all over the rock, dead parts of coral, even my clams’ shells
doesn’t touch live algae, nothing’s on the zoa. this is in my 65 tank,
and the algae is just beginning to get a foothold, as the one rock is clear
the 75, which is connected to the 65
acro and clam and that sht.
accurate numbers
1.026
8.1
9 dkh
0.0-.02 phosphates
ca 420-450
mag 1350
no trates, ites, ammonia
calcium reactor
feeding every other day, elos and hikari frozen mysis only for a month. brushed and suctioned out about 500000 lbs 2 weeks ago, nice and clean, now it’s back
lighting is different on both tanks, skimmer, about 30 gals in fuge w chaeto
Holly cow, Paul. I never seen algae like that before. I don’t know what to tell ya. I’ll research and see what I can find.
is this maybe red turf? I can’t quite tell by how dark the red is but it might be it.
Paul have you added anything new other then the couple clams from the meeting, and whats the TDS of the water your using for your tank?
What filter media are yo using?
[quote=“billrob71, post:4, topic:4621”]
Paul have you added anything new other then the couple clams from the meeting, and whats the TDS of the water your using for your tank?
What filter media are yo using?[/quote]
tds is 0. haven’t even added those clams. still in qt .i got some montis from A, and acouple tiny frags from mr coral, 2 very small anemone crabs.
i eliminated the filter sock filtration and basically am using chaeto, lots of rock in the fuge, and a new sro skimmer. the durso essentially goes straight to the sump where it hits a mesh bag, not the filer sock type, through the sump and back up.
http://www.melevsreef.com/id/pink_cotton_algae.html
From what Ive read in the past it’s a real PITA. There is a ton of info on various websites regarding this specie of algae.
Paul, i just did a quick glance at the info andrew linked :
: altough reekeeping wont load all day ???
if you get more snails though, check em’ very good, even quarantine… i had several pyram snails on my big turbos and astreas! you probably know that though… fwiw, i didnt get mine under control (pyrams)until i took every snail big enough to host, out of the system.
I’m blaming the LED lighting. 
Remember whenever you have an algae bloom you are probably not going to register any Nitrates or Phosphates as the algae is using it for food and therefore keeping it out of the water column so it can’t be tested.
When did it start? Have you tried not using the new food for a couple weeks to see if it goes away?
You might want to check your TDS with someone else’s meter just to be sure, you can also try to run lights out for 3 days to see if it helps slow down / stop the growth.
Apparently Asparogopsis is introduced via contamination. And it’s necessarily indicative of a nutrient over abundance and/or chemical imbalance.
Everyone is quick to ask where it came from. Where did you get it? Was it the group buy I was in on? Was it the clams you bought from the same store as I did?.. This information won’t help you much. A strand of the particular algae is only 1mm thick… in an image magnified 100X! Translation, if you knew you were getting something out of a system that had it you wouldn’t likely be able to illuminate the possibility of transferring. Thing is transferring it may not be doomsday for your tank, though always good to avoid transferring a lot.
The conditions are right for this stuff to grow in Paul’s tank. One of the reasons I know this is because there isn’t one but at least 2-3… “unsightly” things in the image. (I use this phrase because while some of what I see is algae some of it is bacteria)
The second reason I know the conditions are right is this stuff has been in that aquarium for two years. Paul I wish I took images of your tank the first time I saw it almost two years ago. If you save your old pictures, and you should, take a look back. It was FULL of this stuff. The images would look almost identical. When you went away on vacation I grabbed your tooth brush and scrubbed 99% of it off and returned it to where it was in your bathroom.(jk 
I used an old tooth brush of mine) For a while when the water changes were kept up and the media changed frequently it stayed away.
I’m not so sure it is Asparagopsis taxiformis. For one the last time we beat it off was with nutrient control and proper water chemistry. It also looks more like some species of Ceramium. We would have to see a magnified image to really get a good idea of exactly what it is.
Have you stopped using carbon and phosphate media? I would step of the water changes as well as running these medias. Not too much of either as your system isn’t used to significant changes happening. The nutrients have slowly crept up over a long period of time and unfortunately it is going to take a long time to reduce the nutrients as well. Meanwhile frequent scrubbing with a brush will keep the population lower so it doesn’t compete with corals as much.
Let me repeat though, since you have done only very small water changes for a long time a large water change or even a large scrub down without a water change would be a massive change and likely shock some of your animals. Start slow, but start soon as that stuff will eventually outcompete most of your corals.
i know it’s a lot of work but maybe look into the plenum system? i’ll help you out with it. Ken said it worked good for him and i believe him but would be a bigger believer if it worked for you. I didn’t see kens tank before but the after is awesome. It is possible the rocks have nutrients bound in them and is slowly releasing them keeping the nutrients invisible to tests. Thinking about it if you take some algae and put it in a jar without light it should die and release whatever it absorbed then test that water for nutrients and treat. Just an idea
[quote=“Gordonious, post:10, topic:4621”]
Paul I wish I took images of your tank the first time I saw it almost two years ago. If you save your old pictures, and you should, take a look back. It was FULL of this stuff. I AM GONNA CHECK THOSE IMAGES. The images would look almost identical.
I’m not so sure it is Asparagopsis taxiformis. SEE MY ID OF IT For one the last time we beat it off was with nutrient control and proper water chemistry. It also looks more like some species of Ceramium. We would have to see a magnified image to really get a good idea of exactly what it is.
Have you stopped using carbon and phosphate media? NO STILL USING IT. I would step of STEP UP??? the water changes as well as running these medias. Not too much of either as your system isn’t used to significant changes happening. The nutrients have slowly crept up over a long period of time and unfortunately it is going to take a long time to reduce the nutrients as well. Meanwhile frequent scrubbing with a brush will keep the population lower so it doesn’t compete with corals as much. YEP!
Let me repeat though, since you have done only very small water changes for a long time a large water change or even a large scrub down without a water change would be a massive change and likely shock some of your animals. Start slow, but start soon as that stuff will eventually outcompete most of your corals. [/quote]
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/maralgid15.htm
about halfway down the page. sure looks similar. if so, is this a sea hare food? besides scrubbing, running both media reactors, and w/c, would a sea hare, more snails, hermits, any cuc critter work???
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/maralgid15.htm
I don’t know if a sea hare would munch it or not, but you also have to be careful adding animals for specific purposes or that only eat specific algaes. Once the problem is gone you end up with an animal and no food for it.
I think adding some extra hermits, crabs, and snails may be a good idea as it seems there’s enough decomposition without consumption to increase nutrient levels enough to feed an algae bloom.
Paul don’t listen to tim! Tanks were fine before he cared for them! slap-stick
Sea hare and a vortech? Chopped up sea hare won’t really do much for you and in a high nutrient system if you turn off the flow… that could be disastrous. Could illuminate the one, but if you found a critter that ate every type of algae possible and the nutrients were still there… bacterial blooms. Now you have to find things that eat bacteria. So adding to what Craig said, if you found one thing that eats all that type of algae and it is now gone and another grows and you find something else to eat that and you have 5 different critters that have a veracious appetite and you have to put food into your system to feed them… Even if the mindset comes in that perhaps I could just get the critters to someone else that has an issue… still not the way I would go about it.
It is possible, though unlikely, to start a club of people that promise to keep their tanks dirty and never run proper filtration in combination with water changes and every time a different pest critter comes up you swap with clean up critters with a buddy.
All this certainly would take more work than scrubbing your rock, doing more water changes, and putting the media in your aquarium. It would also take more money to purchase all these critters. I would also have a worse impact on the environment to ship all these critters from the islands to your tanks and drive them back and forth.
I’m not saying there isn’t more than one way around it or that I definitively know what you have pictured isn’t what Andrew posted. I will say there are more the one type of high nutrient loving things in your aquarium which tells me nitrates and phosphates are higher then you want them, and I swear that looks identical to what you had and beat away before.
Took a look at the link you included Paul.
"<ID the source of your excess nutrients to treat the cause. Band-Aids might include a Diadema urchin, sea slugs such as Aplysia and Hermaea, and manual removal…oh, so much fun!> "
"All water parameters I can measure are pristine,
<Mmm, doubtful, "
So to reiterate it doesn’t matter what is in the pictures, what the person posting for WetWebMedia is stating… You have too much phosphate and nitrates going in and not enough coming out. The band-aids will not cure your aquariums issues just help it look pretty.
One other note. If you found something that ate every type of bacteria and algae that grew in your tank you would just have phosphates and nitrates in your water column that would harm both your fish and corals. You should be happy they are they otherwise your animals would likely already be significantly harmed by raw nutrients in the water column. Look at the red algae as a red flag. Don’t find a way to take the red flag down, but remove the reason it is there.
I hope my responses were helpful and not to blunt. People say my posts are too long, but I need to make them longer with kind words that bring the facts in at a softer tone. I see things from a scientific view point and just try to post what is helpful. Save the small talk for a meeting or DRC bowling night.(which I’ve heard talked about several times, but don’t think we’ve ever had one)
Woo hoo bowling!! Lol
lots of scrubbing today. billions of thanks to the dynamic duo of tim and jason. feeding only every third day. new phosguard and carbon
lookin good a fts would be good ha ha