Dinos and Algae

Mcbauer1 · Jul 21, 2021

Hello there,
just as a small preface I have been in the hobby for about 5 years and now am coming back from a break.
I have an 80 litre nano that is now 2 months old. Nutrients were a problem because they were super low super fast. I did use exclusively live rock and a little bit of live sand to start the tank and cycled until no more nitrite was observable and the nitrate was getting used up slowly by algae. I have had very low <1 or no measurable nitrates and phosphates ever since. The algae were eaten mostly by the cleanup crew but I had one coral that didn't really look good after shipping. I decided to add it anyways and it died, sparking a 2. wave of algae. Some of it is green hair algae but I also noticed large amounts of macroalgae mostly Ulva. Now it is a little bit too much to handle for the cleanup crew and I also have a new problem entering: Dinos. Have been noticing dinos on the rocks, sand and even around the algae.
My question is what to do with my nutrients? Usually, you should increase nutrient levels in case of dinos, but it is very hard considering there are quite much algae so what to do?
I could feed more (currently just 1 blenny and he eats algae and 1 fire shrimp) or should I dose nitrate and phosphate?
Also, I consider getting a sea hare "Dolabella auricularia" to get rid of the algae (borrowing for 2 weeks until the algae are eaten) so that nitrates and phosphates can stay in the water without getting used up by the algae. Also, I did order a small UV for the tank to fight the dinos some more. How would you go about that Problem?

savethe0cean · Jul 21, 2021

Mcbauer1 said:
Hello there,
just as a small preface I have been in the hobby for about 5 years and now am coming back from a break.
I have an 80 litre nano that is now 2 months old. Nutrients were a problem because they were super low super fast. I did use exclusively live rock and a little bit of live sand to start the tank and cycled until no more nitrite was observable and the nitrate was getting used up slowly by algae. I have had very low <1 or no measurable nitrates and phosphates ever since. The algae were eaten mostly by the cleanup crew but I had one coral that didn't really look good after shipping. I decided to add it anyways and it died, sparking a 2. wave of algae. Some of it is green hair algae but I also noticed large amounts of macroalgae mostly Ulva. Now it is a little bit too much to handle for the cleanup crew and I also have a new problem entering: Dinos. Have been noticing dinos on the rocks, sand and even around the algae.
My question is what to do with my nutrients? Usually, you should increase nutrient levels in case of dinos, but it is very hard considering there are quite much algae so what to do?
I could feed more (currently just 1 blenny and he eats algae and 1 fire shrimp) or should I dose nitrate and phosphate?
Also, I consider getting a sea hare "Dolabella auricularia" to get rid of the algae (borrowing for 2 weeks until the algae are eaten) so that nitrates and phosphates can stay in the water without getting used up by the algae. Also, I did order a small UV for the tank to fight the dinos some more. How would you go about that Problem

savethe0cean · Jul 21, 2021

My sea slug doesnt do a whole bunch of cleaning they’ll end up just sitting stationary after a few hours. In my plain thinking mode id say just go out and buy a couple damsels for the cycle, it helps spread around the bacteria quicker because they move faster. Back in the cleaning note I had a sally light foot crab that did work on algae but if you have small fish i wouldn’t recommend, they can become aggressive and attack but as for the cleaning job id givem 5 stars.

AlgaeBarn · Jul 22, 2021

Mcbauer1 said:
Hello there,
just as a small preface I have been in the hobby for about 5 years and now am coming back from a break.
I have an 80 litre nano that is now 2 months old. Nutrients were a problem because they were super low super fast. I did use exclusively live rock and a little bit of live sand to start the tank and cycled until no more nitrite was observable and the nitrate was getting used up slowly by algae. I have had very low <1 or no measurable nitrates and phosphates ever since. The algae were eaten mostly by the cleanup crew but I had one coral that didn't really look good after shipping. I decided to add it anyways and it died, sparking a 2. wave of algae. Some of it is green hair algae but I also noticed large amounts of macroalgae mostly Ulva. Now it is a little bit too much to handle for the cleanup crew and I also have a new problem entering: Dinos. Have been noticing dinos on the rocks, sand and even around the algae.
My question is what to do with my nutrients? Usually, you should increase nutrient levels in case of dinos, but it is very hard considering there are quite much algae so what to do?
I could feed more (currently just 1 blenny and he eats algae and 1 fire shrimp) or should I dose nitrate and phosphate?
Also, I consider getting a sea hare "Dolabella auricularia" to get rid of the algae (borrowing for 2 weeks until the algae are eaten) so that nitrates and phosphates can stay in the water without getting used up by the algae. Also, I did order a small UV for the tank to fight the dinos some more. How would you go about that Problem?

Are the dinos disappearing at night/when the lights go out?

Mcbauer1 · Jul 24, 2021

There are some on and around the rocks and algae on the rocks and some are on the sand. I have the feeling that now that UV is kicking in the ones around algae have become much less while the ones on the sand stayed somewhat the same or did become more. I will siphon them out as good as I can but I did not want to make any real water change. What kind of sieve would I need to reuse the water (like how many micron)?