Algae Scrubber
By Cain Cook
By Cain Cook
Most people in the aquarium hobby use hang-on-back, sumps, wet/dry, and canisters to filter their aquariums. They also have to use carbon, cartridges, and bio-media to help keep there water crystal clear. But most people have never herd of an algae scrubber. An algae scrubber is a filter that is used to harvest a special type of algae to filter there aquariums. You can also find this algae on ocean piers at low tides and even in older setups on décor & rock work.
All though hardly anyone uses this type of filter these days, but the technology for them has been around for well over 30 years. They where primarily used in cleaning lakes and streams of contamination or high levels of harsh chemicals. The main reason they where not widely used back then was the cost. Most started around $3000 and where hard to build. Now due to the recent advancements in plastics, water pumps and lights people can have these wonderful setups in their homes.
Why should I have this type of filter you say? The main reason is this filter is a skimmer, carbon filter, and phosphate & nitrate remover all in one plus much more. The key to this filter is the algae called “Turf”. Turf is slow growing algae found in the ocean that removes excess foods and inorganics while raising organics to natural levels found in nature. Another great attribute with Turf algae is that it works on both freshwater AND saltwater setups and can be the ONLY filter on the tank. Don’t get turf algae confused with green or brown algae. Since green and brown algae will mostly eat leftover food and nutrients and wont help as much in removing of metals, ammonia, nitrate & nitrites, inorganics etc. Turf algae is better and more efficient at this job.
The algae scrubber can remove metals, ammonia, nitrites, dissolved wastes, and inorganics (Inorganic Nitrate and Inorganic Phosphate are what cause nuisance algae to grow on your rocks and glass, and are what you measure with your test kits.). So extra care should be taken if treating the tank as the turf algae may absorb some medicines. Another great quality of the turf algae is that every week during maintenance (explained below) when you scrape one side of the filter algae off it removes all the harmful chemicals, inorganics, and dissolved wastes from the water for good.
Setup of the algae scrubber is now quite inexpensive and generally only requires an investment of around $50 depending on what you do and don’t have. A few things you will need to start your algae scrubber.
Water pump (see below to choose which one you will need)
Lights (see below for the correct lights needed)
A plastic canvas, roughed up. It’s best to rough up 3 screens and glue them together
A container for the filter to be housed
Misc pluming supplies
PVC pipe for spray bar
Vinyl tubing, or tubing without mold inhibitors
