Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

mdd1986 · Jun 27, 2018

reeferfoxx said:
It took my Dino's some time but it's dependant on the specie. So for me it took a month but then I experimented with different bottled bacteria and other methods to reduce other algae growth, only to have several reblooms. My advice would be to not experiment like I did lol. Some species though can disappear in days or weeks.

The nutrients we provide increase other micro fauna and Flora that help shift nutrient uptake from Dino's to beneficial organisms including bacteria. Those organisms outcompete so to speak.

How often did you manually remove all of the dinos? I'm trying to figure that out for myself.

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

mdd1986 said:
How often did you manually remove all of the dinos? I'm trying to figure that out for myself.

Probably once a week or biweekly with water changes. Forgive me it's been awhile. Ideally you want to keep them suspended in the water column to get filtered out. So, daily turkey basting and daily change outs of filter floss.

mdd1986 · Jun 27, 2018

reeferfoxx said:
Probably once a week or biweekly with water changes. Forgive me it's been awhile. Ideally you want to keep them suspended in the water column to get filtered out. So, daily turkey basting and daily change outs of filter floss.

Thats what I been doing. Once a week usually. Scrub the rock with brush and turkey baster. Been using poly filter and black sponge filter. Works like a charm.

Andeyking · Jun 27, 2018

reeferfoxx said:
No problem. If your Dino's became a problem for some time, it's wise to run GAC to reduce toxins as well as introduction of beneficial organisms such as live sand or rock from healthy systems.

For my tank, it was started with dry dead rock and so organisms were very limited. Once nutrients were maintained I added UV as well as live rock pieces and seeding other organisms like worms and pods. I also added Dr. Tim's one and only, Dr Tim's eco balance pro biotics, and very small amounts of seachem stability for bacterial diversity. Rebuilding the natural ecosystem is very important.

I think bacterial diversity one of the contributing factors to my outbreak. It's only been 2 months since starting the tank with dry rock. I started with colony so that has been my only source of bacteria, apart from the tiny amounts that come on corals/frag plugs. I'll pick up some stability tomorrow with a some live rock.
I've been running carbon in the tank for a few days although my corals seem mighty annoyed so hopefully that'll help.

Your tank looks incredibly from where it has come from. Do you continually run the UV as a preventative measure?

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

Andeyking said:
I started with colony so that has been my only source of bacteria, apart from the tiny amounts that come on corals/frag plugs. I'll pick up some stability tomorrow with a some live rock.

I would say it's not the bacteria. It's the rock. Dry rock acts as a sponge and will absorb po4. When adding coral, sometimes you add the good, the bad, and the ugly. In this case dinos. With your rock absorbing po4 as well as bacteria and coral, you've allowed po4 to bottom out. Stability is denitrifying bacteria. It's not advised for you right away. Going from 10mph to 100mph on an empty tank isn't getting you anywhere. Start with adding fuel or in this case nutrients. Maintain nutrients without fluctuations. Once you do that, seed your diversity. Give it more time. Then work on bacterial additions. But don't use them as a fix or bandaid to a problem. Use new additions as a correction and allow the tank to adjust.

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

I actually shouldn't have said anyting about seachems stability ;Facepalm

mdd1986 · Jun 27, 2018

reeferfoxx said:
I would say it's not the bacteria. It's the rock. Dry rock acts as a sponge and will absorb po4. When adding coral, sometimes you add the good, the bad, and the ugly. In this case dinos. With your rock absorbing po4 as well as bacteria and coral, you've allowed po4 to bottom out. Stability is denitrifying bacteria. It's not advised for you right away. Going from 10mph to 100mph on an empty tank isn't getting you anywhere. Start with adding fuel or in this case nutrients. Maintain nutrients without fluctuations. Once you do that, seed your diversity. Give it more time. Then work on bacterial additions. But don't use them as a fix or bandaid to a problem. Use new additions as a correction and allow the tank to adjust.

This is a 100% what is happening with my tank. I basically have to dose P04 into my tank (even with heavy feedings). I guess the dry rock I started with is absorbing it somehow. I think if you add stuff like microbactor or vibrant that will help.

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

mdd1986 said:
I think if you add stuff like microbactor or vibrant that will help.

No, we are losing the concept here very quickly. Adding nutrients only to add bacteria to remove those nutrients does nothing for microbial communities. Those bottles are tools for later down the road.

mdd1986 · Jun 27, 2018

From my understanding dinos appear from a lack of bacteria more so than lack of nutrients. Again this is from experts in the hobby that are move versed than myself.

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

mdd1986 said:
From my understanding dinos appear from a lack of bacteria more so than lack of nutrients. Again this is from experts in the hobby that are move versed than myself.

Lack of nutrients = lack of bacteria. Everything needs to eat and without food or with limiting factors, you create deficiencies. There are many forms of bacteria that need more than ammonia.

fishbox · Jun 27, 2018

mdd1986 said:
From my understanding dinos appear from a lack of bacteria more so than lack of nutrients. Again this is from experts in the hobby that are move versed than myself.

And without sufficient nutrients for that bacteria to feed off of, their numbers will dwindle and you'll be back to square one

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

If we take a dino infested tank that's already limiting N or P or both, adding bacteria without nutrients will do nothing but provide nutrients to Dino's. The bacteria will die and release small quantities of nutrients to keep them alive. Increasing N and P in a inorganic form will provide a large enough buffet for both beneficial and plague organisms. The only difference is, beneficial organisms are beneficial in that they can outcompete and even consume plague growths not limited to Dino's. It's also theorized that with sufficient nutrients it can reduce growth as survival isn't a necessity. The joke is on dinos and it's been shown here time and time again.

I didn't start adding different bacteria till all signs of Dino's were gone. And the amount added was measured in drops rather mL. It's not my goal to add bacteria to only reduce nutrients but to have diversity to help out compete other algae like hair algae and cyano for example. It's a fine line of what and when to dose but it's not exactly what needs to happen. Adding Dr ts one and only nitrifying bacteria is good as it creates nitrates and adding probiotics helps keep stress inducing bacteria at a minimum and fortifies beneficial bacteria. Totally anecdotal.

mdd1986 · Jun 27, 2018

For me only elevating my nutrient levels in my tank didn't help and I was told by a few folks that this was also the case for them. I think we are saying the same thing. So I think adding supplement bacteria is going to help me. But we will see what happens.

I will also note that I had a few tanks with really low N and P with live rock and sand and never had issues with dinos.

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

mdd1986 said:
For me only elevating my nutrient levels in my tank didn't help and I was told by a few folks that this was also the case for them. I think we are saying the same thing. So I think adding supplement bacteria is going to help me. But we will see what happens.

I will also note that I had a few tanks with really low N and P with live rock and sand and never had issues with dinos.

I won't argue any of those claims. It makes sense that live rock already has those organisms that dead rock doesn't. As far as adding nutrients not working, it's hard to say without more details.

reeferfoxx · Jun 27, 2018

Actually @mdd1986 , You have another thread. I remember now. Listen, you don't have Dinos. You have chrysophytes.

mako72 · Jun 28, 2018

mcarroll said:
I would say that repeating a third time isn't going to produce different results than the first two times.

That's why I started this thread, in fact.

Check out the first post in this thread and digest as much as possible including the links.

If you can post the history of your tank, inlcuding how the dino's started and what your nutrient levels have been like, we can probably help!

Thanks for your help.
My tank is a 30l tank with softies and LPS,no fishes and no skymmer; started 16 months ago with live rocks and It did quite fine until three months ago when dinos started.
I feeded live phytos any other day and target feeded LPS pellets but I always measured low nutrients levels: 0 NO3 and 0 phospates and reading your studies I think this could be the cause of the pest.

Started my cure with UV lamp for about 2 weeks but had no success than I moved to bleach : in the meantime continued with target feeding and phyto.
Bleach cleared all the strains in about 3 days but after 4/5 days they where back again.
It's a month now that I started raising No3 with KNO3 dosing: at this time the level is between 5 and 10 ppm ; I added micro filtration that I clear daily and two times a day (on lunch and dinner) I try to manually remove with a turkey baster more strains than I can.

And the battle goes on.....

mdd1986 · Jun 28, 2018

reeferfoxx said:
Actually @mdd1986 , You have another thread. I remember now. Listen, you don't have Dinos. You have chrysophytes.

I think at the start of my issues this was true? But now I'm pretty sure I have dinos based on my latest Scope findings. Maybe I have both lol. Who knows I'm no expert. Anyway I replied to your post in the other thread so we can continue there to keep this thread clear of chrysophytes

taricha · Jun 28, 2018

mako72 said:
Started my cure with UV lamp for about 2 weeks but had no success than I moved to bleach

I would not personally add any amount of bleach to a live tank.
Bleach is one of the most effective biocides available. Really only autoclaving is more likely to kill something than bleach. I love it and I use it for sterilizing culture flasks, and I chase it with a dechlorinator after. In a reef system, even at "safe" doses (no such thing, IMO), it kills organisms, harms others, and stresses even more. Even after it's reacted with whatever it's targeted, it creates secondary products that themselves are toxic, and possibly more toxic to organisms not intended as targets than those that are targets.
some details here....

Randy Holmes-Farley said:
I agree you can keep from redosing before it drops, but I wouldn't be sure the elevated ORP means bleach (hypochlorite) is present. It is known that hypochlorite reacts with bromide in salt solutions to form bromate, which itself is high oxidizing (raises ORP) and also has well established toxicity in marine systems:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-03/rhf/index.php#15

Toxicity of Ozone Produced Oxidants (OPOs)

Two sorts of toxicity studies of ozone produced oxidants (OPOs, such as bromate, hypobromous acid, etc.) are relevant to reef aquarists. The first involves the testing of seawater that has been exposed to ozone, and the second involves the testing of specific compounds dissolved in seawater that are known to form when using ozone. Most of the OPOs are unstable, and so have few or no specific toxicity studies. Bromate (BrO3-) is the notable exception, and its toxicity is examined in the next section.

Much of the study of OPOs stems from applications slightly different from aquaria, and such studies must be viewed in that light. Often they relate to aquaculture facilities, where ozone is used at high doses to sterilize the water. Other studies are done on the disinfection of wastewater using ozone, another high dose application. Bear in mind that OPOs in reef aquarium applications will be at a maximum of about 0.3 ppm in typical reaction chambers, and will be lower (hopefully, much lower) once the water passes over activated carbon (assuming it does) and finally enters the aquarium. The concentration of OPO is always given in terms of the weight of ozone that produces that amount of oxidant.

In terms of the toxicity of ozonated seawater itself, one group concluded that fish were relatively insensitive to OPOs:

"Ozonation of estuarine or marine waters can produce significant amount of bromate…Toxicity studies showed that the concentrations of bromate which theoretically could be formed in an ozonated discharge were not toxic to the early life stages of striped bass (Morone saxatilis) and juvenile spot (Leiostomus xanthurus)."50

Larvae are, in general, more sensitive to OPOs than are eggs,51 adults or juveniles.52 Japanese flounder eggs were found to be impacted by OPOs to the extent that 50% did not hatch after one minute of exposure to 2.2 ppm OPO. Larvae aged 3-15 days were killed to the extent of 50% in 24 hours at 0.02-0.05 ppm OPO. Larvae aged 44 days were killed to the extent of 50% in 24 hours at 0.15 ppm OPO. In this case, the larvae were shown to have damage to their branchial tissues.53

The eggs and larvae of Japanese whiting (Silago japonica) also have been tested for toxicity by OPOs. In this case, half of the eggs and larvae died in about 24 hours when exposed to 0.18 and 0.23 ppm OPOs, respectively.54

Certain microalgae are also relatively insensitive to OPOs (perhaps to the disappointment of many aquarists). The growth of the microalgae Tetraselmis chuii was found to be unaffected at levels up to 0.7 ppm.55 At 1 ppm, growth was impacted negatively.

Toxicity tests of OPOs on shrimp show them to be less sensitive than fish. Penaeus chinensis and Paralichthys olivaceus were found to live up to 48 hours at OPO concentrations of more than 1 ppm, while ******* halibut (fish) in the same study lived only three hours at 1 ppm and 48 hours at 0.13 ppm.56

As for other organisms, the damage to the American oyster (Crassostrea virginica) by OPOs varied with their age. Even for adults, fecal matter accumulation was reduced at OPO levels as low as 0.05 ppm.57

The effect of OPOs on rotifers (Brachionus plicatilis) has also been determined.58 No effect on survival was seen at less than 0.22 ppm OPO, but effects became significant above that level. The authors point out that bacteria and other pathogens can be killed at that level, so rotifer cultures can be used with that amount of continuous ozone to reduce bacterial contamination.

Are these levels of OPO toxicity important to reef aquarists? That is difficult to answer without knowing the levels that are attained in reef aquaria. In a typical ozone application in reef aquaria that might produce 0.1-0.3 ppm OPO in a reaction chamber, the levels are quite significant compared to potential toxicity to fish larvae and other organisms at as little as 0.02-0.05 ppm. After passing the reactor's effluent over activated carbon, the OPO concentrations should be much lower, but exactly how low is unclear and will vary considerably in different setups.