bubble algae

[Rosco's Reefs]

My 29 gallon AIO is a complete bubble algae garden. Went berserk after I tried to eradicate a small patch and OBVIOUSLY did it wrong.  Is there any hope for this tank or should I crash it and start over?

 

Thx WAMAS

 

Ross

[YHSublime]

So you're going to hear lots of different schools of thought on this one. Some folks believe that if you pop them, the spores create more bubble algae. I've found that siphoning what you can out, and getting a bunch of emerald crabs will do the trick as well. If it's bad enough, I've taken the rock out, scrubbed it, gotten off what I could, and then tried to vac off the rest after a rinse before putting it back in the tank. 

 

Somebody made the point of, well, when the emerald crabs eat the bubble algae, what do they do? They pop it! So there's that.

 

I'd fight through it, there's always a way. 

[dpassar12]

Where is it in the tank? Sand, rocks, walls? All of the above? Pics..

[pizzaguy]

Reefcleaners.org

I had the same problem years ago. Ordered 10 emeralds and they desimatted(spell check here) it. And theres are guaranteed to eat bubble algae.

[Jon Lazar]

My standard algae answer:

 

-Manually remove what you can 

-Get something that eats the problem algae (emerald crab for bubble algae)

-Improve your water quality to prevent algae from returning.  (less feeding, more skimming, and more water changes)

[tygger]

There's definitely hope for the tank. When I neglected mine over the course of a year or so, I had tons of bubble algae. I removed what I could by hand and even popped a bunch under water by accident. I never had any luck with emerald crabs, but I started doing water regular water changes, got the fuge up and running again, and kept excess nutrients to a minimum by not over feeding. Over time, they disappeared.