The Dreaded Dinos!!!

Discussion in 'General Reef Discussion' started by jarjor, Jul 6, 2018.

  1. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    I had a bit of an incident removing too many nutrients and now have dinos plaguing my tank. I am trying to get the balance back after giving them what they want with water changes and running gfo bc I thought they were diatoms. So, they are exuding their filthy toxins and interrupting my little reef. I have started feeding a lot more and even dosing ammonium nitrate to help. Also, I have just today bought some activated charcoal that I’m fluidinsing and baging in my filter sock. I’ve also purchased dino x online and can’t wait for it to get here. My zoas haven’t opened in 3 weeks now and other corals are stressed. Any other advice anyone can give to get rid of this monster plz let me know!
    Thanks!
    Jarrett
     
  2. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    I feel for you man. I am just now starting to recover from a long battle with those devils. I dosed lab grade sodium nitrate and used Flourish made by Seachem to dose phosphate. I tried to keep my nitrates around 5-10 and my phosphate at 0.05-0.1. It worked but it still took it's toll. I'm about 5 months in and my zoas still aren't open. I lost most of my SPS, all my acans, my duncan and my euphyllia. Fish and inverts weren't affected.

    There is a great thread on Reef2Reef which has a tremendous amount of information/experience with dinos. It's in the nuisance algae forum. Hang in there, they can be beaten!
     
  3. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Sorry to hear about that! Right now I’m just over feeding to keep nitrates/phosphate up but it’s still registering low. Also just making sure my beneficial bacteria is built up with seachem stability and fluidizing activated carbon to remove the Dino toxin. I have a product called Dino-x on the way and hope that will help me out. If not then I may do a 5 day black out. So far it’s only claimed my zoas, palys and some of the clean up crew.

    Here’s hopin’!

    Jarrett
     
  4. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    If you get time go read the thread I sited above. Blackouts sometimes don't help at all. Several different species cause problems in aquaria. It's really helpful to know which species you have. I had ostreopsis which is the worst one. Dino X hasn't been very helpful for most people on the thread. Raising PO4 to 0.05-0.1 and nitrate to around 5 seem to get the best results. UV filters help some species but only the ones that are in the water column.
     
  5. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Mine looks pretty much like rust patches on the sand bed and sometimes have air bubbles in them. The stuff on the rocks have more bubbles and just look like thin brown snot. I’ll prob end up sending back the Dino-x and ordering these (on your advice :):

    - Seachem Flourish Phosphorus
    - Mix up my own NaNO3...I found this one that should work: https://www.sciencecompany.com/Sodium-Nitrate-500g-P16240.aspx

    Thanks,

    Jarrett
     
  6. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    You can try the Dino-X with the nutrient dosing if you like. No harm in that. Be sure and run Carbon because if you are successful the dying dinos will produce a toxin that can wreak havoc on your corals. I didn't change mine enough and I'm sure that's part of the reason for my SPS crash. If you have access to a microscope you can put a sample on a slide and take a high power picture of them with your phone camera. I can get an ID from some people over on the other site.

    Here's what mine looked like under the scope.
    [​IMG]
     
  7. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Yep! Have the same kind. I started dosing Dino-x after and got on a strict lighting schedule (6 hours normal light with 10 hrs full blue like suggested). It’s going ok so far. I overdosed the first dose and killed a lot of inverts and sps. Zoanthids look gone too - haven’t opened in weeks. It looks like it’s going to take out my bubble tip too, but oh well.

    Still waiting on my lab grade sodium nitrate.
    Any advice on calculations on mixing that with RODI to raise 1ppm? It should be here Friday.

    Thanks

    Jarrett
     
  8. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    I mixed 1 tablespoon in 200cc of RO/DI and started out dosing 1cc a day. Test, adjust dose, rinse, repeat. My tank is 155 gallons with a 42x18 sump.
     
  9. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Thanks for all your help @huntindoc
    I have never been so happy to see green algae in my life! lol Had some sad losses (my urchin, Elvis left the building due to Dino-X). SPS all died but didn't have too much of it anyway. and my BTA split, but oh well. Dino-X did absolutely nothing. The lights out for 3 days along with keeping nitrates around 10 ppm and phosphates around .10 seems to be the key along with adding beneficial bacteria everyday. I'm nowhere near the finish line, but seems to be going in the right direction!
     
    huntindoc likes this.
  10. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    Outstanding! Once you don't see any for a couple of weeks you can let your NO3 come down on its own. I'm aiming at 0.5-2.5. Even more important is the phosphate. I aim for 0.03-0.05 but don't let it fall to undetectable no matter what!
     
  11. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Question: have your zoas opened back up yet? Mine seem just like they are done for even though the polyp structure looks good.
     
    Last edited: Jul 26, 2018
  12. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    The zoas seemed to be hit the hardest. It's weird but the two paly colonies I had haven't missed a lick other than losing a little color. The zoas on the other hand have withered away. These Fruit Loops and LA Lakers appear to be gone. My Blue Tubbs are starting to open a little and maybe two of my Rastas still look like they may survive. The zoa I got at the meeting last Sat seems to be doing great though.
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
     
  13. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Ugh! I’m almost at my wits end. Now I have red slime and my nitrates are showing ~5 ppm and phosphate is .10 ppm. I just want white rock and sand again!

    I know there are Phosphate and Nitrates in there since the red slime is everywhere and went crazy when tried to correct the nitrate (trying to keep the Dinos at bay) with sodium nitrate and GHA and coralline is growing. It’s just being absorbed out of my the water column and affecting my tests.

    Now I’m pretty sure I have Dinos and red slime. Im not sure if I should do a water change to combat the red slime and make the Dinos happy or just use chemiclean to get rid of the Cyano. I miss the days when I was mad I had to scrap the film algae on the glass lol.

    Thanks for any assistance,

    Jarrett
     
  14. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Yea, I'm going to go the chemiclean route. My ro/di water is fine (0 TDS), and i don't feed that much and haven't fed my corals since the Dino outbreak... @huntindoc do you think I should give my system time to work it's self out or hit the cyano with chemiclean? I've included a picture what's left of my coral and red warfare. :( FYI - i'm letting my coralline grow out of the 2 glass sides so as to pull nutrients from the Dino.
     

    Attached Files:

  15. Botheboss

    Botheboss Director-At Large

    Don’t think cyano is such a big problem. I think it likes lower nutrients kinda like dinos do. But I could mistaken. I get cyano from time to time usually when nutrients are lower than normal I’m pretty sure. Lots of people with even very established tanks get it sometimes. I would do some research on reef2reef you can find out pretty much anything over there.
     
  16. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Thanks, @Botheboss ... the thing is, I have 2 different opinions on Reef2Reef. One says, low nutrients cause it ... another says high nutrients cause it (and youtube). It's confusing...
     
  17. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    I think it would be ok to treat the cyano. I would also regard it's appearance as a good thing. It could help out compete the dinos. Increase your flow if you can and manually remove it.

    Can you post a recent picture? Are the dinos receding any? Any green hair algae or other algae appearing?
     
  18. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    Yes there is a picture a couple replies up. I have some green hair algae and some other kind growing on the back glass (I don’t think it’s Dino bc I can’t blow it off with a turkey baster). The rest is just cyano everywhere.
     
  19. jarjor

    jarjor Copepod

    @huntindoc Dino is back :( ... do you still have to dose sodium nitrate and phosphorus to this day?

    Basically, it's my fault b/c I used Vibrant to get rid of really bad hair algae after it exploded with the nutrient dosing and it quickly killed it all, but then the brown evil bastards came back. Right now it's just on my glass, but figure it will continue to spread. I've started dosing nutrients again (slowly) in hopes that I can knock it back again.
     
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  20. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    I am still having to dose Seachem Flourish for phosphate a couple of times a week. Not having to dose nitrate though. Holding steady at around 4.

    If you can bring my a small sample of the dinos I have a microscope and we can get a positive ID. Some species are very susceptible to UV. I started UV and had mine almost eliminated in about 24 hours.

    Do yours markedly decrease during lights out and get worse when the lights come on? If so it's likely one of the species that goes in to the water column at night and would be treatable with UV. You could borrow mine if that's the case.
     

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