Sea Hare

[hansmatt]

After a prolonged battle with Hair Algae, I feel I have finally found the ultimate weapon of destruction..."Harry the Sea Hare". I have tried various snails, hermits, herbivorous fish, toothbrushes & elbow grease, refugium & chaeto, phosphate reactor, carbon reactor, most suggestions except additives. In a two week time span with my new addition, I have very little, if any, hair algae left to complain about. Yes, he will get nori sheets to ensure his health.
Though they can be a bit tempermental in getting them to live through shipment and the first few days, this one is a winner. I tried one before, but never saw him after a day, and a friend (Josh) had one die early on too. They look like a giant snail/slug without the shell, around 3+ ".
My tank looks better than it has in more than a year. I'm not sure if I'll loan him out, as my kids have taken a liking to him and would hate to see him leave.
For those of you encountering a long term algae issue, I'd highly recommend trying a sea hare.

[Loverotties]

How big of tank and how long did it take for him to clean it all up?

[hansmatt]

90g, with medium algae growth, 10 days

[Loverotties]

That's fast!

[Jnicho]

Yea, sea hares rock...but they are almost impossilbe to keep alive once they run out of algae...best to find a local reefer that needs his services.

[hansmatt]

Yep, concerned about that so I fed him a nori sheet last night. I figure that doing that (and feeding my tang) every few days should keep him happy. Anyone have experience keeping one long-term?

[Kevin1000]

My 02

A $20 investment that may substantially reduce your algae issue .. and many LFS's will give you partial credit when your return it. In the scope of things .. not a bad deal .. just remember too keep nutrients under conrol so you don't have to buy another one.

[[WDT]TardFarmer]

Glad he is terminating your HA with extreme precedence

[Jrmass]

With the addition of my Phosban Reactor my hair algae will very soon be completely erradicated (not like I had a ton of it to begin with). I'm still trying to figure out why you were having such an issue with it in the first place Matt. There has to be some reason for it to flare up. How old are you bulbs in your fixture?

[hansmatt]

bulbs less than a year. I still think that I was releasing some PO4 from the argonite bed, and I was probably underskimming. Since doing the mesh mod on my skimmer, I'm emptying it daily, or even in the am and pm (though it's not super dark). I figure that I'm finally catching up with some excess waste in the water column. I've been running phosphan for a long time, and have also running the fuge...though both help, I don't think they made as big of a difference as the skimmer.

[aquawolf]

Can you post a picture of the Sea Hare you have? I am very curious as I am starting to hear about several different types.