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Algae Troubles

marineboy

Wonderpus
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Dec 30, 2005
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Ok, since the thread "starting my saltwater tank" I have been succesful in creating a stable and healthy environment for a couple marine species found off the California coast.

But I have had trouble recently with algae. It is a thin layer of orange-like algae that has grown on all the walls of the tank and on the inside chamber of my SeaClone protein skimmer. Can I just scrape it off with an algae scraper? Or is there a reason its growing on my tank? Its getting hard to see the tank with it blurring up the glass!

thanks,

~Michael
 
I'm unfamiliar with orange algae, but any algae can be scraped off and siphoned out in a water change. Some types of snails will eat the algae and keep your tank clean, too. Perhaps someone familiar with the California sea life could recommend some algae eaters for you.

Nancy
 
i had a similar problem but with bubble algea try a clean up crew ( a bunch of snails and hermits, and mabe a sea star that should clean up your tank in a few weeks and keep it that way until you get an octopus to eat them.
 
Behold!!! The moon snail! Tremble in fear at the all consuming destroyer of algae! To simply look upon the beast is to see the death of all aquatic plantlife! Revel in its glory as your eyes burn within their sockets and your mind screams out in chorus with your mouth at the site of that which should not be seen.
Oh wait... No no sorry they eat clams. But you might try some sea hares. They are especially good with hair algae.
So yeah... I hear they are native to calif. Id get one if I were you. Good luck with algae.
-Nick
 
Check your phosphate levels...you may need to do some water changing when you start to see matting algaes, especially the red/orange varieties.
 
Tako_Poke said:
But you might try some sea hares. They are especially good with hair algae.
So yeah... I hear they are native to calif. Id get one if I were you.

Yeah, I see sea hares a lot around Laguna, so I bet they're pretty common down by you. They're pretty big, though, and I have no idea what they eat... There are also those little black turban snails that live around tidepools on the whole CA coast... but again, I don't know what these eat, just that they're common, and fit in your theme for "local intertidal life."
 
monty said:
Yeah, I see sea hares a lot around Laguna, so I bet they're pretty common down by you. They're pretty big, though, and I have no idea what they eat... There are also those little black turban snails that live around tidepools on the whole CA coast... but again, I don't know what these eat, just that they're common, and fit in your theme for "local intertidal life."

Seahares are extremely usefull for eating unwanted algae, but watch out they will also eat the wanted macro algae too. What kind are there in califorinia? I had an eared sea hare and it got HUGE. What kind of tank of tank does marineboy have?
 
an 18 gallon running on the berlin system with 6 pieces of live rock and assorted southern california inertidal life. (sculpins, hermits, minnows, and so forth)
 
do you think that a bat star could solve the problem? I see turban snails all the time and small sea hares to but the sea hares release there digestive system when they are threatened so I think they may mess up the tank. I was thinking of adding a bat star very soon anyway but I thought that all sea stars eat mussels and other bi-valves...

~Michael
 
Originally posted by marineboydo you think that a bat star could solve the problem? I see turban snails all the time and small sea hares to but the sea hares release there digestive system when they are threatened so I think they may mess up the tank. I was thinking of adding a bat star very soon anyway but I thought that all sea stars eat mussels and other bi-valves...

Bat stars usually eat stuff they find on the bottom of the ocean, I can't remember if they eat algae, but they might...

Turban snails will probably help with the algae problem.

Sea hares (Aplysia californica) release purple ink, and sea cucumbers release their "guts". Sea hares may be ok, but they are pretty delicate and if they die, they will affect your water chemistry. I wouldn't recommend them unless you can get your tank temperature 68 or under...

Sea cucumbers eat detritus, and are more delicate than sea hares, so I wouldn't recommend them for your tank either, plus they don't eat algae.

Not all sea stars eat bivalves...

Good luck, it is probably related to your tank cycling and remember some algae is good.
 
cuttlegirl said:
Bat stars usually eat stuff they find on the bottom of the ocean, I can't remember if they eat algae, but they might...

Turban snails will probably help with the algae problem.

Sea hares (Aplysia californica) release purple ink, and sea cucumbers release their "guts". Sea hares may be ok, but they are pretty delicate and if they die, they will affect your water chemistry. I wouldn't recommend them unless you can get your tank temperature 68 or under...

Sea cucumbers eat detritus, and are more delicate than sea hares, so I wouldn't recommend them for your tank either, plus they don't eat algae.

Not all sea stars eat bivalves...

Good luck, it is probably related to your tank cycling and remember some algae is good.


Bat stars do eat algae, as well as other stars and worms. Ive always wanted a sea star in my aquarium, but they are hard to find here. Are they abundant in your tidepools? Also sea hares really arent that fragile or at least the ones I keep. Yesterday I had one really messed up by my filter but it recovered pretty good. However I found out that californian sea hares can grow up to 16 inches! So im not sure if they would fit your tank.
 
many species in my tank will eventually grow to big but I will just release them at that point. I come by sea stars pretty often since I know where to look.

bad/good news, im being forced to buy a chiller in this heat wave...I found the tank at 82 degrees one afternoon when I was out for only a couple hours. I rushed to chill it down and was lucky to suffer no losses.
But im not going to wait and let it happen again.

~Michael
 
Michael,

Have you tried setting up a fan over the open top of the aquarium? Try that a while before shelling out big bucks for a chiller.

1 gallon of water evaporating = 7000 BTU of cooling
 
Its to hard to angle a fan over the tank with having it fall into the drink...

chiller sounds needed to and freezing all this stuff every day just to cool off the tank for a little is becoming tiring...
 
Look for a fan that has a clip so you can mount it to the rim of the tank.

A couple weeks ago we had a big heatwave here. I checked the temp one afternoon and it was 86 degrees! I ran to Walmart, put two small (30 watt) fans on the tank, and it was under 80 by the time I went to bed. Now that's fast! The fans were $8 each. A chiller would have been hundreds (and really noisy!).

Dan
 

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