Dino fight...

[jiggysmb]

My son just upgraded his 4 year old 27gallon tank to a 80 gallon, as of today we are at the 5 week mark. We cycled the new tank, seeded with the filters from his old tank. It took about 3-4 weeks for ammonia, then nitrates to drop close to 0. We added a bottle of copepods, BIO-spira, a damsel and couple zoas and some GSP that had been running wild in the smaller tank. We added a few squirts of plankton each day since adding the copepods. Left it for a week then every other day added 1-2 corals or fish. During that 4-6 day process the dino slime started appearing on the crushed coral at the bottom of the tank. Now I am using a turkey baster twice a day to keep everything clear for the past 5 days. I took a look under a microscope and saw the little brown teardrops so I am 99% sure I know what I am dealing with. A friend gave my son the API Algaefix and he added a half dose a single time and then we decided that was a bad course of action. I just turned off the protein skimmer today to let nitrates build up a little.

Some zoas stayed closed for over a week and the head lightened in color then today we noticed one dangling off. If I continue to manually remove will the dinos present a problem for the corals? Should I move them back to the 27 gallon tank?

Is there anything else we should or should not be doing? I read raising the temp to 82 may help but I maxed out the 24" heater in the tank and a smaller 10" heater in the sump and can not get it over 79.

 

[SPR1968]

I would initially try a 3 day blackout which is what I did years ago in my S650 which worked, but if you have a week or so to read see here

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/dinoflagellates-–-are-you-tired-of-battling-altogether.293318/

 

[vetteguy53081]

Algae fix? Dont drop anything else in tank and do not add any corals foods or chemical, Do this:
Turn lights off (at least white and run blue at 10-15%) for 5 days and at night dose 1ml of hydrogen peroxide per 10 gallons for all 5 nights. If you dont have light dependent coral- turn all lights off.
During the day dose 1ml of liquid bacteria (such as bacter 7) per 10 gallons.
Clean filters daily and DO NOT FEED CORAL FOODS OR ADD NOPOX as it is food for dinos.
Day 5,, you can start with blue lights - ramping up and work your white lights up slowly

 

[ScottB]

So if they are sesame seed shaped and swim as if the tip is anchored, you have ostreopsis. Good news is they are easier ones to kill off. Bad news is they are fairly toxic.

A properly sized and deployed UV is your best tool. But you also need to lift your nutrients. Here is the full guide.

A Dinoflagellate Treatment Guide

docs.google.com

 

[jiggysmb]

Algae fix? Dont drop anything else in tank and do not add any corals foods or chemical, Do this:
Turn lights off (at least white and run blue at 10-15%) for 5 days and at night dose 1ml of hydrogen peroxide per 10 gallons for all 5 nights. If you dont have light dependent coral- turn all lights off.
During the day dose 1ml of liquid bacteria (such as bacter 7) per 10 gallons.
Clean filters daily and DO NOT FEED CORAL FOODS OR ADD NOPOX as it is food for dinos.
Day 5,, you can start with blue lights - ramping up and work your white lights up slowly

Would you recommend removing the corals to the old tank while lights are out?

 

[jiggysmb]

So if they are sesame seed shaped and swim as if the tip is anchored, you have ostreopsis. Good news is they are easier ones to kill off. Bad news is they are fairly toxic.

A properly sized and deployed UV is your best tool. But you also need to lift your nutrients. Here is the full guide.

A Dinoflagellate Treatment Guide

docs.google.com

Yes they do move a bit under the microscope, should I remove the corals since they are toxic?

 

[ScottB]

Yes they do move a bit under the microscope, should I remove the corals since they are toxic?

How hospitable is the old tank? It remained running this whole time or you would need to restart it?

The toxicity isn't IMO offensive but instead defensive, it just makes them inedible. It is suggested you run GAC.

Your corals are suffering due to:
a) Starvation. Measure nitrates and phosphates (PO4 with a Hanna)
b) Potentially the algaecide.

If one or both nutrients are zero, your corals will suffer and the dinos will dominate surfaces.

* EDIT! I just saw that I wrote GFO and that is a very wrong thing to do. I meant granular activated carbon.

 

[BiggestE22]

Algae fix? Dont drop anything else in tank and do not add any corals foods or chemical, Do this:
Turn lights off (at least white and run blue at 10-15%) for 5 days and at night dose 1ml of hydrogen peroxide per 10 gallons for all 5 nights. If you dont have light dependent coral- turn all lights off.
During the day dose 1ml of liquid bacteria (such as bacter 7) per 10 gallons.
Clean filters daily and DO NOT FEED CORAL FOODS OR ADD NOPOX as it is food for dinos.
Day 5,, you can start with blue lights - ramping up and work your white lights up slowly

I just lowered the photo period to 5 hrs a day for a week turned off the algae reactor and ran protein skimmer during the day only. Also I feed my small 3 fish in my 50 inch RS Reefer about 4 times a day. Remember all filtration is tunable. Too much snd you get Dino’s. Too little and you get algae and cyano

 

[jiggysmb]

I would initially try a 3 day blackout which is what I did years ago in my S650 which worked, but if you have a week or so to read see here

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/dinoflagellates-–-are-you-tired-of-battling-altogether.293318/

Thanks SPR, I did thy H2O2 and coffee filter test. Odd thing is no bubbles and through the coffee filter the cells dont reclump, they are all evenly coating the bottom of a white bowl. Is it possible the bown slime is not dinos?

 

[jiggysmb]

How hospitable is the old tank? It remained running this whole time or you would need to restart it?

The toxicity isn't IMO offensive but instead defensive, it just makes them inedible. It is suggested you run GAC.

Your corals are suffering due to:
a) Starvation. Measure nitrates and phosphates (PO4 with a Hanna)
b) Potentially the algaecide.

If one or both nutrients are zero, your corals will suffer and the dinos will dominate surfaces.

* EDIT! I just saw that I wrote GFO and that is a very wrong thing to do. I meant granular activated carbon.

old tank ran a week with no fish but we always left some zoas and mushroom in it. Then I bought another damsel when we decided to keep it for QT. I setup a eggcrate 10" off the bottom just in cases. The API master reef kit shows close to 0 on both tanks nitrates and phosphates.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Thanks SPR, I did thy H2O2 and coffee filter test. Odd thing is no bubbles and through the coffee filter the cells dont reclump, they are all evenly coating the bottom of a white bowl. Is it possible the bown slime is not dinos?

I gave you treatment for dino as I assumed you see something I dont - as I see none. Itcould very well be diatoms and minimal from what I see

 

[vetteguy53081]

Would you recommend removing the corals to the old tank while lights are out?

no. Thats the reason for the minimal blue. Now- if you have a suitable housing for corals- you can and then go TOTAL blackout

 

[jiggysmb]

Algae fix? Dont drop anything else in tank and do not add any corals foods or chemical, Do this:
Turn lights off (at least white and run blue at 10-15%) for 5 days and at night dose 1ml of hydrogen peroxide per 10 gallons for all 5 nights. If you dont have light dependent coral- turn all lights off.
During the day dose 1ml of liquid bacteria (such as bacter 7) per 10 gallons.
Clean filters daily and DO NOT FEED CORAL FOODS OR ADD NOPOX as it is food for dinos.
Day 5,, you can start with blue lights - ramping up and work your white lights up slowly

Would a light dependant coral be anything with bright colors? I know we have aycans, aussie, zoas, rock flowers, small birds nest, green candy cane. I thought they all depend on high lights

 

[vetteguy53081]

Would a light dependant coral be anything with bright colors? I know we have aycans, aussie, zoas, rock flowers, small birds nest, green candy cane. I thought they all depend on high lights

well most are but mainly, the ones that depend on zooxanthellae for survival. The ones who have would be safe

 

[jiggysmb]

I gave you treatment for dino as I assumed you see something I dont - as I see none. Itcould very well be diatoms and minimal from what I see

Under a cheap microscope they look like brown watermelon seeds. From what i have seen on diatoms, they show as brown patches. Ours is more dark brown stringy slime.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Under a cheap microscope they look like brown watermelon seeds. From what i have seen on diatoms, they show as brown patches. Ours is more dark brown stringy slime.

sounds like amphidium. The recipe I gave you will defeat diatom and Dino

 

[tanstrobels]

I ran into a problem with Dino’s after being away to often, not feeding enough and bottoming out my nutrients. This was about a month ago. I use neo nitrate and neo phosphate to slowly bring my numbers up (dose at night). In tandem I cleaned my filters daily (I would baste the whole tank and try to catch as much as possible in the filter before doing the clean), dosed micro bacter7, and run a uv at night as well. All my Dino’s were gone within 2-3 weeks. It’s like they never existed. It takes time for the tank to bounce back and find a balance. I never turned my lights down because I didn’t want to stress my corals. Personally I would hold off on messing with the lights in anyway unless it’s a last resort. Change in lights means your impacting more than just the Dino’s in the tank.

 

[jiggysmb]

sounds like amphidium. The recipe I gave you will defeat diatom and Dino

thanks, starting black out now. Should protein skimmer be turned off?

 

[jiggysmb]

I ran into a problem with Dino’s after being away to often, not feeding enough and bottoming out my nutrients. This was about a month ago. I use neo nitrate and neo phosphate to slowly bring my numbers up (dose at night). In tandem I cleaned my filters daily (I would baste the whole tank and try to catch as much as possible in the filter before doing the clean), dosed micro bacter7, and run a uv at night as well. All my Dino’s were gone within 2-3 weeks. It’s like they never existed. It takes time for the tank to bounce back and find a balance. I never turned my lights down because I didn’t want to stress my corals. Personally I would hold off on messing with the lights in anyway unless it’s a last resort. Change in lights means your impacting more than just the Dino’s in the tank.

I think I may keep on manually cleaning for a week and see if it is better. If not, move everything over to the 27gallon and do the black out and does H2O2. Thanks everyone for the input.

 

[ScottB]

old tank ran a week with no fish but we always left some zoas and mushroom in it. Then I bought another damsel when we decided to keep it for QT. I setup a eggcrate 10" off the bottom just in cases. The API master reef kit shows close to 0 on both tanks nitrates and phosphates.

API is fine for nitrate
Hanna HI774 is needed to test low range phosphates

Whichever tank has the most nutrient would be my answer. Feed the fish every couple of hours. They produce the needed ammoniums to keep corals going just fine in the absence of nitrates and phosphates. Better still, dosing the NeoNitro and NeoPhos will get you there even quicker.

This is ostreopsis dinos. Is this what you saw?