Coraline Algae Growing!

[MarkW19]

Well, after less than 2 months of having my 10G nano, I've noticed a spread of coraline algae. It was on just a small portion of my initial live rock, as well as the bottom of a couple of small corals I've added.

Now, it's showing up a lot more over the tank, as little pink dots on other parts of the rock, the snails/crabs' shells, etc. I guess this is a good sign?

Also, over the last couple of days I've noticed a lot of RED dots of algae all over the rock, and a bit of deep red string/hair algae that hasn't been there before. But I guess this is "bad" algae?

 

[Sadielynn]

Yay coraline is great I can remember seeing it the first time I was extatic that I had it Its a very good sign a sign of a healthy system !I cant remember what the latter is so will reserve comment on . I also have it but have not seen it as a problem .

 

[MarkW19]

What I was wondering is, I do a 25-30% PWC every 2 weeks, with good salt (Seachem, not "Reef" though, just normal). And I now have 2 hard corals (maze/brain and short-tentacled plate). Should I be dosing calcium? Or should the PWCs be enough?

I don't intend adding any mor hard corals.

 

[Sadielynn]

If you are doing water changes that should be fine just get a calcium test to back that up tho

 

[roka64]

The red stringy could be the start of cyano, more frequent PWCs and cleaning of your media should help get rid of it. Of course a pic would help...

 

[MarkW19]

I'll get a pic later when the tank lights are on

 

[MarkW19]

There's some pics here of the red algae, is it cyano? :-

http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidw49/sets/72157602267042537/

 

[lReef lKeeper]

kind of hard to tell from the pics but it LOOKS like it might be cyano.

 

[MarkW19]

Yeah the pics are bad, sorry. Damn iPhone camera

It's a deep red colour, sort of stringy. I guess I should check my phosphates, but I use good quality RO water, and only feed lightly once or twice (max) a day. My 3 lights (2 white and 1 actinic) are on together for 9 hours, with the actinic on alone for an extra hour either side. Also, my powerhead happens to be pointing RIGHT at the place the majority of the red algae is on, so I doubt it's a flow problem, as the algae is all blowing about.

The algae has also only come a couple of weeks ago.

 

[lReef lKeeper]

cyano is actually not an algae but a bacteria. i would siphon out as much as possible when doing a water change and keep up with the water changes. i would change out about 3-5 gallons a week until it subsides.

 

[MarkW19]

There's not much of it, only a few patches on just one piece of rock. I guess I'll keep my eye on it. Is there anything bad about it, except that it's unsightly?

I've got a 30% waterchange scheduled for Wednesday anyway.

 

[Sadielynn]

I would take a tooth brush and scrub it off , and then siphon it off it comes from too many nutrients in the H20 such as over feeding , and even your lights needing replaced can sometimes cause it ... what are your tests showing ?

 

[lReef lKeeper]

here is a little invention by a friend of mine ... it works great for siphoning and scrubing at the same time ...