Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

ScottB

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OK boys and girls, while I wait on Amazon to deliver my microscope... Hoping for a visual ID of the situation below. Video 1 is this morning and 2nd video is from 30 minutea ago.

1


2



Parameters:
SG - 1.026
Ph - 8.2
Alk - 8.7
PO4 - 0.01ppm on Hanna ULR
NO3 - 2ppm on Red Sea.

I dose approx 0.04ppm of PO4 and 1ppm NO3 every twice a week.

This popped up a week after I ran chemiclean to kill cyano... Which popped up after I hit GHA with fluconozole. Tank is 8 months old or so. Currently syphoning sandbed weekly, 15% WC, running carbon and floss in media cups, and have a jebao UV plumbed into the return/sump.

I have a feeling I know what this is (thus why I'm here) but I guess I'm hoping to hear that it's not Dino. ;Dead


I am going to share some very high conviction opinion on what to do with your 8 month old biome.

Leave it alone to do its thing. Your interventions are only prolonging the uglies. No chemiclean. No fluconazole (except for bryopsis only). No GFO. No carbon dosing. No pellets. No Vibrant. No nutrient dosing until month 24 (I see algae so you have ample available nutrient.)

Keep:
- Stable temp.
- Stable salinity.
- Smooth to gradually increasing bioload.
- Good flow.
- Add all the live rock you want to sump or display. Don't add dead rock.
- Feed high quality/variety frozen fish foods.
- Regular WCs with sand vacuum.
- If it makes you feel good, harvest some algae by scrubbing rocks in a bucket of old tank water.

Otherwise, let it go through all of the normal phases. Body odor, pubic hair, acne, facial hair, general obstinance, parental rejection... may be getting a bit off track but still a good metaphor. Keep the fundamentals steady and leave the meds out of it for a good while so the biome can mature naturally.

Bring out the party hats when coralline starts to dominate lit surfaces.
 

Backreefing

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OK boys and girls, while I wait on Amazon to deliver my microscope... Hoping for a visual ID of the situation below. Video 1 is this morning and 2nd video is from 30 minutea ago.so I’m gonna step up the phosphate doseing and recheck . Cheers

1


2



Parameters:
SG - 1.026
Ph - 8.2
Alk - 8.7
PO4 - 0.01ppm on Hanna ULR
NO3 - 2ppm on Red Sea.

I dose approx 0.04ppm of PO4 and 1ppm NO3 every twice a week.

This popped up a week after I ran chemiclean to kill cyano... Which popped up after I hit GHA with fluconozole. Tank is 8 months old or so. Currently syphoning sandbed weekly, 15% WC, running carbon and floss in media cups, and have a jebao UV plumbed into the return/sump.

I have a feeling I know what this is (thus why I'm here) but I guess I'm hoping to hear that it's not Dino. ;Dead

Lucky you , I’m doseing .100 ppb of phosphate a day and an equal amount as that in my ATO per day . And it still bottoms out daily . I stopped doseing nitrates as they are at 20 ppm . Slowly dropping.
 

AbjectMaelstroM

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I am going to share some very high conviction opinion on what to do with your 8 month old biome.

Leave it alone to do its thing. Your interventions are only prolonging the uglies. No chemiclean. No fluconazole (except for bryopsis only). No GFO. No carbon dosing. No pellets. No Vibrant. No nutrient dosing until month 24 (I see algae so you have ample available nutrient.)

Keep:
- Stable temp.
- Stable salinity.
- Smooth to gradually increasing bioload.
- Good flow.
- Add all the live rock you want to sump or display. Don't add dead rock.
- Feed high quality/variety frozen fish foods.
- Regular WCs with sand vacuum.
- If it makes you feel good, harvest some algae by scrubbing rocks in a bucket of old tank water.

Otherwise, let it go through all of the normal phases. Body odor, pubic hair, acne, facial hair, general obstinance, parental rejection... may be getting a bit off track but still a good metaphor. Keep the fundamentals steady and leave the meds out of it for a good while so the biome can mature naturally.

Bring out the party hats when coralline starts to dominate lit surfaces.

Well, if it turns out to not be dinos that's going to be my plan.... Leave it alone. I was (still am) deathly afraid of getting dinos as it seems to be a high cause for people giving up the hobby (at least superficially). That led me to dosing nutrients when they were low, assuming now that algae was taking it up. Then came the massive fields of GHA.

Anyway I was just anxious about finding out what the sruff is and see if I need to start making preparations...

I guess I'll know tomorrow when microscope gets here.
 

ScottB

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Going from 78 to 81 degrees has made a huge impact on the ostreopsis I've had in my system now for the past 5 years. It's been 5 days now and very little is still visible.

When I first heard of elevating temperature having an impact on them, I was truly skeptical.

The only other thing that has changed in my system was recently i added a 56 gallon column as a frag tank plumbed into the sump.

Water changes as others have stated would cause them to get worse. You would think that adding 56 gallons of fresh saltwater would have done this, but no. The addition was just a few days ago. Temperature elevation was done before this and each day seemed to help.
Well, if it turns out to not be dinos that's going to be my plan.... Leave it alone. I was (still am) deathly afraid of getting dinos as it seems to be a high cause for people giving up the hobby (at least superficially). That led me to dosing nutrients when they were low, assuming now that algae was taking it up. Then came the massive fields of GHA.

Anyway I was just anxious about finding out what the sruff is and see if I need to start making preparations...

I guess I'll know tomorrow when microscope gets here.

Most dinos are solvable with some tools and patience. Large Cell Amphidinium are very difficult to solve for, but are not toxic so they don't kill corals or inverts. They are just another "ugly". Leave 'em be. They will eventually lose out. IMO.
 

AbjectMaelstroM

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Well, turned the lights on this morning... Oh boy.....

20200804_095919.jpg


20200804_095904.jpg


I see a lot of fun days in my future.
 

AbjectMaelstroM

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Well good news bad news. Good news, Amazon delivered microscope early! Bad news... Dinos confirmed, from two samples seems to be ostreopsis.

20200804_125941.jpg





Now, need to work out a plan on dealing with these ******s.

Gonna try to decipher the flowchart for nutrient ratios (blowing my mind) and in the meantime, find a way to move my uv from the sump to DT only... Time to buy a jebao pump.
 
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AbjectMaelstroM

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In reference to Ostreopsis and N : P ratios, according to the post here lower ratio than Redfield has "negative impact" on Dino bloom. So... Meaning instead of 5(N):0.08(P) one should run something like 5(N):0.16(P)?

Trying to make sure I dont overdo dosing.
 

Xavier434

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Need an ID. I have three videos. Two are from my microscope and the third is of the tank. The first shows them freely swimming in water which includes a close up. The second is them clustered around some additional algae.







 
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lakai

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Can someone help id. Also what the heck are these worms spazzing out?

 

twilliard

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It is good to see Carols thread is still running!
Lakai, when you look at a sample under the scope you will find many different forms of life. More than likely something from the nematode family. What I can say is that poses no harm to the water when compared to Dinos.
 

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Here my run down and observations of my last ditch effort to deal with ostreopsis for the last 5 years!

Microscopic identification was done with the sample taken to my work. We use some high-powered microscopes. None of which have any abilities to take photos, so I don't have a photo of them. So the best of my ability at 200x, 99.9% confirmed ostreopsis.

N03 consistent around 40 PPM.
P04 consistent around .03.
Approximately 240 gallons total system.
Uv 15 watt.
Total flow through UV 300 gph.

I've tried every trick in the book to eliminate them.

4 day blackout.
Addition of bottle bacteria.
UV plumbed directly to display tank.
Hydrogen peroxide dosing.
Addition of copepods and phytoplankton.
No addition of nutrients as my tank has been stable at those numbers for years.
Removing sand bed and replacing with brand-new aragonite sand.
Vacuuming sand with a micron filter.
Reduced water changes.

None of the above worked in reducing them.

After reading about some of the hobbyist having had success with raising the water temperature to 80-81 degrees Fahrenheit, I figured why not give it a shot.

I adjusted my heaters until I reached the final temperature of 81 degrees Fahrenheit confirmed with a fluke digital thermometer that is calibrated. After day 4 of the temperature being at 81 degrees, I witnessed a reduction in dinoflagellates. Now after a week and a half at 81 degrees Fahrenheit, there is no visible signs of the dinoflagellates on my sand bed. Rocks, tank glass, wavemaker pumps....etc never showed any signs of them the whole 5 years. The elevated temperature during this duration has not shown any negative signs to any of my corals, inverts or fish. Growth and coloration has been maintained.

I feed the tank by broadcasting frozen food, unrinsed, the size of a thumbnail twice-daily.

I do not dose anything into my system other than Kalkwasser (calcium hydroxide) through my ATO reservoir.

I am skeptical by nature and willing to try any method within reason understanding by researching before applying it and having little doubt that there could be a negative outcome before attempting anything.

At this stage right now I'm fairly convinced, though anecdotally at this point, that increase and stability long-term at 81 degrees Fahrenheit has had a positive effect in reducing or possibly eliminating the ostreopsis dinoflagellates that I have battled with all this time.

What needs to be done in a controlled setting is an experiment with the increase in temperature to verify its validity with ostreopsis.
 

AbjectMaelstroM

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Here my run down and observations of my last ditch effort to deal with ostreopsis for the last 5 years!

Microscopic identification was done with the sample taken to my work. We use some high-powered microscopes. None of which have any abilities to take photos, so I don't have a photo of them. So the best of my ability at 200x, 99.9% confirmed ostreopsis.

N03 consistent around 40 PPM.
P04 consistent around .03.
Approximately 240 gallons total system.
Uv 15 watt.
Total flow through UV 300 gph.

I've tried every trick in the book to eliminate them.

4 day blackout.
Addition of bottle bacteria.
UV plumbed directly to display tank.
Hydrogen peroxide dosing.
Addition of copepods and phytoplankton.
No addition of nutrients as my tank has been stable at those numbers for years.
Removing sand bed and replacing with brand-new aragonite sand.
Vacuuming sand with a micron filter.
Reduced water changes.

None of the above worked in reducing them.

After reading about some of the hobbyist having had success with raising the water temperature to 80-81 degrees Fahrenheit, I figured why not give it a shot.

I adjusted my heaters until I reached the final temperature of 81 degrees Fahrenheit confirmed with a fluke digital thermometer that is calibrated. After day 4 of the temperature being at 81 degrees, I witnessed a reduction in dinoflagellates. Now after a week and a half at 81 degrees Fahrenheit, there is no visible signs of the dinoflagellates on my sand bed. Rocks, tank glass, wavemaker pumps....etc never showed any signs of them the whole 5 years. The elevated temperature during this duration has not shown any negative signs to any of my corals, inverts or fish. Growth and coloration has been maintained.

I feed the tank by broadcasting frozen food, unrinsed, the size of a thumbnail twice-daily.

I do not dose anything into my system other than Kalkwasser (calcium hydroxide) through my ATO reservoir.

I am skeptical by nature and willing to try any method within reason understanding by researching before applying it and having little doubt that there could be a negative outcome before attempting anything.

At this stage right now I'm fairly convinced, though anecdotally at this point, that increase and stability long-term at 81 degrees Fahrenheit has had a positive effect in reducing or possibly eliminating the ostreopsis dinoflagellates that I have battled with all this time.

What needs to be done in a controlled setting is an experiment with the increase in temperature to verify its validity with ostreopsis.

I'm going to give this a try with my ostreopsis outbreak.

How fast did you up your temp? I'm sitting at 76.7 most of the time.
 

Flippers4pups

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I'm going to give this a try with my ostreopsis outbreak.

How fast did you up your temp? I'm sitting at 76.7 most of the time.

It took around 6 hours to raise it up.
 

Flippers4pups

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If going from 76 to 80-81, I would raise it slower than I did. I went from 78 to 81 in that time. 3 degree difference.

Depending on your tank and what's in it, a 5 degree jump in a short time may be stressful.
 

AbjectMaelstroM

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If going from 76 to 80-81, I would raise it slower than I did. I went from 78 to 81 in that time. 3 degree difference.

Depending on your tank and what's in it, a 5 degree jump in a short time may be stressful.

Mostly fish, take is new. I have a couple hammers, a bounce and a shroom.. And they are already mad because of dinos.

I considered moving them into coral QT but I don't want to bring dinos in there too.
 

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Mostly fish, take is new. I have a couple hammers, a bounce and a shroom.. And they are already mad because of dinos.

I considered moving them into coral QT but I don't want to bring dinos in there too.

I will have to say that your "milage may vary" as my tank is going on 6 years old soon and it's most likely much different biologically than a new tank is. Nutrient wise as well. Not everyone has had success doing this, then again as I just started, every tank is different.

Do you have a microscope I'd of the Dino's you have?

I don't think it would hurt anything raising the temp, but go slow and observe, then proceed.
 

AbjectMaelstroM

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I will have to say that your "milage may vary" as my tank is going on 6 years old soon and it's most likely much different biologically than a new tank is. Nutrient wise as well. Not everyone has had success doing this, then again as I just started, every tank is different.

Do you have a microscope I'd of the Dino's you have?

I don't think it would hurt anything raising the temp, but go slow and observe, then proceed.

Yeah, I posted some shot and a video of my $30 amazon special microscope on the last page. Looked like ostreopsis, but no one had chimed in. They looks like sesame seeds and moved like they're doing the stop drop and roll...rolling on their certer axis.

At night they seem to go into the water column as the sand looks much cleaner at night.
 

twilliard

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Hi Don. Do you plan to keep the temperature elevated in the long run? When the lab was set up experimenting with temperature, I noticed they would go dormant. The species I was testing developed what seemed to be a shell around them when stressed and then would break free leaving this shell behind. I only had 3 species I was working with so yours may be different.
I think it was at that point my studies were put on hold as this old man went to college.
 

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Hi Don. Do you plan to keep the temperature elevated in the long run? When the lab was set up experimenting with temperature, I noticed they would go dormant. The species I was testing developed what seemed to be a shell around them when stressed and then would break free leaving this shell behind. I only had 3 species I was working with so yours may be different.
I think it was at that point my studies were put on hold as this old man went to college.

At this point Todd, it can stay there! Lol

From my research, I read about the dormancy and their ability to "cyst" for a indefinite amount of time.

Tank is doing great at 81, no reason to change now. Lol

Edit: "They can stay in their shell forever!" :cool:
 
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