liquafried Posted February 23, 2007 Share Posted February 23, 2007 Hello, and thanks for reading this post. I just moved back to San Antonio from Cali, and for the first time I've got a bad hair algae problem. Anyone know of a creature that just loves to much this stuff? yea.... this smiley kinda looked like what i looked like, when i first noticed the hair algae. I got the problem when i moved my entire 30g and all the livestock the 22hrs it took us to drive from san diego. I set it up at my parents house out in the country for 2weeks, added tap water in an emergency and BLam! thanks Russell Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wryknow Posted February 23, 2007 Share Posted February 23, 2007 I would recommend doing a large water change (like 25-50%) or two with RO/DI water for starters. I would then also use some Phosban to help control the phosphates. I just run Phosban in an E-heim canister filter on my tank along with some activated carbon and filter pads and it makes a big difference in algae growth and general water quality. As long as your not over-feeding the tank it should start to clear up in a couple of weeks. are you skimming your tank? What kind of skimmer are you using? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liquafried Posted February 24, 2007 Author Share Posted February 24, 2007 sorry bout that, im skimming with a g3, filtering with carbon, and that nasty water was in for only 2weeks. Its all ro/di now. im also doseing phosphate eliminator. So it should just clear up sooner or later? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liquafried Posted February 24, 2007 Author Share Posted February 24, 2007 and thanks for the reply Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeeperKeeper Posted February 27, 2007 Share Posted February 27, 2007 Your rock, etc. could have absorbed the phosphates from the crummy water and is now leeching it back into the new water. I agree large water changes and phosphate sponge would be a good place to start. Also, what kind of lighting are you using? Are your bulbs old? My tank had a horrible year in pretty much all of 2005. I was about ready to take the whole thing down, then as a last ditch, I did a 100% water change and at the same time took every piece of rock out and scrubbed it with a toothbrush to get as much of the HA off as possible. I then added LOTS of snails and hermits. Like 100 snails and 35 crabs (on a 75G tank) I think. That did the trick. When I saw things were improving, I invested in a T5 light set up with about twice as many bulbs as my previous PC set up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barderer Posted February 27, 2007 Share Posted February 27, 2007 The hair will go away if you lower the nitrates and or your tank recovers from the move. Hermit crabs, some star fish, and turbos much up the hair, in my experience anyway. Also if you grow some macro it will be good in taking away the nutrients the hair needs to grow and is much more controllable. N Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wryknow Posted February 27, 2007 Share Posted February 27, 2007 IMHO the majority phosphate "eliminators" are not that helpful. Their chemical make just does not allow them to absorb very much phosphate relative to the dosage. You really need the ferros-based phosphate reducers in order to adsorb a significant percentage of the phosphates. There are a couple of them on the market and they are all fairly expensive unfortunately (like $15 for a 150g container but they are good for 3 months for a 150 gallon tank so it's not that terrible really.) Phosban is the one I use but there are a couple of others with very similar composition that will most likely work just as well. The key to them is that have to move water through them pretty slowly - if the flow is too fast the particles will break down into dust and you don't want that to happen. (100-150 gph of flow is good.) You can buy a small Phosban branded reactor but a small canister filter works just as well and is great for carbon and mechanical filtration too so that seemed like a no-brainer to me. It will take a couple of weeks before you see the results but you'll be glad that you did it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liquafried Posted February 28, 2007 Author Share Posted February 28, 2007 thanks for all the input. Ill let you all know how it goes! im running a 250 20k xm, and 2 65w actinic pc the actinics are old, but the halide is new. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liquafried Posted March 1, 2007 Author Share Posted March 1, 2007 picked up a sea hair today! ..... we'll see Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liquafried Posted March 2, 2007 Author Share Posted March 2, 2007 yep sea hair is definately the way to go. munching like a champ its been 2 days and my tank is 50% clear! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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