Dinoflagellates - dinos a possible cure!? Follow along and see!

libster87 · Mar 20, 2021

Kingston said:
Even if you order it online?

I haven’t searched extensively online for it but I tend to buy a lot of things from Amazon.ca, if I switch it to their .com site I could find it for about $10 but when I logged in and set my mailing address to a Canadian one it’s only offered through secondary sellers for ~$18 and then $15 shipping unfortunately

spicymikey · Sep 21, 2021

This is a "mature" thread, but I stumbled across it just now and am reading through it. Its over 200 pages and only got to page 15. Looks like the thread moved on from the original discussion so I'm looking for the cliff notes on the idea of using Metro to knock back Dino. I think I know how this story ends. It probably didn't work to eradicate Dino. Unless someone can find out how to permanently eradicate it from the earth, I don't think we can eradicate it from our tanks. So my expectations are lower from the start. I'm just trying to manage it better in the early stages of my tank cycling . Any advice would be appreciated

HuduVudu · Sep 21, 2021

This tank is 8 years old. It has dinos. I ignore them, because they are irrelevant.

spicymikey · Sep 23, 2021

taricha said:
metroplex reduced the population for 1-2 weeks. It was found that the ostreopsis formed cysts and increased in population after that.
additionally, another strain of dinos, amphidinium didn't even seem to have their population reduced by a big dose of metro at all.
now you're caught up.

Me again, so I decided not to be so lazy and started scrolling backwards from the end. Looks like someone asked this same question last year in September. and someone nicely summarized things (quoted inline). Thought I'd repost it again here at the current end of the thread.

This is a big thread and is well indexed in all the search engines. It will come up near the top of any search on this subject. It would be great if R2R would allow the OP to modify their original post (or do it for him) to show the results of this interesting experiment. At very least shut it down since its drifted off the title subject over the last 5 years.

It would sure save a lot of people a lot of time and ultimate disappointment. Just my 2 cents.

Rich Klein · Sep 23, 2021

I and others have posted that we solved our Dinos long term by raising our nutrients to encourage macro and micro fauna growth that out-compete the Dinos (nitrate, phosphate, silicate, phyto, pods. Dinos bloom when nutrients are so low that other good stuff can’t survive. There is no magic bullet IMO. Getting a healthy eco-system will take weeks and your goal will be to get algae growing in your tank.

chicago · Nov 9, 2021

ok.. big big thread.. to those with sps let me say this....

I will confirm that I just loss a bunch of smooth skin sps when I dosed General Cure.. Last time I used it I had not issues but I only did one does.. this time to try and save my scribbled show male I followed the directions and did another after 48 hours... and bad luck and worse luck occurred... in summary maybe at low doses of Metro sps will be ok.. mine did not and as I write this I am losing more sps.. Wolverine, Prometheous and others to name a few... so aggravating... and the scribbled did not make it.. wasted away...

Reef. · Nov 9, 2021

HuduVudu said:
This tank is 8 years old. It has dinos. I ignore them, because they are irrelevant.

I would think all tanks have them as lowering nutrients low enough will trigger an outbreak, so they would already need to be in the tank.

HuduVudu · Nov 9, 2021

Reef. said:
I would think all tanks have them as lowering nutrients low enough will trigger an outbreak, so they would already need to be in the tank.

Like so many other things that we try desperately to keep out.

BTW this is not an outbreak. The dinos are present constantly. They don't get out of hand and they never go away. This is in my opinion "normal" i.e. Balance

Reef. · Nov 9, 2021

HuduVudu said:
Like so many other things that we try desperately to keep out.

BTW this is not an outbreak. The dinos are present constantly. They don't get out of hand and they never go away. This is in my opinion "normal" i.e. Balance

I was making the point that those asking for help with clearing their dinos, most likely have an outbreak, not just something they can let go.

HuduVudu · Nov 10, 2021

Reef. said:
I was making the point that those asking for help with clearing their dinos, most likely have an outbreak, not just something they can let go.

And all of those people look to eradicate the problem instead of viewing it from a holistic approach. This leads them to exacerbate the problem and cause more stress and anxiety.

I have had the dreaded dino outbreak. I figured out the issue causing it, chose solutions that were least invasive and was patient as I waited for things to play out.

People panic because other people panic. Now, actual advice is drowned out in immediate hysteria. It is only the people willing to buck the crowd that can find solutions that actually work. I guess that is the way it should ultimately be.

Reef. · Nov 10, 2021

HuduVudu said:
And all of those people look to eradicate the problem instead of viewing it from a holistic approach. This leads them to exacerbate the problem and cause more stress and anxiety.

I have had the dreaded dino outbreak. I figured out the issue causing it, chose solutions that were least invasive and was patient as I waited for things to play out.

People panic because other people panic. Now, actual advice is drowned out in immediate hysteria. It is only the people willing to buck the crowd that can find solutions that actually work. I guess that is the way it should ultimately be.

Not sure I have seen many people panicking here, though dinos can kill corals and inverts so a little panicking can be understood.

The general advice at least on this thread has been generally as you say to balance the ecosystem in the tank out and the dinos should retreat.

I just felt your comment of you have dinos and ignore them, that they are irrelevant could be bad advice if some people that come here for advice were to follow.
As they would then not look into the reasons the tank had an outbreak and not try to correct the issue.

In your follow up post you did then go on to say your tank does not have an outbreak, hence your reasons for not taking any action. This was what I felt needed pointing out.

All good

Rickyrooz · Nov 12, 2021

I have had luck with outcompeting Dino's by reducing my lighting schedule to 7 hours of Actinics, 4 hours or daylights for a week along with dosing homemade phytoplankton (you can use Algae Barn as well) every day along with 3 times the recommended dose of Brightwell Microbacter 7 and Brightwell Microbacter Clean (360 mL per 100 gallons). The tank is now Dino free, my lighting period is back to 12 hours for actinic and 8 hours for daylight and the rock looks super clean as well.

Fourstars · Nov 12, 2021

love it and live with it. A diatomaceous earth filter will filter down to 3 microns, a pleated filter is 25 microns? So just encourage it to break up and become free floating just before lights out and then run the filter all night. Do this every few weeks at first, then just when needed. your probably going to have to build your own filter.

AXBROWN · May 20, 2022

spicymikey said:
This is a "mature" thread, but I stumbled across it just now and am reading through it. Its over 200 pages and only got to page 15. Looks like the thread moved on from the original discussion so I'm looking for the cliff notes on the idea of using Metro to knock back Dino. I think I know how this story ends. It probably didn't work to eradicate Dino. Unless someone can find out how to permanently eradicate it from the earth, I don't think we can eradicate it from our tanks. So my expectations are lower from the start. I'm just trying to manage it better in the early stages of my tank cycling . Any advice would be appreciated

Hey I know this is a long time ago that you posted this, but I was just going through some of my old posts (and saw this thread I contributed to) and thought I would give you my input on dinos, as I was able to get rid of them from my tank. First off manually remove as many dinos as possible from the tank using a turkey baster, filtering through a filter sock in the sump, etc. and then change all socks to fresh ones. Next, complete a 3 day black out, which will kill a lot more of the ones you can't see. After this, dose metro. It does work, but there will be some that go dormant with some sort of protective barrier they form to fight the metro. Lastly, dose hydrogen peroxide daily for several weeks and run a UV sterilizer. This is what I did, and it worked beautifully. And my tank was BAD at first. Yes, it is a small risk to some life in your tank, but to me it was worth it to not have to tear the thing down.

The Opinionated Reefer · Oct 16, 2022

AXBROWN said:
Hey I know this is a long time ago that you posted this, but I was just going through some of my old posts (and saw this thread I contributed to) and thought I would give you my input on dinos, as I was able to get rid of them from my tank. First off manually remove as many dinos as possible from the tank using a turkey baster, filtering through a filter sock in the sump, etc. and then change all socks to fresh ones. Next, complete a 3 day black out, which will kill a lot more of the ones you can't see. After this, dose metro. It does work, but there will be some that go dormant with some sort of protective barrier they form to fight the metro. Lastly, dose hydrogen peroxide daily for several weeks and run a UV sterilizer. This is what I did, and it worked beautifully. And my tank was BAD at first. Yes, it is a small risk to some life in your tank, but to me it was worth it to not have to tear the thing down.

Whats metro?