I don't have a huge outbreak, actually most of my stringy brown algae has no bubbles in it...hermit crabs and snails seem to be eating it so I am lot as to what it is, there is only maybe 4 strings of it, mostly on one of my zoa colonies and GSP
here are some pics, stuff on the sandbed is not covered in bubbles but does create a sheet like thing
May be a bit of dinos, could be diatoms? Either way I would just keep up the outstanding care and water changes and you ought to be okay.....Deep breath....seriously.
If it's being eaten then it's just a matter for the CUC....
Remember, nothing good happens fast in this hobby...you don't need to over react....
You could try limewater/kalkwasser dosing. If done slowly (over several days), you can raise the pH along with maintaining Ca/Alk.
Slow/consistent dosing with this method also provides a more regulated pH compared to just adding pH additives intermittently.
Do you have silicates? They will go right through a RO/DI and as long as they are present you will have diatoms and all sorts of other problems. Are you running GFO? Either that or the white ceramic looking Phosphate remover, either will pull Silicates too. It doesn't sound like dinos because they are more distinct stringy snottyness from all that I have seen.
ok here is an updated picture, look at the zoa rock and notice the piece that has no zoas(the pointy rock piece)...now look to the left a little and you can faintly see a brown string (this is what I am dealing with)
it is only growing on certain coral and rocks, it is not on the sand bed and I do not have any bubbles in the sand bed at all no mater how high the lights get...sometimes the strings have bubbles but only at the base it seems
I did add a piece of LR last weekend and that has seemed to start it and also, when I put my frags in the tank they instantly gravitated towards them and have started growing on them it seems...does this sound weird??
I also included a FTS to show how little algae I have...my 10G nano had this same type of algae and ever since I put a bag of phosguard in my filter it has diminished ALOT so maybe my GFO sucks in the 30G???
I blacked out for 48 hours and there is no sign of it...talked to my LFS and he said that he had something like that before and no one knew what it was, it eventually went away he said when he added his MP40
thinking of getting an MP 10 but I already have 900GPH flow and softies don't like a whole lot...I don't have any hard coral, all softies