Please help, red algae all over my refugium plants

[reefin-rofin jr]

What should I do? There is this little bubble red algae growing all over my mud and plants in my refugium. I have a 30gallon refugium. I tryed over and over to pull them off, but it grows back, and more than the plants. I have pics, please, any advice would help.

Thank you

 

[Juruense]

Cyanobacteria can be eradicated by not feeding it and not giving it light.

 

[Fizz71]

Is it Cyano? Are we sure it's not Botryocladia?

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=490+662&pcatid=662

 

[Jstdv8]

just leave the lights out for 3 days and if its cyano it will be gone.
if you have stuff in there that needs light put it in your DT for the 3 days. your macroalgae will be fine for well over that time so it can stay.

 

[Sk8r]

Don't even worry about it. It'll come and go. As long as it's not lying in thick sheets in your display, just figure it's a phase, and if it's in your fuge, your fuge is doing what it's supposed to do, which is sop up undesired nutrients: siphon it out with a turkeybaster, and for the rest, your skimmer is your best removal tool for this stuff: as it dies, the skimmer will get some of its stuff, and for the rest, the tank willl age and become less friendly to it.

 

[t4zalews]

doesnt look liek cyano..too leafy

 

[reefin-rofin jr]

Ok, thank you for the advice. I will keep the lights off the three days and see what happens.....

 

[Sk8r]

Actually, on a second look, I'm more worried about the green algae you have in your fuge: it looks like caulerpa. I would really recommend against caulerpa. It roots in your display tank rocks and is much more serious than cyano. Plus it 'goes sexual' and spores, clouding the tank and threatening the oxygen supply, if deprived of light.

 

[Saltyllama]

Sk8r

Are you talking about the long grass-like stuff?

 

[Sk8r]

yep. Just checking. Caulerpa comes in all sorts of shapes, and that just looks suspicious.

 

[MikeTR]

Looks like cualerpa prolifera to me... and that doesn't go sexual.

 

[Saltyllama]

Damn, that's the stuff I have in my fuge. I already have a grape caulerpa infestation which forces me to run my light 24/7. I'd like to get rid of it but I don't want to kill all my rock and/or toss my big, pod filled algae ball.

Any ideas?

(Sorry for the hijack)

 

[usefulidiot213]

That's not Cyanobacteria. Cyno is a bacteria.

 

[reefin-rofin jr]

Actually, on a second look, I'm more worried about the green algae you have in your fuge: it looks like caulerpa. I would really recommend against caulerpa. It roots in your display tank rocks and is much more serious than cyano. Plus it 'goes sexual' and spores, clouding the tank and threatening the oxygen supply, if deprived of light.

Actually the green plants in my refugium you see in the picture is cheato. I think that is what you are talking about?? I bought it from a LFS. I had it, (and growing/looking great) for eight months, then all of a sudden this red algae starting taking over.

 

[VacavilleFC3S]

that is not chaeto, most likely a form of caulerpa but i can't see it clearly

it's also not cyano, it's some sort of invasive macro algae, i'd remove it before it gets worse

 

[Sk8r]

For that matter :lol: the red stuff could be gracillaria, which is great stuff---having a lot of trouble making it out. But I do advise against caulerpa. It's just a nasty invasive species. Whatever is in that picture, it's not cheato, which looks like green Brillo dish-scourer. What I see in there is an unidentified red macro ---but gracillaria is hard to grow, so I'm suspicious of it crawling up the strands of caulerpa---NOTHING's more aggressive than caulerpa. If it were mine, I'd keep the red stuff, ditch the green stuff, and get some real cheatomorpha from another source. If your lfs told you that green stuff was cheato, I'd be pretty incensed, and they owe your your money back. The pink stuff is definitely coralline, btw.

 

[jt_milstead]

That is some form of caulerpa. I have no idea what that red stuff is.It is not cyanao though.