Help With Hair Algea

[dez_newman]

So my tank has been running for 10 months now and over the last few months I have had quite a bit of hair algea. The tank is 260 litres and amonia and nitrite are zero. MY nitrate is sat at 2 and the phosphate is at 0.25, I have tried 3 days of covering my tank with no light which didn't really help . I have been using 4ml of NoPox for the last month nearly everyday and it has still slowed down but it is still growing on my sand and around the feather duster with still a bit on the rocks and glass.
Stock list:
1 Brown Sailfin Tang
3 Green Chromis
1 clown
2 Cardinals
1 Wrasse
1 Royal Gramma
1 emerald crab
1 sally lightfoot crab
9 red leg hermits
1 turbo snail
10 narssis snails
2 feather duster
Zoas
GSP
Small hammer coral
Small Torch coral


I feed seaweed every other day, a bit of flake and formula 1 pellet most days and frozen mix every other day (opposite days to seaweed). I also feed the soft corals once a week Salifert coral food.

My lights are on from 10am to 8.30pm everyday. I do a 20% water change every 4 weeks but add trace elements every week.

I don't want to take rocks out as I have coral on them.
Is there anything else I can or should I cut something out? Is there anything else I could add.
Fish seem to be happy and my Cardinal is holding at the minute so that isn't bad. I just want it to look really good

Thanks

Dez

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[McPikie]

What lights are you running, and are they on full chat for that whole period? Do you have a sump, and if so, are you running chaeto?

 

[dez_newman]

I am using TMC LED, they have a 1 hour ramp up and down time. So they are on just about maximum for 7 hours a day. I don't have a sump as I don't have room for one in the cabinet.

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[Mr Dave]

Hi pal your P04 is very high what colour is your skimmate ?
Stop the seaweed feeding for now and let the tangs munch in the hair algae.
Try and rip out as much as you can daily

 

[shady]

As above, I know its a pain but if you want to get on top of it, rip out as much by hand every night , 10 minutes of getting your hands wet every night plus the tangs eating away, its worth it in the end.

 

[doug_amanda]

I would assume nitrate and phosphate to be higher than test results say as the hair algae will be using it as it's produced,
as above stop feeding seaweed, you can also stop feeding soft corals, they don't need it, once you've pulled it off the rock give the rock a good blast with a turkey Baster, running po4 remover will go a long way to helping it clear up.
A good tip I was once told, when pulling it off the rock dispose of it in a tub of fresh water, (tap water will do) rinsing your fingers in it each time you pull some out to kill any spores.

 

[Mike and Clare]

Although I cannot comment on your light setup, I would say you are running them for too long.
When I suffered from hair algae, I changed my lights to start up at 2.30pm ramping up to 60% over one hour, then to stay at this power until 8pm and ramp back down til 10pm.
I haven't suffered from hair algae since, and I'm one of those weird people that only does 2-3 water changes a year, yes a year!
Hope this is of some assistance.
Mike