sponges, green hairy algea

M

mikalis

New member
I am having a problem with alot of sponges and green hairy algea, is this ok and if not what do I do? I have tested and the only thing that is off is my nitrates are high and I have done water changes and even bought nitrate sponge to put into filter and still high, any ideas?
 
nitrate sponge is useless! i would increase the flow add some type of phosphate sponge and keep up with the waterchanges!! i would also try and pull as much of the hair algae off the rocks and get it out of the tank!
 
sponges are ok in the tank. they are filter feeders. if you dont like the look of them just pull them off. or let them grow and have a new dish scrubber...lol...
 
so then that would be the things that are coming out of them, the way they feed? looks kinda like white tubes coming from them. I was considering just taking out the rocks and scrubing them in fresh saltwater but worried about other things on them, would that work, just scrubbing (gently) them off and returning them to the tank?
 
I've done that on a couple of my rocks with major GHA. It only works temporarily because the problem isn't being taken care of. The primary causes of GHA is NO3, Phosphates, and Silicates. You need to reduce them to actually get rid of the GHA. One thing you have consider when doing that water changes is that tap water is full of all 3 of the nasties listed. The only way around is getting RO\DI water. Either from Walmart, Giant (Culligan water machines) or a friend that has a RO\DI filter. In my personal experience, the machine at Walmart seems to be better maintained.
As for the sponges, I concur with Vince (fatrip).
 
I like to use a RDSB for nitrates and phosar in a media bag for phosphate removal. If you don't like the sponges you can remove them manually or get a fish that will eat them. They won't hurt your tank and I just let mine grow as they will.
 
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