Amphidinium Dinoflagellate Treatment Methods
- Thread starter taricha
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Hey everyone,
I remember seeing on one of these threads that introducing some natural live rock, muds, or rubbles into aquariums can be a solution to dinos. Have we made any progress on understanding this? I tried to find garf funk or whatever it is called like 4-6 months ago, but they don't sell it any more. I remember hearing the term fiji mud maybe not in this context, but I have tried literally everything on my 360g, and still have dinos over a year into this battle. Would love to hear if anyone has had luck with introducing some kind of live rock, rubble, mud or something from ocean, labs, or other tanks which have some kind of cultures that can help naturally battle dinos.
I hope someday we can solve this lol. It's by far the hardest battle I've ever faced in reefing. I've tried carbon dosing, blackouts, microbacter and others, hydrogen peroxide, 120w UV, skimmer on, skimmer off, snails, cucumbers, diamond gobys, silica, etc
The only things that seem to help really are
*Cucumers. Tiger Tail, Black, Black and Pink. These work but need more or for them to reproduce. I have nine 4-12" cucumbers and they barely dent my 360gallon tank.
*Silica - Definitely helps, reduces dino numbers, but doesn't eliminate them. Corals survive much higher rate with Silicia, but it doesn't wipe the dinos by any means. (keep at 1-2ppm, test weekly. Dosing 6ml/day of water glass)
*MAYBE UV for some species of dino (I have multiple). Honestly can't tell difference though.
*Diamond Goby's but I cannot ******* keep these. I've lost around 10 over the last 2 years. Mostly to jumping or wriggling out through overflows, egg crate, bullying, starving, etc. I'm done trying with these, which sucks because they do keep sand clean and turned. I have almost 100% survival with all new fish for a long time now, except these 0% survival lol.
I remember seeing on one of these threads that introducing some natural live rock, muds, or rubbles into aquariums can be a solution to dinos. Have we made any progress on understanding this? I tried to find garf funk or whatever it is called like 4-6 months ago, but they don't sell it any more. I remember hearing the term fiji mud maybe not in this context, but I have tried literally everything on my 360g, and still have dinos over a year into this battle. Would love to hear if anyone has had luck with introducing some kind of live rock, rubble, mud or something from ocean, labs, or other tanks which have some kind of cultures that can help naturally battle dinos.
I hope someday we can solve this lol. It's by far the hardest battle I've ever faced in reefing. I've tried carbon dosing, blackouts, microbacter and others, hydrogen peroxide, 120w UV, skimmer on, skimmer off, snails, cucumbers, diamond gobys, silica, etc
The only things that seem to help really are
*Cucumers. Tiger Tail, Black, Black and Pink. These work but need more or for them to reproduce. I have nine 4-12" cucumbers and they barely dent my 360gallon tank.
*Silica - Definitely helps, reduces dino numbers, but doesn't eliminate them. Corals survive much higher rate with Silicia, but it doesn't wipe the dinos by any means. (keep at 1-2ppm, test weekly. Dosing 6ml/day of water glass)
*MAYBE UV for some species of dino (I have multiple). Honestly can't tell difference though.
*Diamond Goby's but I cannot ******* keep these. I've lost around 10 over the last 2 years. Mostly to jumping or wriggling out through overflows, egg crate, bullying, starving, etc. I'm done trying with these, which sucks because they do keep sand clean and turned. I have almost 100% survival with all new fish for a long time now, except these 0% survival lol.
If your system is struggling in terms of diversity those things help but I don’t think they’re a dino cure. Have you tried the carbon dosing at night strategy while keeping nutrients elevated? How much coral stock do you have? The option I would probably take if keeping sand is a must is removing corals and fighting with a lack of light. Or swap the entire sand bed with sand from Tampa Bay Saltwater or Gulf Live Rock? Would be expensive but combined with a lack of light to fight the dinos that remain could give you enough of a reset to overcome them. Have you tried dino-x?
The tank is 2 years old.
Yes I've tried carbon dosing at night while keeping nutrients elevated.
I've got ton of coral, removing it definitely not an option. I'll add photo from my phone after I post this.
I'd definitely be open to swapping sand with different sand if there was strong evidence that it has worked for many others. As an alternative why not just add sand on top of my sand ? This is exactly the type of solution I was asking about in previous post. Mud, sand, rubble, whatever.
I haven't tried dino-x. I haven't heard enough good things to think it's good idea to try. Did this work for you?
I'm kind of trying to just leave the sand alone more now and see if things balance or something over time. I know I have some species of something that eat dinos I have seen them under my scope. Maybe those will control population at some point if I don't stir or vaccuum sand bed for long enough. Doesn't seem to be working, but going to give it time. As long as I keep Silica 1-2ppm, the dinos stick to the sand mostly, and leave my coral and live rock alone.
I should note I also have to do 30% water change every 2-3 weeks or corals start dying. I strongly suspect it's dino toxins in water. I think adding carbon bags helps though as I can go 3-5 weeks without water change when I use those, but it's hard to say. I may make separate post in main forum about my weird water change requirement situation. It's definitely not nutrient issue either. Kenya tree toxins also a suspect, but I really think it's the dinos releasing toxins into water column.
Thanks for the help btw
Maybe try a carbon reactor for more effectiveness? I’ve not tried Dino-x. I think adding a .5” layer of good live ocean sand wouldn’t hurt for sure. Will it guarantee a victory? Probably not. I’ve been going to opposite direction and adding dry aragonite to my TBS live sand (adding an Melanurus wrasse in a couple weeks and needed to sift out some larger shells for smaller grains) and when I had company last three weeks my phosphates dipped and dinos moved in to the fresh sand. I know I’ll get diatoms with the new sand though so I’m adding extra silicate and carbon dosing to see if I can beat them back.
SocalS14
Community Member
OK - I had a small-cell outbreak here. Tank is four months old. Knocked them back using a combination of efforts. Reduced blue photo period (6hrs), followed by vacuum of the sand, blowing of the rocks, and cleaning glass, followed by some coral snow. Dosing has included hydrogen peroxide, MB7, and silica. I followed all of this with a few bottles over the last week of TiggerPods. I increased my feeding along with phyto every other day. We'll see if this can maintain my gains.
REEFRIED!
Active Member
I think I am going to try this. I have battled LCA for 4 months now. I am fed up. I have been dosing silica the last 6 weeks. Microscope shows some added diatoms but not what I was hoping for.
AtlanticGail
Community Member
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