The Puffer Forum

I have a 45 gallon with a Valentini puffer, a tailspot blenny, 2 false percula clowns, and 3 blue green chromis with a hair algae problem. I have been keeping up to date with water changes, I have a canister filter, an HOB filter, and a protein skimmer all fit for 100+ gallons and I haven't been able to get this hair algae to go away.I have a fire shrimp and a cleaner shrimp that he terrorized for a while but he now doesn't see them as food anymore, he ate all of my hermit crabs that I had helping to keep it in check before, and whenever my nassarius snails come out to eat something that falls to the sand bed he will try to eat them immediately even though he is fed table shrimp and Marine Cuisine twice a day. Is there an invert that will help with this problem that the puffer won't devour or will I just have to resort to a chemical of some sort?

Ditch the canister/HOB, it is a nitrate/hair algae factory! You don't use FW filtration on a marine system. How mush LR is in there? Do you have powerheads running?

You could dose with vitamin C: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=13501

Pufferpunk wrote: ↑Tue Oct 16, 2018 5:57 pm Ditch the canister/HOB, it is a nitrate/hair algae factory! You don't use FW filtration on a marine system. How mush LR is in there? Do you have powerheads running?

You could dose with vitamin C: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=13501

Might ditch the canister because it has been nothing but a beast to try to maintenance but I do want to keep some sort of filtration other than just a skimmer because I got that purple painted "live rock" when I first started the aquarium and I'm not sure if that serves the same purposes as actual reef rock and I have 1 powerhead running. I have another one that is not in the tank because I don't know if that much flow is too much for a 45g. I wasn't aware that HOBs and canisters are for fw since they are fluvals and have emperor angelfish on the box (sorry if I sound dumb this is my first tank LOL)

I wasn't aware that HOBs and canisters are for fw since they are fluvals and have emperor angelfish on the box

Well, that's pretty silly of the manufacturer! Marine tanks need 1 1/2-2lbs LIVE rock/gal to function correctly.