Tom Stevens
Active Member
Hi, Can I have your help identifying these Dino’s?
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Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?
- Thread starter mcarroll
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I know you might find this odd however i noticed my dinos seem to be ok in very dim light or even if the lights are off they stay in the sand. So ive decided to turn the lights on full blast and see what happens.. reason for this is i noticed i had dinos everywhere except the rocks closest to the light. Now it wasnt the flow that was stopping this as i tested it with the powerheads off so MAYBE having brighter lights maybe kills them off not sure but i will try this. I was reading through the threads and some people DID upgrade the lights and upped the feeding and it went away on its own. So im going to start feeding heavy as hydrogen peroxdie/ dino x lights out. Low light, syphoning sand, no water changes etc nothing seems to be working. So im going to try heavy feeding with bright lights and run uv steriliser
Grigs
Active Member
I completed two courses of blackout and Dr Tim's Dino killer plan, and think that I am on my way... NO3 is slightly >10ppm for the past two weeks and PO4 has to be dosed to stay elevated. I am attempting to maintain at approx 0.03ppm.
I am in the midst of a rather massive algae outbreak now. I went ahead and dosed Flux Rx because it's a bit silly and starting to produce bubbles. I have growth on my sanbed, as well, but it isn't clumping like dinos were or blowing bubbles down there. I grabbed a video of a sample from the rock.
Does this look like algae or ostreopsis? or both... lol
I am in the midst of a rather massive algae outbreak now. I went ahead and dosed Flux Rx because it's a bit silly and starting to produce bubbles. I have growth on my sanbed, as well, but it isn't clumping like dinos were or blowing bubbles down there. I grabbed a video of a sample from the rock.
Does this look like algae or ostreopsis? or both... lol
Sorry, I can’t see the video on my iPad. If there is motion, likely dinos.
MadTownFess
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I do not.
ReefingHavoc
New Member
Feeding is good, but it's not the same as dosing N and P under our model on this thread. In a nutshell, that's because feeding (which sort of implies a Redfield-like ratio of nutrients) ultimately raises all nutrients in the system.
Doing that under bloom conditions really only feeds the bacteria that are feeding the dino bloom and does nothing to change tank conditions.
But read on – you'll like this next part a little better!
Inoculate Your Tank
Don't forget to consider inoculating your tank with some detritus, dirty sand or rock pieces from a healthy system if you can. If your LFS sells live rock, try to get a scoop of muck from that system.....I'd be willing to pay by the pound as if it was live sand, and get some water in the bag too!
Some Science
I don't have this article (link below) on my blog yet. Some scientists proposed this diagram as a model on the effect of the N : P ratio, water temp, and hydrodynamic conditions on a bloom of Ostreopsis from the Adriadic Sea.
Fig. 8. Conceptual model of the effect of Nratio, water temperature and hydrodynamic conditions on both bloom onset and maintenance of Ostreopsis cf. ovata. Green (lighter) and red (darker) arrows symbolize positive and negative effect, respectively. Dotted line represents a slight effect relative to solid line.
(BTW, the red arrow on the right side of the diagram is clipped off of the original photo for some reason...it connects "Hydro. conditions" with "Water temp.")
Note: It's important to remember they're talking about the ocean in that diagram, where by comparison with aquarium standards, flow (the "hydrodynamic condition") in the ocean is....
Storms have a lot to do with these differences.
- much much stronger
- especially during storms and other localized chaotic episodes
- more laminar
- responsible for the "scrubbing" or cleaning effects of a water change
- responsible for raising and lowering nutrient, salinity and temperature levels.
More stagnant seas do have worse, more-persistent Ostreopsis blooms.....but as we're seeing that's a simple statement, but not a simple conclusion.
Our tanks that have the most chaotic flow almost always also have the weakest flow...so it's hard for me to judge whether increased chaotic flow would be more effective. (Does anyone with Tunze Stream or Nanostream pumps have a dino outbreak??? I'm gonna have to think....off-hand nobody comes to mind.) But even the tanks with the strongest flow can't hope to emulate all of the effects of flow in the ocean just with pumps. That's why emulated storm surges, whether automatically or manually induced, can be important to emulate. And why nutrient additions and the other supporting solutions we apply (see the rest of this thread!) can make so much sense.
So even this diagram is only a "proposed model" – it's not a written solution to Ostreopsis blooms by any stretch. But let's dig in and see what that diagram does tell us...
A Walk Through The Ostreopsis Diagram
Beginning at the bottom "Hydrodynamic conditions" box of the diagram I'll make some comments as we go...
- Blasting the rocks and sand and "restoring nutrients" with N and P dosing roughly corresponds with "High" hydrodynamic conditions and the green arrow pointing to the N : P Ratio box. (Notice there's a red line too though and keep reading.)
As you can see from that N : P Ratio box...
- Keeping nutrients elevated, in particular nitrogen (N : P greater than Redfield) has a strong negative effect on bloom onset.....a "good preventative" but "weak cure" is how I'd say it.
- Normal N : P levels (≈Redfield) are not beneficial in this scenario.....there is a strong positive effect for Ostreopsis blooms to start and to continue to bloom under this condition.
- In fact, elevated N : P levels ("raised nutrients") are shown to have only a weakly negative effect on an Ostreopsis bloom. It may only be the first trigger that has to be tripped before the bloom will stop.
- Ironically, however, once a bloom has started, lower N : P ratios is the first thing on the diagram that has a strong negative effect on an existing bloom.
- Unless you can lower your tank temperature to <68ºF, then lowering the N : P ratio (less than Redfield) may as well be the only thing on the diagram that has a strong negative effect on a bloom.
- If you can keep your tank temperature under 77ºF then temperature will not contribute to a bloom starting. (<77ºF does not appear to affect a bloom that is already happening.)
- It's important to manage reducing the N : P ratio closely, as this same condition (N : P < Redfield) also has a strong positive effect on bloom start. The opposite of what you want, so crashing N and P to zero with a vodka+GFO blitz is not the idea.
If you have already brought up your nutrients to recommended levels (which are > Redfield) then based on the diagram, applying macro algae or an ATS seems like it would be the way to go. Either option should burn through the availble N quickly without putting a severe enough cramp on either N or P to harm the rest of the tank.
I would probably continue the same maintenance dose you had been putting in the tank to boost N and P.
But stop managing the ppm's...let them fall as the algae grows.
We hope that this triggers the dino's to revert back to photosynthesis and consuming nothing but dissolved nutrients....therefore stopping the blooming behavior and the toxin formation. Once things are stabilized without the dino's around, then wean the tank off of N and P dosing slowly.
Reference:
A conceptual model of annual Ostreopsis cf. ovata blooms in the northern Adriatic Sea based on the synergic effects of hydrodynamics, temperature, and the N : P ratio of water column nutrients - Scientific Figure on ResearchGate. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/public...re_and_the_NP_ratio_of_water_column_nutrients
@taricha
On month 3 or so with battling Ostreopsis with no luck.
- Stopped water changes
- Tried blackout
- Tried Cruz's method
- Running 50 watt Jabao UV @140 gph for 3 weeks
P04 @ .031
After reading @mcarroll post on Redfield and the science behind it I'm still a little confused. What is the Redfield ratio and if I have an existing bloom, what N and P should I be targeting?
Love this hobby, but patience is slipping on this battle
oops, response below
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Sorry I don’t know the science behind the redfield ratio. But, we’ve had lots of successes using UV to eradicate ostreopsis. I don’t know what your size your tank is, but that UV set up should work for a tank 150 gallons or less. You need to be sure to run from DT back to DT. If your nitrate and phosphate test kits are accurate, you are good there. Although we often run phosphates about 0.1 ppm to make sure they are not near zero.
Is your ID of ostreopsis solid? That's a very unusual history for ostreopsis.
Is your UV a 55 watt? I can't find a 50 watt made by Jebo.
For the second time I had problems with dinos in my 100g reef.
Whenever my PO4 goes undetectable they return. I started dosing neophos and my PO4 was at 0.03 my NO3 at 5ppm. No positive results with these levels. On Saturday the dinos attacked some acroporas, before they were only in the sand ...
I took the following steps to resolve the issue.
- I turned off the skimmer.
- added neophos and neonitro PO4 0.1 and NO3 10ppm
- 3 days blackout
- Start chaeto refugium
- 55W UV in the sump (100gph)
- 1 vial biodigest - 1 vial bioptim
- Add live pods, phyto and rotifers
Monday the aquarium was completely free, I went back to the normal lighting routine and all the acroporas are great.
Somehow, I only get positive results when my PO4 is above 0.08, without these levels the dinos always seem to prevail.
Whenever my PO4 goes undetectable they return. I started dosing neophos and my PO4 was at 0.03 my NO3 at 5ppm. No positive results with these levels. On Saturday the dinos attacked some acroporas, before they were only in the sand ...
I took the following steps to resolve the issue.
- I turned off the skimmer.
- added neophos and neonitro PO4 0.1 and NO3 10ppm
- 3 days blackout
- Start chaeto refugium
- 55W UV in the sump (100gph)
- 1 vial biodigest - 1 vial bioptim
- Add live pods, phyto and rotifers
Monday the aquarium was completely free, I went back to the normal lighting routine and all the acroporas are great.
Somehow, I only get positive results when my PO4 is above 0.08, without these levels the dinos always seem to prevail.
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ReefingHavoc
New Member
I'm open to double checking the type of dino. Take a look at the videos:
It is the 55; typo on my end. Running it on my 120 in the display.
Yeah, that's not ostreopsis. Great video by the way! Looks like coolia to me. They are toxic just like ostreopsis. They need more help to get them in to the water column unlike ostreopsis that go there every night. 36 hour blackout while blowing them off of the rock and sand to get them in the water column can help. Dosing silicates helped my nano when it had coolia. If you don't already have your UV running from the display tank back to the display tank you could consider doing that. Seems to work better if you plumb it that way.
thanks.
I went to read the solutions for ostreopsis in the forum.
Uv: DT of 66G I connected a 55w with a 211G / h pump closed to the minimum, which goes from dt to dt, not known miracles.
po4 and no3, I'm dosing many,
I have a skimmer with adjustable pump, today I have reduced the power.
At most he created problems, I managed to make them disappear with the only dosages of no3 and po4, I put it back to the maximum and they returned.
someone advised to dose silica? it works? in what format can I retrieve it?
h2o2 helps? I dosed only 1 value and I didn't see any improvements.
other to do with ostreopsis ???
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