180g basement tank

[gmerek2]

Don't fight it too hard Alan. As you know stuff like this comes and goes during the first year of a tank being cycled. Just harvest what you can and let it run it's course. If you look at my build thread you will see I went through a lot of different algae problems I thought it would never end. Now that the tank is settled In I can't find algae anywhere but the overflows

[Origami]

Alan, by any chance, did you acid wash the rock beforehand? Like Rob, I'm amazed at how much and how fast it's grown. The nutrients feeding it are coming from somewhere and in ample quantities.

[AlanM]

Alan, by any chance, did you acid wash the rock beforehand? Like Rob, I'm amazed at how much and how fast it's grown. The nutrients feeding it are coming from somewhere and in ample quantities.

Yes, I did acid wash. Not as strong as I have in the past, though. Did 1.5 gallon muriatic in 50 gallons of water.

 

Dave thinks it might not be bryopsis, but might be derbesia. His crispata critters didn't go to town on it. It's weird enough that he may sequence it to see what it is.

[Origami]

Yeah, the thin hairs are atypical of the byopsis that I've seen - it more typically looks like short leaflets - but there are so many species, that I figured it was just something else.

 

Maybe it's Derbesia munteri? 

[AlanM]

Don't fight it too hard Alan. As you know stuff like this comes and goes during the first year of a tank being cycled. Just harvest what you can and let it run it's course. If you look at my build thread you will see I went through a lot of different algae problems I thought it would never end. Now that the tank is settled In I can't find algae anywhere but the overflows

 

Yep.  I'm not freaking out.  Mostly just amazed at the volume.  If I dried it all out I bet I'd end up with a pound of algae which just amazes me that there would be a pound of nutrient in the tank feeding this stuff.  Dave reminded me that it's actually mostly carbon, which makes sense.  I'm participating in carbon sequestration here!  I should sell my services to the government. 

 

Wonder if it's lowering the CO2 levels in my house enough to make the pH go up in the other tank...

 

Yeah, the thin hairs are atypical of the byopsis that I've seen - it more typically looks like short leaflets - but there are so many species, that I figured it was just something else.

 

Maybe it's Derbesia munteri? 

 

I will have to arm wrestle Dave for naming rights if he does the sequencing on it, and it turns out to be a brand new mutant algae that can survive acid and bleach baths.  

[mogurnda]

Thanks for dropping the algae by.  The slugs are still not showing much interest, but I will take some into work.  I'll be happy to name it after you 

[zygote2k]

I've never seen bryopsis grow that long or that color. It's typically bluish green and rarely gets more than 3" long.

Looks like regular hair algae to me. If you turn off the pumps, it grows really long- I've seen it get to a foot or more.

Hang in there- don't add any food or other snake-oil potions to combat algae- you're purposely trying to grow this stuff in order to not have issues later.

[AlanM]

I've never seen bryopsis grow that long or that color. It's typically bluish green and rarely gets more than 3" long.

Looks like regular hair algae to me. If you turn off the pumps, it grows really long- I've seen it get to a foot or more.

Hang in there- don't add any food or other snake-oil potions to combat algae- you're purposely trying to grow this stuff in order to not have issues later.

Ok. I pulled a bunch out yesterday. Seems sensible to pull it and skim it out.

[AlanM]

It looks like some of the pictures I've seen of bryopsis pennata, but not others.  Some of it is blue-green and thick like Rob describes, some looks more green and wispy.  I've seen the thick stuff before and I agree this doesn't look like it.  

[mogurnda]

The girls have been grazing off and on.  It may not be their favorite flavor, but I guess it's good enough.  On closer inspection, the branches are radial, coming off the axis in all directions, rather than in a single plane like Bryopsis.  So, it's definitely not Bryopsis, nor is it Derbesia (what some call "regular hair algae").  Doesn't match any of my guides, but I haven't looked that hard.  Will take a batch to work tomorrow for extraction, if I remember.

[AlanM]

OK.  Good to know it's not bryopsis, and interesting that it's not derbesia.  Whatever it is, it's an agressive light user.  I see the bubbles on yours.  Mine bubbles a lot too with the amount of light I'm feeding it.  I keep thinking about cutting down on the photo cycle, but in a way I'd rather just burn it out now than wait until I'm trying to grow corals before turning the lights up and having them surrounded in algae.  

 

I do need a better way to do physical removal of it, though because it's slippery enough that I can't really get my fingers around it well and dense enough that tweezer won't cut it.  Some kind of mower would be ideal.  Maybe I'll just sacrifice some scissors to the saltwater.  Everything rusts.  Even "stainless"

[s2nhle]

Wow, I have some of that in my clown fish tank.

[khh27]

Any conclusion I got some I'm trying to remove that looks exactly like it. CUC don't touch it H2o2 doesn't work... I have tried light out period and helps a little but can't do long enough to fully do something since I have coral in the tank.

 

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[AlanM]

Dave is getting DNA results on what the algae is.  I reduced my light intensity and will just run actinics for a while.  My best guess for what is happening is that I started with totally dead rock that had some nutrient in it to decay.  I put it in the tank and lighted the heck out of it.  There must have been a minute amount of this algae, but since the rock was almost 100% dead it was able to establish a monoculture with absolutely no competition for resources and just run straight over the rocks even possibly out-competing the nitrifying bacteria for ammonia.  The algae is still growing and lush.  It looks pretty, actually.

 

I'm going to try to get some truly live sand from florida or something to add some diversity.  I've added some pods from Aquarium Depot and a couple of rocks from my established tank, but expect them to take forever to "seed" the tank.  In the meantime I'll run fewer lights and keep skimming.  I got some Vibrant from a club member to test out and have put in two doses because it's supposedly just a strain of bacteria with a little vinegar.  Possibly snake oil, but apparently not actually harmful.  So far it isn't doing doodle-squat.

[mogurnda]

Finally got a chance to send the DNA in for sequencing.  Each of three sequencing runs came back closest to Acrosiphonia.  I am not completely convinced, because the rbcL sequence is only about 88% identical to Acrosiphonia.  If it was the same species, I would expect the high 90s, so I am not convinced it's even in the genus.  By way of comparison, the Munter alga is 83% identical to Bryopsis pennata.  Acrosiphonia is a temperate and boreal genus, so I am not sure how it would get into the tank.  I suspect that Alan's alga is not in the database yet.

 

Here's a close up view.  Doesn't look quite like Acrosiphonia, but it's pretty close.

[AlanM]

Huh, pretty interesting.  It's a whole new algae type, but at least we know it's not bryopsis pennata which I thought was likely.

 

I can post a new video, but it's dying out.  I did a few large harvests after the last one I did with you and turned down the lights for a few days.  I also dosed a little Vibrant after reading that big thread on reef2reef just to see what would happen.  

 

The combo of harvest, plus running out of nutrient from rock, plus a little less light, plus maybe some Vibrant and it's going away.  Nitrate and phosphate are very low still even though the algae is dying off, so maybe the nutrient is leaving the system.

[Cliff Puckstable]

Diabolical

[mogurnda]

Huh, pretty interesting.  It's a whole new algae type, but at least we know it's not bryopsis pennata which I thought was likely.

 

I can post a new video, but it's dying out.  I did a few large harvests after the last one I did with you and turned down the lights for a few days.  I also dosed a little Vibrant after reading that big thread on reef2reef just to see what would happen.  

 

The combo of harvest, plus running out of nutrient from rock, plus a little less light, plus maybe some Vibrant and it's going away.  Nitrate and phosphate are very low still even though the algae is dying off, so maybe the nutrient is leaving the system.

The slugs wiped out the supply you gave me in a week or so.  They seemed to like it.  Glad your plague is dying down, but I am a little sad to see it go.

[AlanM]

Wow, that was a lot of algae for them to wipe out.  

 

So it never started spreading in your tank?

 

I can always see if I can grow another crop by tossing in some more food and blasting the light. 8)

[mogurnda]

Wow, that was a lot of algae for them to wipe out.  

 

So it never started spreading in your tank?

 

I can always see if I can grow another crop by tossing in some more food and blasting the light. 8)

Started to grow, but never took off.  SPS does fine, but algae dies.  Does that make me the worst aquarist ever?

 

Seriously, though, I have been diving into the literature in an effort to get the Bryopsis culture going better.  Turns out that fast growing, filamentous algae like Bryopsis, Chaetomorpha, Cladophora, etc, tend to be much more limited by nitrogen and carbon than by phosphorous.  The "Redfield Ratio" of 106:16:1 (ratio of consuming C:N:P) only works for phytoplankton, and the ratio is more like 500:30:1 for benthic algae.  My Bryopsis was limited by carbon, and a little vinegar dosing (combined with ongoing KNO3, KH2PO4 and micronutrients) has given me much better growth.  For normal people who are not trying to culture nuisance algae, but who are feeding heavily and dosing carbon in one form or another (vodka, vinegar, biopellets), I think it would be tough to eradicate Bryopsis. 

[AlanM]

Started to grow, but never took off.  SPS does fine, but algae dies.  Does that make me the worst aquarist ever?

 

Seriously, though, I have been diving into the literature in an effort to get the Bryopsis culture going better.  Turns out that fast growing, filamentous algae like Bryopsis, Chaetomorpha, Cladophora, etc, tend to be much more limited by nitrogen and carbon than by phosphorous.  The "Redfield Ratio" of 106:16:1 (ratio of consuming C:N:P) only works for phytoplankton, and the ratio is more like 500:30:1 for benthic algae.  My Bryopsis was limited by carbon, and a little vinegar dosing (combined with ongoing KNO3, KH2PO4 and micronutrients) has given me much better growth.  For normal people who are not trying to culture nuisance algae, but who are feeding heavily and dosing carbon in one form or another (vodka, vinegar, biopellets), I think it would be tough to eradicate Bryopsis.

 

Wonder if lowering Mg helps bryopsis grow since everyone swears that raising it kills it off.

 

Also, would carbon in the form of CO2 work? Or what about glutaraldehyde supplements like Seachem Flourish Excel that some people put in their freshwater planted tanks? That's what I used in mine until I got a CO2 reactor going.

[mogurnda]

Wonder if lowering Mg helps bryopsis grow since everyone swears that raising it kills it off.

 

Also, would carbon in the form of CO2 work? Or what about glutaraldehyde supplements like Seachem Flourish Excel that some people put in their freshwater planted tanks? That's what I used in mine until I got a CO2 reactor going.

I am really dubious about the whole Mg thing.  One group says it's the impurities that kill the Bryopsis, others recommend using levels that are so high that it's toxic to half of the livestock in the tank.  Justin had no luck at all with high Mg, even though he used the magic brand that supposedly had the right impurities. Nonetheless, I was desperate enough to consider the possibility, but Mg has been about 1200 to 1250, so it should have been low enough.  

 

I tried dosing CO2, but vinegar is cheaper and stays in solution much better.  Bacteria turn it into CO2 soon enough.  Not sure if glutaraldehyde would be any better, plus our environmental health people would scream at me for using it outside a fume hood.  

[zygote2k]

Raising Mg to above 1900 does indeed work to eradicate Bryopsis. I've used home depot brand, Kent M, and BRS brand- all 3 work to raise the levels and kill the Bryopsis.

[Annap729]

I tried mag but it's sooo much. What worked for me was the Red Sea stuff. That and pulling rock and spraying with peroxide. It was so thick and out of control. Back to zero.

 

 

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[AlanM]

Ready to start quarantining fish.