Bubble algae

[scubayou]

What to do?Any suggestions besides Emerald crabs that don't work.

[andycook]

Lots of manual removal. If you can take the rock out and scrape the bubbles off outside of the tank. Rinse the rock in saltwater before putting back in the tank.

If you can't remove the infested rocks, scrape the stuff off while you siphon the tank for a water change. Use the siphon hose as your scraping tool.

Persistence.

[scubayou]

Yep been doing alot of that but what about rock with polyps and and corals that is my problem.

[fish1219]

My emerald crab takes care of the bubble algae it can find. The algae on the power heads I remove by hand.

[graveyardworm]

I've been fighting it for a long time the problem is the ones you cant see or get to. Today I bought a rubbermaid container. My next attempt will be to remove my rocks one at a time place them in the container with tank water pull off all the bubbles, then rinse really well wth tank water and place them back in. I'm going to continue this until they dont come back. Just to give you an idea of how bad it can get.

[gillies]

Sorry to hear, been battling it myself. I've got no answer for you either. Tride all the usual stuff - emerald crabs etc. Posts with this question never get a good answer. I figure there is little than can be done but live with it. The more I pick at them, the more I get. Been thinking about cooking the rock just to start over and save the money from buying new.

[andycook]

Manual removal around the corals and polyps. I cut the end of my siphon hose to a point king of like a spear. I hacked at the stuff and siphoned up the bits. I had the stuff several inches thick over a lot of my rock. Took me about 8 weeks of weekly cleaning. What probably solved the problem was the volume of water I ended up changing on a regular basis more so than the mechanical removal.

[tdtiger]

bubble algae are pretty cool...let them grow for a month or two and do their job as it was intended in nature. To reduce nitrates in the water. Once it gets low enough they will start to die off on their own. I actually want to keep them but they wouldnt grow back for me no matter what I did. Odd how when u dont want it, they are there and when u want it it wont come back :)

[graveyardworm]

I've had 0 nitrates on my test kit for a long time and still cant get rid of the bubble algae. They are however very good at competing for excess nutrients. Although alittle to aggressive and hardy for my taste. In two years they've never given up one inch.

[scubayou]

I don't believe the nitrate thing ,I have 0 nitrates and I don't see a decline as of yet.

[graveyardworm]

What I believe is once established they can become free from bulk water nutrients by collecting detritus within their groupings. They can also subsist in extremely low light conditions for long peiods of time. I tried the rock cooking thing in an attempt to get rid of some and if it wasnt for manual removal during the process I believe they would have survived.