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Removing pest algae of a rock with corals?

jepoy

jepoy

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Again a question regarding my tank upgrade. So after my tank crashed i've been battling GHA, bubble algae, and cyano. My plan is to upgrade to a bigger tank and in the process, transfer only the water (and inhabitants of course) to the new tank while adding all new sand and rocks. That said, i do have one rock that is my "zoa garden" that has a few zoa's already growing on it nicely. It may be difficult to pluck each zoa out and transfer to a new rock. So my question is there a way of cleaning this rock without harming the zoas on it? Can I put it on a bucket of salt water and scrub the GHA, bubble algae, and cyano off it? I know that cyano and GHA are pretty much inevitable in this hobby but my main concern is introducing bubble algae spores to the new tank. Is there a way for me to save my zoa rock garden?
 
Hydrogen peroxide dip has worked for me in the past on small pieces for GHA. I've never dipped a big rock. It'll piss the hell out of your zoas for a day or two. I have noticed that a couple (not all) did have some slight color change for little while (eventually came back). I usually do a 25% H2O2 to saltwater dip for a 3-5 minutes. GHA will die within a couple days. H2O2 dips will likely kill other stuff on the rock (inverts, pods, etc.).

Bubble algae is another story. Probably have to pluck those off, h2o2 won't kill that. Or you could try biological removal. If you don't want crabs in your main tank, maybe get a QT and put in emerald crabs. Could maybe even try a small fox face.

Even though this will likely work temporarily, you should plan to have something that can out compete GHA/bubble algae. Get a nice sized fuge or algae reactor. I prefer the former.
 
Oh, and if you do scrub, I'd be careful about scrubbing a rock full of zoas a ton. Wear gloves, eye protection, and a face mask if you do scrub and do it outside. To be honest, I wouldn't go the scrubbing route with rock full of zoas.
 
I've heard of peroxide dipping. Might want to have a little 5g bucket as a "temporary holding tank" with a powerhead/heater/light over just so you can spread out the "treatment".

But if you really don't want to bring stuff over (which reusing the water most definitely will bring any algae spores that are in the water column FYI), I'd chip off the zoas from the rock with a chisel/big flathead screwdriver, if there's algae embedded between some then field surgery time and just get rid of it.
 
If you have lots of unwanted algae growing on that rock, I wouldn’t add it to your new system until it has matured for awhile (ideally if you use someone’s mature live rock).

I just feel like constant battling nuisance algae with a new tank is why many new reefers quit the hobby. Go really slow and keep it low nutrient for a long while and somehow the tank develops a resistance to nuisance algae. Don’t ask me how.

My new plumbed in frag tank got all sorts of uglies early on, so it’s not the water. Maturity is about the substrate.



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RandyC said:
Hydrogen peroxide dip has worked for me in the past on small pieces for GHA. I've never dipped a big rock. It'll piss the hell out of your zoas for a day or two. I have noticed that a couple (not all) did have some slight color change for little while (eventually came back). I usually do a 25% H2O2 to saltwater dip for a 3-5 minutes. GHA will die within a couple days. H2O2 dips will likely kill other stuff on the rock (inverts, pods, etc.).

Bubble algae is another story. Probably have to pluck those off, h2o2 won't kill that. Or you could try biological removal. If you don't want crabs in your main tank, maybe get a QT and put in emerald crabs. Could maybe even try a small fox face.

Even though this will likely work temporarily, you should plan to have something that can out compete GHA/bubble algae. Get a nice sized fuge or algae reactor. I prefer the former.
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RandyC said:
Oh, and if you do scrub, I'd be careful about scrubbing a rock full of zoas a ton. Wear gloves, eye protection, and a face mask if you do scrub and do it outside. To be honest, I wouldn't go the scrubbing route with rock full of zoas.
Click to expand...

My zoa rock is actually only about 10% covered, so it's easy enough to scrub around the zoas.. but thanks for the reminder/warning just the same. I'll probably just try the h2o2 dip and upgrading the fuge.. im hoping to emulate your spinning ball of chaeto so I can have something to stare at for hours on end lol
 
sfsuphysics said:
I've heard of peroxide dipping. Might want to have a little 5g bucket as a "temporary holding tank" with a powerhead/heater/light over just so you can spread out the "treatment".

But if you really don't want to bring stuff over (which reusing the water most definitely will bring any algae spores that are in the water column FYI), I'd chip off the zoas from the rock with a chisel/big flathead screwdriver, if there's algae embedded between some then field surgery time and just get rid of it.
Click to expand...

Gablami said:
If you have lots of unwanted algae growing on that rock, I wouldn’t add it to your new system until it has matured for awhile (ideally if you use someone’s mature live rock).

I just feel like constant battling nuisance algae with a new tank is why many new reefers quit the hobby. Go really slow and keep it low nutrient for a long while and somehow the tank develops a resistance to nuisance algae. Don’t ask me how.

My new plumbed in frag tank got all sorts of uglies early on, so it’s not the water. Maturity is about the substrate.



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Click to expand...

If what sfsuphysics says is true that spores can come over with the water then me going with all new rocks is probably useless. There's no way that I can start from scratch and cycle the new tank because I don't have the room or equipment to have two tanks running at the same time.Then Gablami talking about letting rocks mature made me think that going with brand new "dead" rocks will most likely bring me to battling uglies eventually.

All that said, would it be better to just clean my current rocks the best I can and transfer all of them to the new tank? The rocks that I have now are about a year "mature" and were pretty healthy and algae free all until the tank crash happened recently. Should I stick with the rocks that i have now and just battle the uglies in the new tank? I mean I do really like my current rockwork.
 
jepoy said:
My zoa rock is actually only about 10% covered, so it's easy enough to scrub around the zoas.. but thanks for the reminder/warning just the same. I'll probably just try the h2o2 dip and upgrading the fuge.. im hoping to emulate your spinning ball of chaeto so I can have something to stare at for hours on end lol
Click to expand...

:) the tumbling ball of chaeto is short lived if you have everything going well as it'll grow too big to tumble.
 
Well if you watch the BRS videos on youtube, their theory is to let the rocks mature (cycle) in an empty tank with next to zero light going so far as to put paper on the sides of the tank (that might be because they're in a constantly lit warehouse setting though), it supposedly allows rocks to get a good biofilm on them which helps prevent algae from taking over, and if you have a chaeto or some other macroalgae growing in a fuge with a really strong light it can out compete any nuisance algae growth. Now how true it is, I dunno, but I saw it on youtube so it has to be at least partially true :D

As to what to do with your rocks, you could always cook them (not on the stove top) Melev's reef has a how-to video on that online. However if you wanted to keep any corals, you should remove as many of them as possible from the rocks and throw them in a "frag" tank or something.

That said, what would I do, I'd probably try to wait it through, massively cut down on feeding though, get chaeto going in a fuge or algae reactor if you can, you simply need to have something that out competes the algae in the tank, reducing the tank lighting as much as possible, just enough so your zoas can survive. Depending upon the tank size, get some algae predators to gnaw at it. Not sure what happened in your tank crash, but if all the algae grazers died off that would explain why things happened. Bubble algae is a bee-eye-sea-tea-ache though, use a small diameter hose while doing water changes and try to physically remove as much as possible by flicking them off with your fingers with the hose near by.
 
You will never be able to get rid of all the algae spores and anyway you will eventually get them all back through new additions later on [emoji4] if you want to get rid of 99.9% of nuisance algae, do the beat you can manually removing it before placing the old rocks in your new tank, and make sure you have enough emerald crabs, Scarlett hermits, snails, stuff that will eat the new algae shoots faster than they can grow out again. If you don’t want to pick algae off your rock, I imagine you could also try an algicide since it sounds like you don’t have an algae reactor (?), but do it just before you move everything over so your corals don’t die from the nitrates/phosphates all the dying algae release.

But whatever you do, don’t try to “sterilize” your rocks, like dipping them all in peroxide, because then you’ll get dinos which I hear are much worse!
 
Reviving this thread with a related question. I'm thinking of putting the rocks in a bin of salt water with no lights but with a pump and heater for a few days. Will that help kill off some of the algae? Will it hurt the beneficial bacteria in my rocks having no lights?
 
It wouldn’t kill the bacteria, but you could just turn the lights off and cover the sides of the tank from ambient light and you would get the same effect as breaking down your rock and putting it in a dark bin.


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The advantage to putting it in the bin is that you can keep it without light as long as you want without hurting anything else. You also don’t need a heater to keep the bacteria alive. and the pump doesn’t need to be very strong, just enough to keep it from being stagnant. A stronger pump may help to dislodge dying algae though.
 
The idea behind keeping it in a bin is to “rehab” the rocks in before I put them into my bigger tank.

Thanks for all the pointers!


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jepoy said:
Reviving this thread with a related question. I'm thinking of putting the rocks in a bin of salt water with no lights but with a pump and heater for a few days. Will that help kill off some of the algae? Will it hurt the beneficial bacteria in my rocks having no lights?
Click to expand...
This is another benefit of our cryptic refugium. We can season rocks without light and dump rocks into and kill a lot of the crud
 
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