what cause live rock turn green or brown
- Thread starter mqur1963
- Start date
- Location
- Forked River, New Jersey
algae
- Location
- Staten Island
high nitrites
- Location
- Garwood NJ
it all depends on how long you are running your lights how much food are you feeding plus additives the size of your skimmer are you using ro water and most important how old is the system every tank goes through its algae stages at the beginning
- Location
- Rhode island
- Location
- Forked River, New Jersey
what are your parameters? how old is the tank? what type of filtration do you have? what type of lighting? how old are the bulbs? how long do you run them? what kind of water flow do you have? what is your bioload? what type of cleen up crew do you have and abt how many?.... that would be a good place to start so we can answer your question fully...
- Location
- Union Square, NY
You need more snails and hermits for one thing.
- Location
- Forest Hills
green or brown algea
I believe in both of these cases we are looking at brand new tanks which will go through a bit of an algae cycle within the first couple of months of being set up. Not an uncommon thing to happen, but do stay on top of your water changes and parameters so it doesn't become a larger issue 
Chris Jury
Experienced Reefer
- Location
- Kaneohe, HI
Agreed with Kathy, sounds/looks like these are new tanks. Algae blooms are normal in new tanks, and darn-near unavoidable. When a new tank is set up nutrients are often liberated and there's plenty of open substate on rocks and glass and such that is not occupied by coralline algae, microbes, etc. that take time to develop.
With available nutrients and open space, the critters that can grow the fastest and capitalize on the resources do so, and you get algal blooms. With herbivory and time slower growing communities (coralline algae, microbial communities, etc.) develop and outcompete these early algal/microbial communities. Apply good husbandy and give it time (weeks to a few months) and the community will shift from these algae to corallines and other desirable species.
cj
With available nutrients and open space, the critters that can grow the fastest and capitalize on the resources do so, and you get algal blooms. With herbivory and time slower growing communities (coralline algae, microbial communities, etc.) develop and outcompete these early algal/microbial communities. Apply good husbandy and give it time (weeks to a few months) and the community will shift from these algae to corallines and other desirable species.
cj
- Location
- Midtown
I have a new tank that is barely two weeks old and am having a similar algae bloom. My question is, if I add algae-eating snails / hermit crabs in the tank, will they also be eating coralline algae once that develops?
Chris Jury
Experienced Reefer
- Location
- Kaneohe, HI
They won't damage coralline to any significant degree. That's a big part of why coralline algae are abundant in areas of high herbivory--they're heavily calcified, so they don't get eaten much. They can therefore end up taking over a lot of substrate, even though they grow so much more slowly than other, more palatable algae.
A tank that's only 2 weeks old tends to be a pretty toxic soup of nastiness. Snails and hermit crabs added before a tank is maybe a month old or so (unless the rock is from an established system) tend to die off pretty quickly, which wastes the critters' lives, and your money
I'd just keep up with good maintenance for a few more weeks, let the algae bloom, the tank begin to stabilize, and add herbivores after 4-6 weeks.cj
on my refugim green and my tank very very little green in every 2 weeks i have to spend about 5 min to clean algea but my rock turn green or brown first they look they are going to turn purple then turn dark green my sand is white very clean
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