Algae

[awcurl]

This is a blow up of the algae. It has extremely tiny leaves and grows in tuffs. I have tried a yellow tang, emerald crabs, and snails. Nothing seems to want to eat this stuff. It spreads extremely easy, if any breaks off from the colony it will take hold and grow. Can someone advise a natural predator for this and possibly and ID.

thanks

 

[billsreef]

Looks like it could be a species of dictoya. Not much eats it either

 

[bigben]

i agree with bill. the only thing that gets rid of this stuff (in my experience) is removing the rocks, scrubbing the hades out of them, and then doing it again later some more. i ended up throwing out rock because of that crap some years back. catch it while you can!!! oh, and DO NOT scrub off inside your tank, because this just spreads it... oops, i just saw that you learned that one the hard way.

best of luck.
ben

 

[awcurl]

^

 

[kmk2307]

Diadema urchins and Naso tanks are both reported to eat Dictyota, however Naso tangs require a very large aquarium to be happy. I know at least some people have gotten Diadema urchins and they didn't touch the dictyota, though. It may depend how toxic the species / genotype you have growing is. What herbivores do you have now that don't eat it?

Kevin

 

[sanderson]

A Naso Tang will take care of the algae. Emeralds were hit and miss for me. I think Emeralds are better at preventing the algae from taking over early on rather than a solution to an outbreak.

 

[awcurl]

I have a yellow tang, emeral crabs, astoria snails and turbo snails, none of them will touch the stuff.

 

[sean.kinsey]

I had good luck with a fox face. You will probably need to get rid of the yellow tang...

 

[kevin_mic]

I had a foxface eat algea that looked like that.

 

[Glove]

Its the metalic blue-green nightmare algea-I have some too. I am about to combine 2 tanks into one- so I was going to break out the ole toothbrush and bucket to remove all traces of this stuff on my LR. Its just horible.

 

[MikeLJ]

I have this stuff too and it came back after scrubbing my rock with a wire brush.

 

[awcurl]

After much research, I was able to discover what will eat this. It's called the Two Barred Rabbitfish (Siganus doliatus)

I was able to order one thru my LFS and he seems to love the stuff.:beer:

 

[kmk2307]

awcurl,
Doe it like other foods also?

 

[MikeLJ]

After much research, I was able to discover what will eat this. It's called the Two Barred Rabbitfish (Siganus doliatus)

What size is your fish? I just called the LFS and they have a 3" Two Barred Rabbitfish in stock but I just wonder if he would be big enough. I have a ton of that dictoya in my 175 gallon tank. I will probably pick up an urchin while I am there.

Did the fish eat the dictoya right away or did it take some time?

 

[awcurl]

Up until today I've purposely not fed it anything to see if it would eat the algae. It took to eating it after about 3 hours of getting use to the tank. I feed some flake food today and he had no problem eating it also. He has been in the tank 2 day's and I can already see where he has been eating. It's is in the 3" - 3.5" range.

 

[chipster]

I have the same stuff, most rabbitfish eat it. Naso tang wouldn't touch it. Chip

 

[G-money]

I've had emerald crabs eat it.
Rabbitfish are usually the best bet to eat most types of algae - if anything eats it.

 

[chipster]

I've been battling this for a year, I am now cooking all my rock before i upgrade tanks. I was almost ready to pull my fish and dump a bottle of clorine in the tank when I saw the post on cooking. Chip

 

[Dag]

any updates on the two barred rabbitfish?

 

[mike89t]

I tried the doliatus rabbitfish first and it would eat the dictyota but I eventually lost it for some unknown reason. It eventually got a pinched stomach and died.

Here is the doliatus taking a bite out of the dictyota:

I also tried a long spined urchin and it didn't touch the stuff.

Now I have a Naso tang and it absolutely loves the dictyota. I've actually stopped removing it from the tank because it's acting like a natural food source for the Naso. He has taken a big dent out of it already!