Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

saltyhog · Jan 23, 2018

reeferfoxx said:
FWIW, my outbreak of dino cause some sps to STN. With added nutrients to fight dinos, those corals recovered within 2 weeks. Thus the anecdotal experience of nutrient uptake by coral. I myself did have to dose twice a day. Though my tank is only 30g and 50-70% stocked in coral for the tank size.

I'm having that too. I think the LPS problems I've had may be due to my low nutrients that led to the dinos. The SPS is looking better (some never have looked bothered) and my zoas are looking better. In my tank, "easy" SPS like montis have been affected more than acros but I'm pretty sure I have lost my spathulata colony.

reeferfoxx · Jan 24, 2018

saltyhog said:
I'm having that too. I think the LPS problems I've had may be due to my low nutrients that led to the dinos. The SPS is looking better (some never have looked bothered) and my zoas are looking better. In my tank, "easy" SPS like montis have been affected more than acros but I'm pretty sure I have lost my spathulata colony.

It will rebound! I'm surprised at how some of my corals have thrived through thick and thin. Some took a hit though. I lost a nice colony of bubble coral at the start followed by acros and some stylos stn'ing. My purple stylo is a hoss. I also lost a small colony of clove polyps except for 2 polyps. My rasta zoas shrank to tiny nubs and thankfully (knock on wood) have recovered. Nutrients and keeping alk in the 7-8dkh range will help. I had some reoccurring dinos pop up when trying for 8.5-9dkh range. I saw nutrients dropping more with alk that range.

sfin52 · Jan 24, 2018

saltyhog said:
I'm having that too. I think the LPS problems I've had may be due to my low nutrients that led to the dinos. The SPS is looking better (some never have looked bothered) and my zoas are looking better. In my tank, "easy" SPS like montis have been affected more than acros but I'm pretty sure I have lost my spathulata colony.

I lost almost all my cuc including pods. I also lost two of my favorite lps Duncans with 13 heads apiece. I dosed when I first got up and when I got home from work.

Right now in the middle of gha bloom.

Increasing cuc. I added 3 turbo (my work horses) and a hand full of other snails and small hermit blue legged. Thought about an emerald crab they make me nervous ;Nailbiting. Still might. ;Nailbiting

reeferfoxx · Jan 24, 2018

sfin52 said:
I lost almost all my cuc including pods. I also lost two of my favorite lps Duncans with 13 heads apiece. I dosed when I first got up and when I got home from work. Right now in the middle of gha bloom.
Increasing cuc. I added 3 turbo (my work horses) and a hand full of other snails and small hermit blue legged. Thought about an emerald crab they make me nervous ;Nailbiting. Still might. ;Nailbiting

When that gha gets to long strands, you can take a toothbrush to it and the snails will go to town. Don't forget you still need to watch things for another 6 months. No magic bottles for fixes or nutrient reduction medias. The tank will still be fragile. Sounds like you are on the right path though

reeferfoxx · Jan 24, 2018

BTW I ordered a bubblegum digitata frag and a miyagi tort frag. Since my tri-color valida and red planet are doing so well along with the stylos, I wanted to see if I could still fulfill my hobby needs of new coral during the end of the cyano stage. Along with the upcoming Dr. Tims eco-balance dosings i'll update you guys on how things go! Other than that, pods are thriving and snails are working every night. The tank feels almost back to normal.

Bret Brinkmann · Jan 24, 2018

Bebow said:
My search was probably to narrow, I had silicates and amphidinium in the search bar...
Sodium silicate powder and Seachem’s Si Test kit have been ordered, will arrive Friday. From reading Randy’s research a 1:1 Si to N may be risky as my N is around 8ppm so I’ll probably start at 3 ppm Si.

I may try this too. Where did you get your silicate? I am up to 12 mL per day of PO4 dosing using Seachem Flourish Phosphorus and still I get at most 0.008 ppb on the ULR. Only a 29 gal tank with 10 gal fuge, but 30 lbf of LR in the DT. I bet I could dump the whole bottle in and it wouldn't do anything. The dinos are receding though. They aren't coming back anywhere near as fast and when they do they look different. No bubbling for the most part and they seem to be on the sand more lately. I may have to check if it is a different kind now.

sfin52 · Jan 24, 2018

@reeferfoxx yep it sure is. I be been adding dr. Tim’s refresh to help with bacteria and also added some stability also. I also took some gunk from a friends water change and put in my tank. About a month ago added a bunch of pods.

My dino really went away back in nov time frame.

I Started to get film algae and now has moved to gha. For some reason I skipped the cyano stage.

sfin52 · Jan 24, 2018

Bret Brinkmann said:
I may try this too. Where did you get your silicate? I am up to 12 mL per day of PO4 dosing using Seachem Flourish Phosphorus and still I get at most 0.008 ppb on the ULR. Only a 29 gal tank with 10 gal fuge, but 30 lbf of LR in the DT. I bet I could dump the whole bottle in and it wouldn't do anything. The dinos are receding though. They aren't coming back anywhere near as fast and when they do they look different. No bubbling for the most part and they seem to be on the sand more lately. I may have to check if it is a different kind now.

Remember as the Dino decline their exoskeleton is very hard to break down. Bacteria will use a lot of po4 during that time as well as other organisms that are reestablishing. Rock will also asorb some po4. You are on the right path.

reeferfoxx · Jan 24, 2018

sfin52 said:
@reeferfoxx yep it sure is. I be been adding dr. Tim’s refresh to help with bacteria and also added some stability also. I also took some gunk from a friends water change and put in my tank. About a month ago added a bunch of pods.

My dino really went away back in nov time frame.

I Started to get film algae and now has moved to gha. For some reason I skipped the cyano stage.

Careful with refresh and stability. Both of those reduce nutrients.

Cyano didn't come for me until after the hair algae. In fact my tank looked clean and awesome for a bit before cyano popped up.

sfin52 · Jan 24, 2018

Thanks for that info. So it’s like new tank uglies.

reeferfoxx · Jan 24, 2018

sfin52 said:
Thanks for that info. So it’s like new tank uglies.

Exactly

zachxlutz · Jan 24, 2018

Bebow said:
My search was probably to narrow, I had silicates and amphidinium in the search bar...
Sodium silicate powder and Seachem’s Si Test kit have been ordered, will arrive Friday. From reading Randy’s research a 1:1 Si to N may be risky as my N is around 8ppm so I’ll probably start at 3 ppm Si.

I'm very interested in following along with this type of treatment for large cell amphidinium. UV and nutrient balancing cured my tank of the ostreopsis but I still deal with a bit of the amphidinium on my sandbed. Si dosing seems interesting.

Paullawr · Jan 24, 2018

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1017563031810

Bebow · Jan 24, 2018

Bret Brinkmann said:
I may try this too. Where did you get your silicate? I am up to 12 mL per day of PO4 dosing using Seachem Flourish Phosphorus and still I get at most 0.008 ppb on the ULR. Only a 29 gal tank with 10 gal fuge, but 30 lbf of LR in the DT. I bet I could dump the whole bottle in and it wouldn't do anything. The dinos are receding though. They aren't coming back anywhere near as fast and when they do they look different. No bubbling for the most part and they seem to be on the sand more lately. I may have to check if it is a different kind now.

I ordered Eastchems sodium silicate from Amazon. If you Google “dosing silicate” you’ll find Randy’s write up on dosing it, a must read for dosing!

Bebow · Jan 24, 2018

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0044848602003733

five.five-six · Jan 25, 2018

I think they are dinos... here is a video of their family reunion

The one on the left has had wayyyy too much to drink and making moves on his cousin... and she's only 16 minutes old... pervert!!!

kinetic · Jan 25, 2018

Fighting dinos myself in my Red Sea Reefer 170. I'm trying to increase my NO3 from 0, but I haven't been able to achieve this. My PO4 has risen considerably from 0ppb to now 24ppb with heavy feeding, super dark skimming, and removing every other nutrient export. What I've tried so far:

1. Remove marinepure plate, and all other forms of filtration other than U.V., Carbon ROX, and skimmer
2. Skimmer set to extremely dark (so it barely skims)
3. Stopped skimming completely (just opened the wedge pipe enough so the bubbles never enter the skimmer cup)
4. Increased feeding to three times a day, both TDO Chromaboost and ON Reef Flakes
5. 1 cube of thawed PE Mysis (I even throw the thawed water in)
6. Recommended dosage of amino acids (poly-labs polyp booster) and Reef Chili daily

Not really sure what's consuming the nitrates other than a few nubs of SPS, and the dinos. I have a few anemones, but not sure if they really consume nitrates that much? I'm not sure what else to do, and my fish are SO FAT now that they are starting to ignore food.

My next step is: resume normal skimming, and stop overfeeding so much, and just dose NO3 and PO4 as needed. I have some food grade Sodium Nitrate and Trisodium Phosphate coming next week. I'll start dosing slow and my plan is to get it up high enough to start growing some algae to outcompete the dinos. Once that's done, I'll fire up my chaeto reactor (my chaeto melted away because I had no NO3/PO4) with a new ball of chaeto and hope that'll control everything.

Anything else I should consider?

sfin52 · Jan 25, 2018

reading the first post of this thread is highly recommended.
I would stop over feeding. You can dose nitrates directly. IMO the overdeeding can cause other issues like ammonia spikes, foul water and so on.
I would also stop the trace elements and amino acids it can fuel dino growth.