Annnoying lettuce algae.

[invincible569]

Im starting to have a war with the lettuce algae all over my rocks and is now covering up my corals. Today I picked out so much and once I was done, little strands started to fly all over the tank once the pumps were back on. I know they will start growing everywhere now and need to find a control for this. I recently had a problem with red hair algae and that is gone forever too after I found the solution. What would you recommend in getting rid of this algae?

[mshur]

edward,
this very frustrating...here is what i did...( as per chris recommendation from rm)
i add 50 mex turbos at once and they clean up my tank with in a week..then i remove 20 and after one more week i remove other 10. now i have about 15-20 small turbos and they keeping my tank clean so far...ohh, i do have 2 tuxedo urchins..

mike

[invincible569]

Mike,

Thats exactly what I did. I ordered a lot of mexican snails from RM and thats what killed all the red hair algae so fast. I was amazed. But they wont touch the lettuce algae.

[mshur]

are u talking about dark brown,looks like seaweed

[Aged Salt]

Edward, I also was seeing some on my Fiji, coralline covered LR. My solution was manually scrapping all this off with a toothbrush over several days, & upped my Zeo-quantities for a time, inspite my Hanna P04 meter reading .00, & adding another Tunze 6200 intank. Try Mike's solution first, but if you need my dosing schedule, LMK Bob

[invincible569]

Yes. it looks like the pic below and grows in vines. Sea Algae also macro algae. Does a lettuce nudibranch eat this stuff up?

I've noticed that it has grown like crazy from my Amino Acid dosages.

Bob, thanks for the tip. I was actually using a toothbrush this morning and the worst part is that I cant below some corals that have outgrown itself (cant reach in).

[Aged Salt]

Edward, exactly how mine looked--whatever you do, first try removing as much algae mass with your hands, dental pick, toothbrush etc. as possible. Edward, while I super-upped my dosages, I continued my same quantiy of the zeo-supplements?? Bob

[mesocosm]

Greetings All !

Yes. it looks like the pic below and grows in vines. Sea Algae also macro algae. Does a lettuce nudibranch eat this stuff up?

I've noticed that it has grown like crazy from my Amino Acid dosages.

Bob, thanks for the tip. I was actually using a toothbrush this morning and the worst part is that I cant below some corals that have outgrown itself (cant reach in).

The macroalga in the picture is Caulerpa serrulata ... pesky stuff to be rid of ... and it's a producer of some relatively nasty toxins.

Sprung lists surgeonfishes, angels, and Diadema urchins as herbivores, but I've found that manual removal is most effective. Bob's toothbrush suggestion is my choice as well, but the hard to reach places are problematic. Though irritating to use, I've found dissecting tweezers to sometimes be helpful in accessing those difficult to reach places. Slow, persistent teasing ... tugging ... on a specific rhizome that extends out of the difficult to reach area may also work.

HTH ... Good Luck!

[Ger]

Edward, I think Chad had an issue with this kind of algae a while back... you may want to check with him to see what he did to get rid of it.

[wasp]

We are getting that algae here in New Zealand, from Fiji, and also this one

The brown one is even nastier it came on that yellow coral on the left & quickly spread.
When I found out how beligerant they are I removed all affected rocks and treated with boiling water, luckily it has not spread too far yet but the brown one moving surprisingly fast, the green one a lot slower. This is in a tank with nutrients so low hair algae cannot grow at all. This was just a couple of days ago I wanted to nuke it before it was to late.
All Fiji corals should be checked for this it is fairly prevalent on aquacultured coral.
BTW I asked on our local forum and apparently there is nothing we can use to eat the brown one it makes nasty chemicals to defend itself.
After I replaced the treated rocks with residue of the dead algae, some of my sps slimed profusely over the next few hours.

[reeftec]

wasp that is not the same algae,yours is dictyota probably the worst pest to have (algae wise),i have been also batteling this algae for the past 6 months ,with no success

[invincible569]

wasp... that is also the algae I have under the Sea Lettuce. Its a lot thinner and harder to remove as it will tear into pieces and float around the aquarium landing somewhere else.

So you guys dotn think the Lettuce Nudibranch will eat this stuff up?

"M-995 LETTUCE NUDIBRANCH, Tridachia crispata, Commonly found in warm, tropical waters, it has green and white ruffles resembling lettuce! Feeds on real sea lettuce and other algae. It is one of the few nudibranchs that are vegetarians, and does not feed on sponges or hydroids."

[reeftec]

edward , i can tell you that lettuce nudis donot eat dictyota ,gary mentioned before they make an alcohol base compound ,that algae grazers don't like
some people say naso tang,but you know the problems with that fish (size,messy eater)& that is still hit & miss,i tried kole tang,no go,my yellow tang doesn't touch it,& my little blue tang just gets it off the rocks,so it makes it worse even
it thrive in low nutrient envoirment as well,some people had luck withsome kind of long spine urchin but i am not sure what kind .
so we are all on the same traiN,lets keep this thread running maybe someone has a revolutionary method out there
there is a nudibranch that eats almost allkind of caulerpa,just ask your supplier i forgot its name
overall,the only thing that works in my opinion,would be cooking the rock,which almost impossible to do,cause you have to do it all in once so that means bring the tank down,i am getting really frustrated all my corals are encrusted or epoxied,so cannot take my rock out.
I WELCOME ALL SUGGESTION OR IDEAS,PLEASE LET US KNOW

[brianemone]

might be a good time for a tank upgrade???

annoying how these things can sneak in unchecked and then take over the tank.

[wasp]

Well look who's come in from the cold!! :icon_bigg

Good choice Brian