Amphidinium Dinoflagellate Treatment Methods

[Tjm23slo]

Adding that much vodka to a tank at one time scares me. I would be afraid of losing my whole tank, fish included.

What happened to your tank when you did this? Leaving the skimmer off during this sounds crazy to me. I think I will stick to what I am doing for now as these dinos don't seem to be toxic and are not bothering anything in the tank at the moment.

Please post your experiences if you do this again,

The Zoas have recovered and have some good tentacle extension. Duncan's tentacle extension is good and they are thicker vs thin. Blasto is more colorful, Favia haven't skipped a beat possibly more colorful. Birdsnests have good polyp extension and better color. Yellow tip acropora has good color. I have what I think is a Ridge Coral that is Dino Brown and i want to get rid of this rock and hopefully this color. i thought it was Dino, but I think it's a ridge coral.

I lost a Banded Shrimp, but that could have been that I crushed him during a vacuum Day 5. The Firefish is missing. I have not seen in 3 days, but not unusual for that one as I have found him in the in tank sump before too. Damsels, Clowns, Gobies, Cardinals, Trochus, Astrea, Cerith and sponges have all made it through.

I have some greyish brown dust on my substrate and Diatom blooms on my glass. A few small patches of either dinos or cyano near the glass line. I have not added back my power heads yet a task for the weekend. Still bubbling at night. PH is rising, but still 7.9. I have not started adding any dkh or Ca yet as they were all higher prior to the start of the protocol.

NO3 - 2ppm and PO4 - 0.18 SI02 - 0.5 ppm. Adding Brightwell FaStart-M to bring NO3 up to 5 ppm to hopefully drop PO4. Algae reactor is back online. No UV yet. No Carbon yet.

I may run this again in 2 weeks depending on how things go and if PH is up to 8.1/8.2 while dKh around 8.2.

 

[Entz]

What kind of snafu would cause you to hit the sand directly with UV? Could this snafu be replicated with purpose?

I never hit the sand with UV. I am not sure that is even possible safely. The snafu was the UV sterilizer came with the wrong bulb in the box and had to wait for a replacement. Easy enough fix just took a bit of time due to shipping.

 

[Entz]

Good advice.

I am fighting algae also. Lots of cyano is growing in my tank. I’ll take that over dinos though!

Same.

I tried adding a small patch of sand back and my goby just moved it over to his makeshift cave. So much for that. I may try more. I agree I really don't like the BB look if I am honest but I also gotta stop messing with the tank otherwise it will never stabilize

 

[LOVEROCK]

just added 6 ml to 40 gallon of strenght of 5.25 bleach :O....

 

[Victoria M]

I never hit the sand with UV. I am not sure that is even possible safely. The snafu was the UV sterilizer came with the wrong bulb in the box and had to wait for a replacement. Easy enough fix just took a bit of time due to shipping.

Oh I misunderstood then. LOL thank you

 

[Victoria M]

I was just wondering if I could put some sand back in. Think I’ll wait some more. Thanks.

Me too. But the scant sand I have has dinos. Cleaning the sump encouraged them.

 

[MadTownFess]

I'm happy to inform that my dino amphidinium issue has been solved by:

1. Introducing copepods
2. Making sure PO4 and NO3 are not undetectable. I'm trying to keep them at PO4 0.08 ppm and NO3 at 0.5 - 1.0 ppm. I use Lanthanum Chloride to lower my PO4 once in a while and dose NO3 (Sodium Nitrate) on a daily basis.

I used to hate algae, but now (up to a point) I think it is a sign of a healthy tank and an indication of dino free conditions. At least the weak green film algae on the glass I can live with.

I have been dino amphidinium free for many months now. I'm sure it is there, but not an issue anymore.

How long after adding pods did it take to see a reduction in dino?

 

[Ento-Reefer]

I did a very thorough siphoning last night into a 5 micron sock and today they are definitely taking longer to show up again. My lighting is at its peak and the only place I can see any dinos is along the back wall of the tank in a couple of spots. I am going to keep this up until they stop coming back.

FTS

Left side sand

Center sand

Right sand

Dinos along the back glass

 

[Ento-Reefer]

I am wondering how those of you who have managed to beat these dinos control phosphates moving forward? I am finally getting the upper hand and I am trying to figure out what my next move should be?

Right now I have them to the point that siphoning every other day is keeping them restricted to the back sand/ glass intersections. They seem to be staying in the darker areas now and I am hoping another week of siphoning will do them in. The only other algae that has appeared to compete with them is a green dusting on the glass and a few rocks. My nitrates have always been steady at 7-12ppm, but my P04 is up to .264ppm/86ppb on my Hanna. I would prefer to see my phosphates a little lower in the range of .08-.15. What is the safest way to lower this? I am thinking about adding some pods and a little phyto, but I am not sure how I should manage the P04 moving forward.

I am stumped as to why some tanks have no problem running P04 numbers much lower like .03-.05 and have no dinos. However, anytime my numbers drop it brings on the dinos. I want to establish a balance, but I can;t seem to get there with this tank. My choice for phosphate control would be a little phosguard or Phosphate RX if needed. GFO is not something I would ever use.

 

[MickeyCT]

I've spent the last few days ready this entire thread, and spent many hours over the last few months reading the other dino threads. I'm really curious how many of these tanks with dinos are relatively new, say less than a year old, versus older and more established tanks.

I've been battling various plagues for over a year. The last few months I have tried to ignore it for the most part because I don't want to make things worse. Initially my problem was cyano covering the sand with some on rocks. It rolled up at night. After siphoning it just came back relatively quickly. Cyano started after I used Vibrant for a few weeks. Vibrant made my tank crystal clear but it's not worth the Cyano.

After battling the cyano for weeks/months and reading the various cyano related threads I finally tried chemi-clean which seemed to work. However, shortly after that my sand turned brown, looks like it lessens at night, comes back when lights come on. Based on the dino threads sounds like classic amphi.

I tried siphoning it out but it only came back. Finally I just let it sit hoping it would go away. Fish all seem fine, but I have lost a few snails. Corals are fine except my Duncan coral hasn't been fully out for months. It's a bit larger than a softball and used to have long flowing tentacles, but now only 80% of the heads extend short stubby tentacles.

I should tell you my tank has been up for 15 years. About 4-5 years ago I removed a deep sand bed and replaced with new sand around 2 inches deep. Last few months nitrates have been running high, between 25 and 50 when previously they were usually between 10 and 20. Also I've always had measurable phosphate over .5. I don't have a silica test kit but my water here is high in silica so I doubt it's low. I will be ordering a silica test kit just to be sure and if it's very low I plan to start dosing silica to encourage diatom growth.

I don't have a refugium (took it down a few years ago) but I plan to try to get some and plan to add it to my display in pads on the sand. I even bought a microscope off eBay to confirm the type of dinos. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to take some pictures which I'll post.

 

[Tjm23slo]

I am wondering how those of you who have managed to beat these dinos control phosphates moving forward? I am finally getting the upper hand and I am trying to figure out what my next move should be?

I would prefer to see my phosphates a little lower in the range of .08-.15. What is the safest way to lower this? I am thinking about adding some pods and a little phyto, but I am not sure how I should manage the P04 moving forward.

Someone recently gave me this reference, so I am trying to apply this theory. Frozen is for NO3 and Dry (pellet/flake/reef roids) is for PO4. Skimmer and Chaeto can handle most of the rest. When I run high on PO4 I feed primarily Frozen food. If PO4 is dropping, I add some dry into the tank. When they are both rising, I add time to my Chaeto light and keep skimming. When both are dropping, I skim less and then reduce Chaeto light.

I don't know if I am out of the Amphi woods, but it is looking positive.

 

[Neoalchemist]

Someone recently gave me this reference, so I am trying to apply this theory. Frozen is for NO3 and Dry (pellet/flake/reef roids) is for PO4. Skimmer and Chaeto can handle most of the rest. When I run high on PO4 I feed primarily Frozen food. If PO4 is dropping, I add some dry into the tank. When they are both rising, I add time to my Chaeto light and keep skimming. When both are dropping, I skim less and then reduce Chaeto light.

I don't know if I am out of the Amphi woods, but it is looking positive.

Nori also seems to raise po4 noticeably.

 

[MadTownFess]

I'm happy to inform that my dino amphidinium issue has been solved by:

1. Introducing copepods
2. Making sure PO4 and NO3 are not undetectable. I'm trying to keep them at PO4 0.08 ppm and NO3 at 0.5 - 1.0 ppm. I use Lanthanum Chloride to lower my PO4 once in a while and dose NO3 (Sodium Nitrate) on a daily basis.

I used to hate algae, but now (up to a point) I think it is a sign of a healthy tank and an indication of dino free conditions. At least the weak green film algae on the glass I can live with.

I have been dino amphidinium free for many months now. I'm sure it is there, but not an issue anymore.

How long did it take after adding pods to notice a change?

 

[MickeyCT]

Finally got some pics with new scope.

@taricha, @dwest-Weird, I think this is mostly prorocentrum rather than amphidinium. but I'd really appreciate confirmation.

I'm surprised because for months I was convinced based on characteristics I had amphidinium. Tank water is very clear, sand is covered with reddish brown growth and only on sand, seems to disappear at night then come back when metal halides are on.

I have mostly left the tank alone for the last month to 6 weeks, mostly out of frustration. In the last week to 10 days I have seen a definite change though. The reddish brown growth has slowly been changing to green, though I don't know what that means.

Anyway, here are a few pics. I'll post videos soon, but leaving for MACNA early tomorrow morning so may not get to it tonight.

 

[MickeyCT]

It was easier to convert the videos to smaller files than I thought. Here they are. Quite a lot are not moving at all, others move very quickly.

 

[MadTownFess]

Finally got some pics with new scope.

@taricha, @dwest-Weird, I think this is mostly prorocentrum rather than amphidinium. but I'd really appreciate confirmation.

I'm surprised because for months I was convinced based on characteristics I had amphidinium. Tank water is very clear, sand is covered with reddish brown growth and only on sand, seems to disappear at night then come back when metal halides are on.

I have mostly left the tank alone for the last month to 6 weeks, mostly out of frustration. In the last week to 10 days I have seen a definite change though. The reddish brown growth has slowly been changing to green, though I don't know what that means.

Anyway, here are a few pics. I'll post videos soon, but leaving for MACNA early tomorrow morning so may not get to it tonight.

My situation is 100% the same as yours. Literally the same in every way. How can you tell the difference between prorocentrum and Amphidium by the scope pictures? They look the same to me...

 

[MickeyCT]

My situation is 100% the same as yours. Literally the same in every way. How can you tell the difference between prorocentrum and Amphidium by the scope pictures? They look the same to me...

We'll need someone else to chime in here as I'm not really sure myself. I thought that prorocentrum had a very clear central circle type structure and amphidinium has a hook type structure at one end, but I could be totally wrong.

I'm anxiously waiting help with identification confirmation myself.

 

[Pyrosteve]

This might be a dumb question but I have what I believe to be Amphidinium (waiting on a microscope). I was thinking that since I have no corals yet and easily grow algae in my FW tanks with tap water and a 6500K light, can I just use tap water treated with Prime as a top off? I know my water is high in silicates and I'm sure there's P04 and other nutrients. Just wondering if it would hurt more than help.

 

[Pyrosteve]

We'll need someone else to chime in here as I'm not really sure myself. I thought that prorocentrum had a very clear central circle type structure and amphidinium has a hook type structure at one end, but I could be totally wrong.

I'm anxiously waiting help with identification confirmation myself.

I'm no expert, but I think you may have them reversed. Here's what I found....

Prorocentrum

Amiphidium

 

[Pyrosteve]

This might be a dumb question but I have what I believe to be Amphidinium (waiting on a microscope). I was thinking that since I have no corals yet and easily grow algae in my FW tanks with tap water and a 6500K light, can I just use tap water treated with Prime as a top off? I know my water is high in silicates and I'm sure there's P04 and other nutrients. Just wondering if it would hurt more than help.

On second though maybe I'll try bypassing the DI resin on my RO/DI unit for top off water instead of dosing elements. Since I'm looking to add Silicates, Phosphate and Nitrates for other algae to out compete the Dinos, this would seem logical correct? I believe these are in my tap water already. Using just the Sediment, Carbon and RO membrane should remove any heavy metals, chlorine, chloramines etc. no?