Hair algae soffocating Bird's Nest

[percula99]

I have a beautiful Bird's Nest coral that is being suffocated by nuissance hair algae. I do not have a hair algae problem in the tank except for my Bird's Nest. I have taken it out several times and tweezed most of the hair algae but it is impossible to get rid of it all. In a matter of a few weeks it just grows back. I have a 180 reef and do 50 gallon water changes monthly. My phosphates are at 0.03 and my nitrates read 0. All other parameters are ideal. See below for a picture. Is there a method of ridding this poor coral of the hair algae? I have resisted chemical solutions so far, but I am open to suggestions.

http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c346/percula99/IMG_1966.jpg

[HolyScoly]

im fighting the same battle after a dumb move from my part and all i can say is keep triming it and do more water changes i have a 75g and i am doing 20% water changes weekly and its gotten better i would say 30% better in 3 weeks of doing this and my corals love it.

[davocean]

I bought an electric toothbrush to get at stuff, you might be able to get most of it.
Maybe if nutrients stay low you can rid it.

[BoxsterDude]

I just busted up my pink birds nest about the size of a really big grape fruit to get all the bubble out of it. good news it will grow together again and get bigger, I have to do this about once a yr it seems. Hair is different than bubble but both are a PITA.
I keep my lfs in red bird frags as a result.

[percula99]

I use RO/DI water, and have for many years. As I said, I do regular water changes so all parameters are excellent. I did fight a high phosphate battle so I increased the number of water changes for a while and used Pura PhosLock to get it down. My Salifert test kit says that 0.03 is a good reading. Is it not? It has been at that level for several months now. I put in a small army of scarlett hermits, but they haven't done the job either. I have a lot of macro algae in the sump as well. Aaargh!!

[useskaforevil]

i don't have a birdsnest coral so i dotn know if this would be lethal or not, but could you put it in a hospital tank and just turn off the lights fora few days?

[swimboy123]

that might work, depends on the lighting needs and the amount of light it's been getting. I would seem to think that the hair algae would be able to outlast the coral in that aspect though. Anyone else think otherwise?

[Craig Lambert]

3 questions come to mind.

What fish do you have?
How often and what do you feed?
What is your Alkalinity level?

[boomsticks]

HA will grow even without lights it would definatly win that battle against the coral. I had the same problem with a birdnest frag! I just kept trimming the HA and eventually just cleared itself. I have to do weekly somtimes twice a week water changes though.

[percula99]

I don't think the hospital tank is a good idea. As mentioned here, the hair algae would definitely outlast the coral.

As for fish, I have: Tangs (Powder Blue, Purple, Desjardini, Mimic), two Heniochus, seven chromis, three ocellaris and a Mandarin in a 180 with 230 pounds of live rock, a Geo calcium reactor and a LifeReef skimmer. My tank turns over 32 times per hour, so I have good circulation.

I feed four cubes of various Hikari frozen foods and a sheet of Nori a day (gone in about twenty minutes).

My alkalinity is at 9-10 dKh.

As mentioned previously, I don't have hair algae anywhere in the tank except what is smotheing the Bird's Nest.

[LeslieP]

I hate to tell you that you may have to break it apart (blasphemy, I know) and get rid of the parts where the HA is concentrated and then put the clean parts back. I don't know about yours, but my birdsnest grows quite quickly and in a few months, you may not even be able to tell that you did this except for the lack of HA.

[percula99]

I just spent about forty minutes tweezing the Bird's Nest, and you can see the centre is dead. What else can happen when it keeps on coming back so strong. I am thinking that I may have to break off the healthy parts and glue them to a piece of rock and form a new bird's nest of sorts. Here is the cleaned piece. You can see the centre stalks of the coral are green from the hair algae. Still leaves something to be desired, doesn't it?

http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c346/percula99/IMG_1969.jpg

[percula99]

Hey LeslieP. I just posted and saw your comment. I guess we are in agreement as to how I may have to proceed.

[DarthBaiter]

I had the same problem with my tri color valida .
I set up a 10g q tank for the Valida with a maxijet400 for circulation and no filter. I put it next my sump so I didn't have to light it. Then I put an emerald crab in there. Since he had nothing else to eat, he started cleaning it in a day and it was gone in three. After he was done, I thought the coral was done for because I saw no polyps, so I put it in my sump. Now a few months later I'm seeing maybe 6 polyps and think maybe I can save it.

[HowardW]

When you clean that coral I would take it out of the tank in a seperate tub using your tank water, as any HA that gets loose in the water will attach and begin to grow elsewhere. I would also gently blow off the coral with a PH in clean tank water when finished to remove any loose strands.

I would just keep on removing it the best you can by hand and keep up on the water parameters.

[MrPike]

Frag it into 20 dozen pieces, sell most, keep some. Your tank looks quite beautiful even with the shaggy pink thing in the middle:lol:

[percula99]

HowardW, I do take it out to clean it. Trying to get at it at the back of a 180 would be difficult at best. I put it in a large bowl of tank water and sit the bowl on a table in front of me and pluck away. Time consuming and I am losing ground with it. Every time I pluck the HA, it grows back thicker than ever.

[LeslieP]

I think our idea is a good one :D if the center of the coral is dead, then the HA is probably growing from there. I brought my tank back from a HA explosion and even though almost all of it is gone now, it will still grow on the dead parts of some of my otherwise thriving corals. Good luck!

[useskaforevil]

i must have a different kind of algea that i'm just thinking is hair because it died after 3 days with no light. oh well, good luck.

[Frick-n-Frags]

if there is HA inside the head of birdsnest, there are probably dead areas of skeleton. If there are dead areas of skeleton, it is probably best to break the head up and keep the good ends as new frags since you will never keep algae off of bare dead coral skeleton.