Paul B
Well-Known Member
Framerguy, I would rather not comment on the sea hare right now.
But I will say they are very interesting.
I have a problem with eliminating algae with animals in a tank. I know everyone has a clean up crew with snails, crabs "sea Hares" etc. but it is a big misconception that you can clean up a heavy growth of hair algae with these animals. I know they all eat algae as do tangs, urchins and slugs and in the sea they work wonders. Thats why you don't see algae on a tropical reef. It grows there, ,maybe faster than it grows in your tank but you don't see it. We know it is growing because thats just about the only thing those mentioned animals eat. Urchins especially clean the rock just like it was sandblasted. If you dive at night you will see urchins all over the place.
Unfortunately, this does not work well in a tank.
In the sea there is unlimited amounts of water which dilute the nutrients and the vast majority of seawater is in a much deeper place for algae to grow. No matter how much nutrients go much below a hundred feet or so there can be no algae.
In our 18" deep tanks with all the water and nutrients confined, if algae is not growing, there may be something wrong. Algae can't be "cured" because it is not a disease. As a matter of fact it makes the water healthier.
All of the algae that is consumed by our clean up crew comes out the other end a few hours later as fertilizer. Most of that is not removed by your skimmer. Water changes will dilute it but unless you change 100% of the water every day, there will be enough nutrients there to grow algae.
Now why doesen't it grow all the time?
That is the sticking point and the question usually misunderstood.
Algae needs a few differnet chemicals or in our case pollutants to grow. If one is missing the algae can't grow. When one element is exhausted the algae will die, sometimes overnight which is the reason you will hear so many algae "cures". The truth is that it usually disappears on it's own.
My tank is very old and I still get cycles of algae, sometimes heavy hair algae. I don't have any snails or sea hares and I am not a fanatic water changer but it has always disappeared. Sometimes it takes a couple of weeks sometimes a couple of months but I know it will disappear.
Naturally, we have to limit food, clean up wastes, clean the skimmer etc. I am not saying to have a sespool as that will make the algae thicker and if we keep feeding it, it will never leave. I am just saying that your seahare or 6 1/2" crabs did not overnight eliminate all of your algae.
The best way to keep algae off your corals assuming you are not overfeeding and are not overstocked is to harvest the algae when you get a cycle. That may be difficult in a tank full of rock. I personally devised a method which for me anyway makes this easy. I built a trough out of vinyl fence post the length of my 6' tank. It is suspended over the water and slightly under the lights. The water is fed from one end and it travels to the other end where it goes back to the tank. There is a plastic window screen in the trough that I can roll up, remove and clean. During a cycle, I get very little algae in my reef because the trough has better growing conditions.
A lighted refugium will do the same thing but either way we still must remove the algae.
Removing the algae removes the exact nutrients it needs to live and it will die, not forever but for a while.
A side benefit is you can have the health giving benefits of algae without having it grow in your tank.
