Red Slime or hair not sure?

[handsomerob]

Whatever it is. It is covering everything in my tank when I turn on my halides. I've tried a 50% water change I buy high end salt. I've tried medicating it at well but cant seem to get rid of it. shame on me I dont use an ro filter for my water but I never have in the 8 years I have had my tank. just recently I switched from a 55 gallon reef to a 125 gallon reef. I am using a hang on refugium and two skimmers. for lighting I have a oddessey with 3 250 watt metal halides and the atentics. At first I thought maybe the lights were to close becouse I was using the 3 inch legs wich I think was to close anyways. So I moved the lights up 12 inch's from the surface. is there halide bulbs better then others and could the bulbs cause this to begin with. does anyone have any Ideas for me?

 

[Krish]

Welcome to RF!! :welcome:

For starters, algae won't grow just because of lights as they need nutrients in order to grow as well so chances are you have a nitrate and/or phosphate issue. You mentioned you don't have an ro filter. Have you ever tested your tap water to see what the nitrate and phosphate levels are? If not, I'd test it to see if that is the source of your excess nutrients. Unless your tap water test perfectly fine for aquarium use, you will want to use ro/di water (not just ro water). Other than that, tell us a bit more about your aquarium like are you running a sand bed and if so how deep, how often do you perform water changes and of how much water, livestock and how often you feed, also what you feed them, other equipment you have hooked up to the tank (ie canister filters, wet/dry etc) and so forth. I'm thinking the tap water may be your issue, but you won't know until you test the water. If the water is not suitable for then you can do all the water changes you want, but you won't help anything. Let us know though a bit more about your setup.