A bit of caulerpa in my fuge - need I worry?

I have several strands of grape caulerpa mixed into my chateo, I never worried about it, I was happy for the little bit of diversity.

 

Well this is turning into an interesting thread. Thanks for input all. If I leave it - do I have to worry about it spreading to my main tank with my gravity fuge to sump configuration?

 

Only if it breaks free

 

So you think it could get through my eheim sump pump with sponge pre-filter and get into the display?

 

With pre-filter unless it is Houdini, no

 

Thanks. That was my thought too. Just not sure how they spread themselves around if you know what I mean.

 

I think there is two ways, by growth and breaking off and going sexual.

 

no, the prefilter will catch it and depending how much light leaks to the return section it will grow there till you clean it out.

 

I use both the Grape and Caulerpa Mexicana in my Fuge and my Seahorse tank and have since I set them up. In the seahorse tank they love it especially the smaller ones because it gives them somewhere else to hitch.

I cull at least 1/2 of it out every couple of weeks and have never had a problem. I can say that I can tell when its time to clean it out, it turns kinda white along the edges and even some of the leaves will turn white. Once I clean it out the start turning brite green again.

 

I had an issue with caulerpa in my fuge. I added come brightwell charcoal in a nylon bag and turned my fuge lights off for a day to kill some micro algae(not the smartest move). The next day my whole tank was swamp water green! I almost had a stroke. Anyway, after tons of reading and annoying people I found out that the caulerpa went sexual bc of the loss of light and nutrients(via the charcoal)and caused my whole tank to turn green. A UV sterilizer cleared it up in two days. I probably will never have caulerpa again.