Hair Algae on just 1 rock.

I have a rock around 1/2 foot square, since setting up my reef tank, its the only one with it on and i have 28kg, it also harbors a red coating in places, i assume this to be cyano, don't think coraline algae sticks to hair algae, anyway its getting quite bad so tomorrow i was thinking of taking the rock out the tank along with some tank water and giving it a really good scrub to remove it all, does this sound good and are there any does and don'ts,

The hair algae that was on the sanbed looking like a lawn as miraculously dissappered ;D

Thanks in advance..

 

Yes, sounds like a wise decision. Scrub well.

 

If the algae on the sand disappeared it might have run out of resources (whatever was causing the growth). If you take the rock out and scrub it I don't think you should put it back in the tank. Not 100% sure on this but just seems like it might cause some issues or cause it to spread rapidly. Then again, maybe just take the rock completely out and leave it out if it is the only one growing the algae.

 

It was a piece of live i bought from a lfs, and had no visual living organism on it of any kind, that's why i chose it, but its the only one that's growing hair algae,

I would prefer to scrub it all off and leave it in, im taking it for granted that this is just a new tank algae phase, all i run is a skimmer with live rock, no carbon nothing else, Nitrates are at 1ppm phos at 0.25, tank is due its 2nd water change tomorrow so i plan on doing it then, water change 10% every tuesday

 

I don't think removing the rock and putting it back in will effect much of anything water quality wise. Just make sure you scrub it in a bowl of tank water and then rinse it with tank water before reintroducing it.

Manual removal is really the best means at removing hair algae. Keeping your nutrients down will keep it from returning.

 

Ok, thanks, will see if it comes back again, hopefully not...

 

take the rock out and put a small amount of peroxide on the algae spots, let it sit out for about 5 minutes, rinse off in tank water (not in the tank of course ) and it will go away. Someone on here had the idea to actually put some peroxide on a toothbrush but I'm not sure that would do as good a job as putting some directly on the spots of algae and let it sit. It will slowly go away once in your tank....it's really amazing actually.

 

All done, sorry reefkeeper seen your post after i did it, will bare that in mind next time, i scrubbed it all off with a toothbrush, came off very easy then swilled it in old tank water from water change, looks like new, very happy