Derbesia (GHA, Green Hair) that cannot be starved out.

Chris Villalobos · Dec 25, 2017

I think the reefing community needs to face the fact that some GHA will survive in Ultra Low Nutrient tanks.

I've battled a GHA, which I now believe is Derbesia, for a couple years now and finally have come to the conclusion that some GHA cannot be starved out. I basically starved my tank with Bio-Pellets and super low nutrients; this crap would just keep its green tint and hair like form. I put it in a sterile tank and it looked very nice and green for a month until I tore down the tank. I put it in my blacked out sump for a month and it came out looking very nice and green, ready for prime time in the display tank.

Nothing would eat it. All the snails, tangs, blennies, and sea hares would maybe touch it once when they first got into the tank but that was enough. They would starve to death before eating it. I even stooped to AlgaeFix for months which did slow it down, but never killed it.

It's not Bryopsis but for all it's qualities it acts like it. So I'm finally dealing with it as if it were Bryopsis.

I seriously think this type of GHA is why reefers sometimes say: "Your rocks must be leaching nutrients". Everyone believes that all hair algae can be starved and if you can't do that with your tank. something is wrong with you. It's not true.

I'm now in painful process pulling apart and scrubbing all my rocks down with H2O2. I'll never make a display that can't be broken down and lifted out of the tank again.

saltyfilmfolks · Dec 25, 2017

Does that stuff snap when you pluck it ?

Chris Villalobos · Dec 25, 2017

saltyfilmfolks said:
Does that stuff snap when you pluck it ?

No they don't. They pull out like tufts of hair. I have taken the picture really close up. Those are about a human hair thick. In real life, the zoa's are only around 3/16 to 1/4 inch wide across.

Jose Mayo · Dec 25, 2017

If it is Derbesia sp., it can be eliminated with Fluconazole.

There are several reports about this here: Bryopsis Cure: My Battle With Bryopsis Using Fluconazole

Best regards

Scorpius · Dec 25, 2017

I have something that looks similar. I'm currently wining by running gfo/carbon. I've used Fluconazole in the past which knocks it down to 90% of its original size, but it will come back.

saltyfilmfolks · Dec 25, 2017

Interesting. I wonder what type of derbesia I might be.

Scorpius · Dec 25, 2017

saltyfilmfolks said:
Interesting. I wonder what type of derbesia I might be.

I think mine is some form of turf algae as it looks like my turbo snails like to eat it if I can weaken it with gfo.

Jose Mayo · Dec 25, 2017

There are two things, IMO, that can cause fluconazole to fail, even with Bryopsis: discontinuation of treatment before the elimination of algae or very low nutrients, which cause the algae to fall into numbness and not grow; Fluconazole acts during algae growth and at points where algae is growing, so begin to eliminate them from the tips to the root.

Best regards

Scorpius · Dec 25, 2017

Jose Mayo said:
There are two things, IMO, that can cause fluconazole to fail, even with Bryopsis: discontinuation of treatment before the elimination of algae or very low nutrients, which cause the algae to fall into numbness and not grow; Fluconazole acts during algae growth and at points where algae is growing, so begin to eliminate them from the tips to the root.

Best regards

I did three times the amount of Fluconazole you're supposed to use and my algae came back. Around 60mg per gallon. I think if I used it now since my nutrients are lower I may see better results.

Jose Mayo · Dec 25, 2017

Scorpius said:
I did three times the amount of Fluconazole you're supposed to use and my algae came back. Around 60mg per gallon. I think if I used it now since my nutrients are lower I may see better results.

When the algae begin to sag, and there is a clear signal that the drug is working, treatment should be maintained until disposal, even if partial water exchange is required, to export nutrients and balance parameters, but always adding the dose of medication , in the same proportion, in the replacement water.

saltyfilmfolks · Dec 25, 2017

It plain and simple does not work well on thicker plants.

Jose Mayo · Dec 25, 2017

saltyfilmfolks said:
It plain and simple does not work well on thicker plants.

Yes, there is very little knowledge yet about the action of Fluconazole on thicker algae and macro-algae ... the first point of attachment for its use is that target algae contain ergosterol as the primary structural lipid in their cell walls, but surprisingly it also seems to work in others where ergosterol is only residual or non-existent, but algae synthesize 29-carbon sterols in its chain, and a biochemical pathway "similar" to that of ergosterol. The issue of dose and duration of treatment in these cases is yet to be established, but the answer will come with time, or other solutions.

Best regards

Mfreddy · Jan 5, 2018

saltyfilmfolks said:
It plain and simple does not work well on thicker plants.

That was my experience, even with 2 separate treatments.

Chris Villalobos · Feb 4, 2018

Just a report back on my battle with Derbesia. It's been a month now and there has been some spots of growth but very little and when I see them I get in there with either a toothbrush or 32% food grade H2O2 Glycerin mix in a 1 ml syringe for when it's hiding inside a crevasse or next to a polyp coral.
I had to purchases a Hanna ULR Phosphorus meter to get reliable readings on my PO4. Without it I really couldn't tell if I had 0 ppm or 0.08 ppm phosphate. The Hanna Low Phosphate meter is just not accurate enough. Currently my parameters are 4 ppm NO3 and o.05 ppm PO4. I would lower the nutrents down a bit but I'm trying to grow Chaeto again and I don't want to starve it out.

I do have some anecdotal evidence that my clean up crew is actually eating small amounts of Derbesia now that it's under control and not 1" to 3" inches long. I saw some on a rock one day and noted that I was going to scrub it the next day but it had disappeared overnight.

Below is a picture of a before and after the 3% H2O2 Scrub I performed the right around new years. Most of the zoas survived, but some did get scrubbed off.

brandon429 · Feb 4, 2018

Chris I can see a neat pattern

Over the last six mos or so you and I have been posting very similar takeaway actions in various challenge threads.
It's from being put through the stress, $ and time mill of reefing, and drawing similar conclusions about the journey in my opinion.

I worked so hard on my first pico only to lose it to mass red algae invasion later on (kept frag from it though/neat)

That loss after 36 mos hard work changed me. I was unwilling to ever let a plant dictate the outcome of my time again

I've seen you getting fed up, familiar ground Sir.

After reefbowl one loss I posted vids on my YouTube page of fire burning, with jet lighter, similar algae in my second reefbowl from the carry over

And that began the journey of cheats, fueled by permission to act, at least in some way.

Ff 2018 and so many of your type after pics I should have an h202 tattoo and I'll never farm algae again.

On living tissue thick zos that straight action works

On live rock, I dig it off the rocks by acute scraping, gouging, and then peroxide only in the cleaned areas post knife work...and it stopped coming back. Coralline plates over, blocks the rest given any general compliance in a range of coral accepting params.

Freedom is through getting fed up with invasion, is it not?

To remove the communal mass robs the invader of core support. I allowed myself to cheat my tank into compliance. I struggle to find any invasion post from me on the internet that isn't subtly or directly working under the notion that the invaded reefer has had, and always has, the ability to opt out of this six months ago.

There are the lucky who can make rock stacks work, but if someone simply opts for modulated access to all substrates, it's simply ensuring the system will never be overtaken by anything. Hand gardening approach from 1957 beats all of today's combined reefing approach for turning out fixed tanks, eh

**People who wield the classic hands off, non ocd method feel ruffled by this advice but I claim the two aren't mutually exclusive. Start any classic way you wanna start a reef tank.

When the sandbed forces you through every nitrate offset known to mankind, we know how to clean sandbeds so the cyano invasion stops.

Someone got algae on the rocks and corals stressed from trying to starve highly adaptive algae out of the system? Stop doing that then.

Work equals not invaded. Work smart means hardly work
Any reef approach should be able to control algae. If it can't, then just cheat it out and continue on.

B

Chris Villalobos · Feb 4, 2018

brandon429 said:
Chris I can see a neat pattern

Over the last six mos or so you and I have been posting very similar takeaway actions in various challenge threads.
It's from being put through the stress, $ and time mill of reefing, and drawing similar conclusions about the journey in my opinion.

I worked so hard on my first pico only to lose it to mass red algae invasion later on (kept frag from it though/neat)

That loss after 36 mos hard work changed me. I was unwilling to ever let a plant dictate the outcome of my time again

I've seen you getting fed up, familiar ground Sir.

After reefbowl one loss I posted vids on my YouTube page of fire burning, with jet lighter, similar algae in my second reefbowl from the carry over

And that began the journey of cheats, fueled by permission to act, at least in some way.

Ff 2018 and so many of your type after pics I should have an h202 tattoo and I'll never farm algae again.

On living tissue thick zos that straight action works

On live rock, I dig it off the rocks by acute scraping, gouging, and then peroxide only in the cleaned areas post knife work...and it stopped coming back. Coralline plates over, blocks the rest given any general compliance in a range of coral accepting params.

Freedom is through getting fed up with invasion, is it not?

To remove the communal mass robs the invader of core support. I allowed myself to cheat my tank into compliance. I struggle to find any invasion post from me on the internet that isn't subtly or directly working under the notion that the invaded reefer has had, and always has, the ability to opt out of this six months ago.

There are the lucky who can make rock stacks work, but if someone simply opts for modulated access to all substrates, it's simply ensuring the system will never be overtaken by anything. Hand gardening approach from 1957 beats all of today's combined reefing approach for turning out fixed tanks, eh

**People who wield the classic hands off, non ocd method feel ruffled by this advice but I claim the two aren't mutually exclusive. Start any classic way you wanna start a reef tank.

When the sandbed forces you through every nitrate offset known to mankind, we know how to clean sandbeds so the cyano invasion stops.

Someone got algae on the rocks and corals stressed from trying to starve highly adaptive algae out of the system? Stop doing that then.

Work equals not invaded. Work smart means hardly work
Any reef approach should be able to control algae. If it can't, then just cheat it out and continue on.

B

Right, every gardener is going to have a problem with weeds. When I look back at my tank cycling method and how fast I was putting corals in my tank I see where the outbreak may have come from. Dead rock with zero coraline algae and less than a month cycle.... Even with low nutrients it was in prime shape for a weed algae outbreak.

You speak of cheats, and yeah, when people keep telling a person it's due to your lights, or leaching rocks, or a miracle drug, or buying the right clean up crew it gives you a chance to think you don't have to do hard work.

Some gardners are satisfied with a weed filled garden but I'm not therefore I will do the hard work that needs to be done.

juliersavage · Apr 5, 2024

New to hobby and hooked. 60 gallon with lps, sps and nps. Tank is 8 months old. I have a fairly diverse clean up crew and functional fish. I started getting tuft looking algae in the crevices that is very lush and difficult to extract and nothing seems to find it appetizing. Not sure it's my ocd or my "just have to know what this stuff is" that got me asking questions and sending emails. I spent DAYS looking at pictures of algae. I have run across a few folks with similar stuff in the process. I contacted several algae organizations asking for help identifying or direction. I received a response yesterday stating they were pretty sure it was Derbesia. I'm going to reread all the input on this thread. Thanks for the share!