problem with orange/ rust colored growth!!! help!

[b_vanfossen]

I have a 2.5 maybe 3 month old 10g reef tank set up. At first I was REALLY over feeding my stock, even though my water parameters were good. I developed a big algae bloom and an orange/ rust colored stuff growing in my tank. I haven’t feed my corals for a few weeks now and have been doing massive water changes each week. The first week I did a 100% change, the second 50%, the third (last Saturday) a 50% . The green alga has dissipated. The orange has a different story. As I did the tank change on Saturday I cleaned the orange stuff off of the glass and the sand, and did the siphoning to get the dirty water and refilled the tank 50%. The following day when I got home from work (Sunday)- it had all grown back. I had to clean all the glass again and the sand. That night I treated for cyano bacteria as per instructions of the bottle. This morning the tank looked a bit clearer. When I got home today it was all back- already- sand and glass covered!!! The tank has really good flow. I have a Millennium 3000 Filter on the tank which Pumps 295 gallons per hour, so the tank water moves around quit a bit. I also removed some of the live rock so the water can flow even better. The 10 gallon has a 40 watt pc light that is 10,000 daylight, and 460nm actinic. This stuff shows no signs of letting up!!!! Because of this, and the tank being so small- I bought a 24 gallon aquapod and set it up 1 week ago today. I made the mistake of taking the thermometer out of the 10 gallon and putting it in the new aquapod to check it's temps out. As of Saturday the orange stuff has now visibly spread into my aquapod- which has never been feed due to not having livestock in it!!! The 24g aquapod has live rock, & aragonite sand. It isn’t drastic yet in the aquapod as in the 10g, but this is really frustrating! I’m always checking my water parameters which are really good- very low to no signs of ammonia, nitrite, or nitrates. I can tell by my six lined wrasse that the water quality must be off because of the texture of her skin. She still eats like a pig and acts normal, but her skin look off. It’s kind of hard to explain.
Does anyone have an idea of what it is, and how to get rid of it? I’m so frustrated right now- I would love to know how to get rid of it without getting rid of everything and starting over? Thanks so much for your help!!!
Brian

 

[bertoni]

[welcome]

The 50% water changes are pretty drastic, and I wouldn't do anything larger than 25% or so except in this situation. I would leave the live rock alone, since it's the filtration system, and perhaps look into growing and harvesting a macroalga to get the nutrients out of the system. That might take some time, but it should work. The water changes will work as well, although they're more work.

 

[b_vanfossen]

thanks for the reply- what type of macroalgae do you recommend?
thanks

 

[N8ster]

A lot of people seem to use the cheatomorpha (cheato), which kind of like a big ball of grass. Various varieties of culpera are also popular--the different types can look quite different.

 

[bertoni]

I agree that Chaetomorpha and Caulerpa are good algae to consider. Chaetomorpha has the advantage of easier care, IMO.