What to do with frag with nuisance algae?

P

paperdesk

New member
I got a zoa frag from a fellow reefer, but it seems to have a good crop of hair or some other nuisance algae on it. I tried to remove the algae but it breaks before coming off the rock and seems to grow very fast. So far it hasn't spread. Should I ditch the frag before the algae takes over the tank? I could probably put it in my QT tank and try to deal with it there. It's been in the tank already for a couple weeks.

My phosphates and nitrates are 0. Mag/Cal/PH/Alk etc are good. I use RODI water. I have a cleanup crew, but they don't seem interested in eating this stuff.

Any advice?

Ted
 
A peroxide dip. Put the frag into a cup of tank water. Pour peroxide into cup until you start seeing bubbles coming to the surface. I think the ratio is 10 to 1 peroxide for 10 minutes
 
Provided that your tank has the water quality and nutrient export/processing to inhibit nuisance algae growth then such algae on a frag plug should prove absolutely irrelevant.

FWIW I would never put a SPS or LPS frag in any type of peroxide dip.
 
peasofme said:
toss it, zoas are cheap, u don't need to wreck ur tank before it's begun.
Click to expand...

That seems a bit extreme. :)

You are gonna get algae. It's in the air! Of course I don't advocate adding it, but algae happens...

If you can dip the frag in a peroxide solution and not get any dip on the zoa, that would be best. Perhaps you can remove the zoa from the plug and glue it to a small, clean rock.
 
Zoabnthidae do very well in a peroxide dip. Not all corals do though. 1 part standard 3% peroxide with 4 parts tank water for 5 minutes with some water circulation works on many types of embedded algae; not bryopsis but turf algae and hair algae and others. I would not dose peroxide into the tank.
 
It should. I've done it many times. I keep hundreds of zanthid colonies.Sometimes it takes a few days for some algae to die off, Red turf algae for example will turn orange and white and then disappear. Peroxide is a strong oxidant ;it kills many things seen and unseen including many pests that plague zaonthus and many algaes,some bacteria too. Some corals are very sensitive to it like chalices, monmitopora and most sps , ime, but zoanthus seem to enjoy the bath if it's no overdone.
 
Last edited:
Unfortunately the peroxide bath didn't work. Maybe I have Bryopsis. I put the frag in my qt tank for now. I hear raising the MG level helps kill off Bryopsis. How fast can I raise it?
 
Whenever I get a frag on a plug with algae I just use a toothbrush and scrub it off as best as possible. Once I put it in the tank, the emerald and hermits migrate to it and finish cleaning it.
 
I had some hair algae on my frag plugs but eventually it disappeared. ...most likely by something in my tank but I guess not everyone lucks out that way.
 
Followup: The original H2O2 bath didn't cut it so I thought maybe it was Bryopsis. I raised the magnesium to about 1800 but that didn't seem to help either. I did some more research, and decided it must be hair algae after all so gave them a second H2O2 bath, this time at a 1:1 ratio as recommended by some on this site. The zoa's hated it, and it took them two days before they even start opening again, but it did annihilate the algae. Not sure I'd do it again at that ratio!
 
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