So ive got a pretty nasty dino outbreak in my 150 gal. They spread over the entire tank in less than 2 days from when i noticed them. I added vibrant this past monday at the reccomended dose and by thursday every acro i had has bleached white and died and my lps that were doing great ( torches, acans, favia etc.) All literally looked like they melted. Dinoflagellates are ok tho nothing really died back there . Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Im also running a 36W uv sterilizer 24/7.
Dinoflagellates and vibrant
- Thread starter Joebiwan3
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Deep
Active Member
Do the dinos seem to be less in the mornings and become more during the day ? If yes, then the UV should work. I would also manually vaccum whatever you can into the sump via filter socks. Also dont carbon dose or feed corals or do any water changes till Dinos are gone. Best of luck,.
Its hard to tell if they are better in the mornings because there is so much of it. I did some manual cleaning with a toothbrush on the rocks and a turkey baster but they came back really fast. Im not feeding any corals or doing any dosing since almost every coral i have is dead now im assuming either from the dino die off from the vibrant or from the affevt it had on nitrates/ phosphates. My system was running with 0 phosphates and 4 ppm nitrates prior to the outbreak which ive heard is an environment dinos love. I started over feeding slightly and adding more reef rlids just to get a slight reading on the phosphates. This system has only been running since may of this year.
Deep
Active Member
Do you have a picture ? I was battling Dinos and manual removal by siphoning into a low micron filter sock in the sump helped a lot. The UV helped too but just make sure the flow into the UV is right. If feeding heavy does not help you could try dosing nitrates and phospates. The idea is to encourage competing growth - could even be Cyano or GHA. They need to outcompete your Dinos.
I dont have a picture at the moment, im stuck in bed battling the covid unfrtunately. Ill get over to the tank at some point and take a few pics. Should i not dose the vibrant anymore? I also had microbacter 7 and microbacter clean but isnt that sort of the same thing?
Deep
Active Member
I am sorry you have Covid. Hope you feel better soon. Yes I would stop dosing Vibrant - I am seeing many threads where people complain of die-offs. I think Vibrant is best suited for when you have issues like bubble algae. You can continue dosing Microbacter 7 - I dont see any issues with that, but then I dont think it helps the Dino situation much.
diverpat
Community Member
I am dealing with dinos also and I’m just now getting to a good place with them. I used Vibrant and it didn’t touch them. It did bleach many of my SPS, some Are recovering, some died. I’ve used Vibrant in the past for bubble algae and never had an issue. It could be the added stress of the Dinos that took them out. I have a 57 gallon tank and bought a 24W UV sterilizer (Green Killing Machine). It has made a huge difference! I’m on day 18 with the UV and I feel like I’m on the other side of the outbreak. Now I’m battling green hair algae because the dinos knocked out my CUC.
I had a nasty outbreak of amphidium dinos. Tried everything from 3 day blackouts to dino x. Nothing worked until I ultimately raised my nutrients and introduced a bunch of established live rock covered in gha. Elegant corals dino method definitely put a big dent into them as well. I had to do it for 3 weeks in a row until about 95% of the dinos were gone.
I used red X algae which is from the same brand as DINO X, did not work at all. Now, I'm using DINO X is working some days, some others inso come back during the light cycle. did you resolve the issue?
What I'm about to say is more informed speculation than scientific fact.
My understanding is that Vibrant is a bacterial blend, the bacteria consume the phosphate, nitrate, and dissolved organics in your water and convert it to bacterial biomass. Those bacteria are than easily removed by your skimmer. This is effective when dealing with some algae blooms because you are able to starve them.
Dino blooms typically occur when you have low dissolved nutrients and they are able to tolerate significantly lower dissolved nutrients than many other organisms. Your nutrients were probably very low to start and when you dosed Vibrant you lowered them even further. Corals do need dissolved nutrients and by reducing them to nearly zero you caused them to bleach while not affecting the dinos. Just my two cents.
My understanding is that Vibrant is a bacterial blend, the bacteria consume the phosphate, nitrate, and dissolved organics in your water and convert it to bacterial biomass. Those bacteria are than easily removed by your skimmer. This is effective when dealing with some algae blooms because you are able to starve them.
Dino blooms typically occur when you have low dissolved nutrients and they are able to tolerate significantly lower dissolved nutrients than many other organisms. Your nutrients were probably very low to start and when you dosed Vibrant you lowered them even further. Corals do need dissolved nutrients and by reducing them to nearly zero you caused them to bleach while not affecting the dinos. Just my two cents.
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