Algae control

[Tang23]

I have a 40g, 10g sump with two Clowns, 1 Diamond Gobie, 3 blue damsels, 2 domino damsels, 2 scooter blennies & 1 Coral Banded shrimp & two turbo shrimp. I have a UV sterilizer & protein skimmer, a thriving Chaeto plant in my sump, all established since May of this year. Who can I add to control the algae on my rock ? I scrub the rocks it from time to time as well as scraping the glass every few days...

I feed pellets in the AM, a Mysis cube (or similar) in the afternoon & pellets at night, all between 11AM & 8PM. This is also when the lights are on.
Is this too much? Is it contributing to the algae? Too much light?
Thank you

 

[Andy Sager]

Get Astrea snails ( a.k.a. Turbo Snails). They are excellent algae eaters off glass and rock and anywhere they can get to. Don't put them in the sump tho as they may try to eat the plant. As far as the cause of the algae, is the algae green or brown?

 

[Tang23]

Green
Thanks

 

[Andy Sager]

Green
Thanks

I'd go with the Astrea/ Turbo snails then. I'd go with 5- 10 of these. If you have a lot of algae, go with 10. If it's just a little algae, 5-6 should suffice. That would be the quick way of getting rid of it. Then there are red legged and blue legged hermit crabs which do a good job on rocks but because they are small, they take some time to get the job done.
As for the cause, Green algae needs food and light to survive. If it doesn't have both, it doesn't do well. If you don't add the algae eaters, I would either reduce the lighting or reduce the amount of food being fed and do more frequent water changes. If you add the algae eaters, I wouldn't change anything so that the snails have a constant source of food. Just keep an eye on the nitrates in the tank.