before i kill something

[SaltLife]

before i doom some poor frag into extinction, i thought i would ask the following: i have switched my tank to a new one, and of course my nitrates went thru the roof. i have been doing a lot of water changes, added a euroreef skimmer, and added some whopping vho lighting. since the new tank has taken off, i have my nitrates way down, almost non-existant, but i have this huge algae bloom unlike i have ever seen. it is like fine feathery green strands, not turf algae or spaghetti, or at least that i have seen, looks almost like little ferns. i contributed the growth to my nitrate spike and mega-lighting. has anybody dealth with this type of algae and is it bad? i figure if it's feeding on the nitrates it can't be all that terrible, or am i kidding myself. this stuff is growing like that stuff in Creepshow, hour by hour it grows. am i going to have problems when this stuff eats my nitrates to oblivion? is there anything that will eat it? i put some turbo grazers in there but they don't seem interested in it.

[jd]

Does it look like these?

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&safe=off&resnum=0&q=bryopsis&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wi

[SaltLife]

yea, i'd have to say that is a good match, bryopsis plumosa... now what?!?!?!?!

[jd]

You're in luck, many have has success with this...

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1113109

[SaltLife]

thanks for the link!! i am off to do some prevetative maintenance now...

[SaltLife]

ok, i'm not chemist, but woulnd't logic dictate that whatever is feeding this algae, which i assume is/was the excess nitrate, would also lead to its demise when the levels go down? my nitrates have dropped considerably, almost to nothing. wouldn't this stuff begin to diminish when the nitrates are reduced to 0?

[jd]

Often, the algae its self uses nitrates as soon as they become available. Thats why you can have tons of algae and little to no nitrates.

[rayk]

You can often have Nitrates 'leeching' out of your rock, as I did.  I neglected my Fish-Only LR tank for about 2 years, and even switched to non-RO water.  I used the same rock for the start of my reef tank, and BOOM, with 3 little fish in a 200+ gallon system I got Bryo coming out of my rock.  Nitrates/Phosphates zero, but yet crap everywhere.  After a failed very large sea hare slugo thing, that died from over-indulgence after clearing a very wide path, I tried the high magnesium, and it worked like a champ.  You need somewhat high magnesium anyways for calcium, so worked out both ways. 

~Rayk

[RTN_H8ter]

You can often have Nitrates 'leeching' out of your rock, as I did.  I neglected my Fish-Only LR tank for about 2 years, and even switched to non-RO water.  I used the same rock for the start of my reef tank, and BOOM, with 3 little fish in a 200+ gallon system I got Bryo coming out of my rock.  Nitrates/Phosphates zero, but yet crap everywhere.  After a failed very large sea hare slugo thing, that died from over-indulgence after clearing a very wide path, I tried the high magnesium, and it worked like a champ.  You need somewhat high magnesium anyways for calcium, so worked out both ways. 

~Rayk

Same thing applies with phosphates. Thats why you need to be carefull buying used rock, live, or dry.