Red Stuff

[The Shan Man]

My tank has been running almost 3 months now. My tank parameters are as follows.

Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate .2
Phos 0
PH 8.1
SG 1.024
Alk 5

I have 1 six line wrasse
2 turbo snails
Bunch of astria and hermit crabs
2 peppermint shrimp

My tank is a 29 Gallon bio cube

I have what looks like red hair algae all of the sudden on some of my rocks an substrate. I am pretty sure it is cyno. I have very good flow as well. I feed very little. I actully watch and make sure my fish eats it all whice he always does. I do not run a skimmer as of yet but do have a small fuge with some chaeto.

I was hoping my turbo snails would clean it up but they have not. Can somebody give me some advice.

[Rob]

it sounds like hair algae with cyano on it..
a picture might help us ID that though

[The Shan Man]

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r265/Theshanman_bucket/DSC00169.jpg

[The Shan Man]

Should I just pull it off???

[CarmieJo]

I had an outbreak recently (the vacation caretaker overfed) and siphoned it off - repeatedly! I had more than you have but after 4 weeks of siphoning daily I gave up and used Red Slime Remover. It took care of the cyano but now I have diatoms although I think they are receding.

[The Shan Man]

will the turbos or hermit crabs eat it???

[CarmieJo]

will the turbos or hermit crabs eat it???
Not in my experience.

[The Shan Man]

So i have to siphon off to remove it?

[CarmieJo]

That was the only way I could get it. I was away for 9 days and so it had time to get established.

[Rob]

yes, in a normal new system it will go way as long as the system is healthy
this is just plain cyano (from the picture)
i dont see any signs of hair algae

you can siphon it as desired

[The Shan Man]

So I can leave it and it will go away on its own as long as system is healthy???

[Rob]

that is correct (most of the time).. as long as the system is properly filtered and not overfed etc. it will go away, however manually siphoning will help this process since to will have to fully grow back each time vs just maintaining.. :)

similar process as to dealing with hair algae

i should place in the disclaimer that this is a general statement, usually this problems when occurring in a new tank, will correct itself in time, but sometimes there are unknown nutrient issues that are keeping it going. so keep an eye on it and if you think its not getting better after a few weeks/month then lets revisit the issue

[The Shan Man]

Thanks Rob... Very helpful as always.