Documenting my fight with Dino's

[Miller535]

You hit the nail on the head right there. Can you switch rocks out with one from a different tank?
I’ve had dino in 3 tanks and no bottle anything cured it, neither did removing the sand bed or taking rocks out and scrubbing them. I tried it all. Balancing the system and allowing it to mature was the only way I got dino to die back, cause it’s impossible to “cure”

No, this is my only tank. But I'm optimistic.

 

[Ewok1]

I am documenting my fight with Dino's. Tank info, Tank is 125 Gallon, 55 Gallon sump, Reef Octopus Regal 200INT, 4 Kessil A360X's, somewhere around 115 pounds of live rock (mostly Fiji, a Pukani), about a 2" sand bed of standard sand, currently running as FOWLER. A few years back I had a bad algae problem, hair algae, all kinds of algae. My nitrates and phosphates were super high, I think NO3 was maybe as high as 30. Phosphates were WAY WAY over what the red sea kit could even test for. I then started using GFO which with GFO and using the high resolution red sea test kit I could finally get a reading. I think it was still like maybe 4 (yes 4, not .4). I then bought a large Reef octopus bio-pellet reactor. Even after I brought the bio-pellet reactor online, I continued to run GFO. Between the bio-pellet reactor and GFO, my NO3 dropped to I think about 4, and PO3 dropped to maybe .1. Tank started looking great. I thought I had fixed everything, stopped testing. Then maybe a year later everything started, started getting cyano. Problem was light but annoying. I tried correcting it with water changes. Never realizing that my NO3 had bottomed out to zero, and my PO4 to .1. I thought this was a good thing so I never considered it part of the problem. I then proceeded to use Chem-clean. Which wiped out the cyano, but within a day or two ushered in my new nemesis, Dino's. At this time (about sep 2019), I had no idea even what Dino's were. I sent away a Triton ICP test and it came back really high levels of Copper (40ppb) and a few other metals. So I thought the metals were my problem. So I dealt with the metals issue, but the DINOS persisted. I eventually came across the DINO thread on Reef2Reef. And that brings me to this week. My rock was so encrusted with dinos, my sand so covered, and the tank so covered, I knew I had to manually remove as much as I could.

In my experience chain and Dino is always the problem with the water. Get RODI water and they’ll never come back. Also get some chaeto in your sump because they use the same nutrients as Dino and cyano and can help a little.

 

[dwest]

I saw his video on this last week. If I can't ID it myself, I think I will do this.

I was hesitant to get a microscope at first. Now I think it’s great! I bought a cheap one to ID my dinos, but I could somewhat monitor progress microscopically when it looked liked none was being made with my eyes. I think you are on your way and doing the right things.

 

[Miller535]

I'm going through this on a small tank as In a fluval 13.5. I have 2 clowns, 2 nems and a few hammers. This weekend I'm going to take out the sand bed, rinse and leave it to dry out. Clean the glass and siphon out what I can through a filter sock. Then continue dosing the peroxide that I have been for the last week. The peroxide has been helping a little.
I'm currently only running a low blue light schedule so the nems dont go for a walk. I think it is mainly in my 3/4 inch deep sand bed, so I'm going to take it out for now. The dinos I have In are horrible long stringy bits that disappear nearly completely at night. I dont have a scope to do a proper I.d. but this is my plan at the moment.
In 14 years of having tanks. out of the 3 tanks I currently run. The one I'm having issues with is the youngest and the one I started with dry rock. I put it down to the lack of diversity.

My tank by no means is young. It's about 7 years old. But once my nutrients got high, I did some stupid things and stripped them back to far and then let them sit there.

 

[Miller535]

I was hesitant to get a microscope at first. Now I think it’s great! I bought a cheap one to ID my dinos, but I could somewhat monitor progress microscopically when it looked liked none was being made with my eyes. I think you are on your way and doing the right things.

Thank you. I was hesitant on buying one because I hope to only use it once. But then I found one for like $40, and I thought, my kids can play with it after that.

 

[Mattman1977]

I was actually talking to @Nicholas Dushynsky but if you wanted to add some diversity I would suggest adding some live rock from other sources. Along with pods and maybe a refugium

 

[Miller535]

In my experience chain and Dino is always the problem with the water. Get RODI water and they’ll never come back. Also get some chaeto in your sump because they use the same nutrients as Dino and cyano and can help a little.

I am using RODI water. And I am good about keeping my filters changed, and I have had my rodi water ICP tested (twice).

 

[ScottB]

I shut 2 of my tanks down that had dinos due to a poorly run LFS that didnt care what they sold. I had a brand new 40g breeder, 20l sump, 50lbs bare base rock (which I eventually cured), 2 ocellaris, 2 damsels, 1 conch , numerous snails and hermits plus a few corals. I tried all the chemicals (i.e. dinox,microbacter7 etc) , blackouts ( caused my ocellaris female to go blind during treatment), nutrient uptake , nutrient overload, manual removal and anything else that people recommended. After battling for over a year ,..what i found that worked was to practically give it all away. (over $1200 in stuff). I believe when you get that crud in your tank you're doomed. Well at least the tank and inhabitants are in for a mess of time and you get one big headache. For that matter I am a proponent of quarantine tanks now.
If you can't quarantine then do not buy anything. If you just have to buy from a pet store then the safer method is to not buy anything that hasn't been there for at least a few weeks or more. If the store tanks arent overrun by a new pest or infestation of sorts then you could be fine. (but not necessarily)
My problem was caused by not paying attention to the LFS tanks conditions closely before purchase ( turned out to be dino and bryopsis infested frag plugs, not to mention once i got brooklynella). Thus why i now toss all frag plugs that come with any coral I purchase.

Proactive is your best defense. You are in dark territory my friend....Good luck

Sorry to hear you had to tear down. I've had my battles with dinos and some are easier to solve for than others, but they can all be managed.

I would argue that dinos exist in EVERY living body of water. There are thousands of species. Five species are real easy to keep in our closed marine systems. We either manage an environment where they can dominate or we don't. Think of it as the common cold. Everybody is exposed at some point, but we are not all sick all the time.

 

[Miller535]

Sorry to hear you had to tear down. I've had my battles with dinos and some are easier to solve for than others, but they can all be managed.

I would argue that dinos exist in EVERY living body of water. There are thousands of species. Five species are real easy to keep in our closed marine systems. We either manage an environment where they can dominate or we don't. Think of it as the common cold. Everybody is exposed at some point, but we are not all sick all the time.

They absolutely are natural. Like the red tide. Dinos are alway there. I inadvertently made their ideal habitat. I bottomed out my nutrients (which caused all other algae to die). At this point I had mostly cyano (at this point the dinos only competitor). I used chemi-clean and the cyano was gone. Now Dinos only competitor was gone, and the dinos took over QUICKLY. I think within a day of the cyano being gone.

 

[ScottB]

They absolutely are natural. Like the red tide. Dinos are alway there. I inadvertently made their ideal habitat. I bottomed out my nutrients (which caused all other algae to die). At this point I had mostly cyano (at this point the dinos only competitor). I used chemi-clean and the cyano was gone. Now Dinos only competitor was gone, and the dinos took over QUICKLY. I think within a day of the cyano being gone.

If I had to choose the number one catalyst for a dino bloom, it would be cyano / Chemiclean.

 

[Nicholas Dushynsky]

I use the same rodi in all 3 of my systems, once I have to be stuck at home, this will give me the time I need to spend on the tank.
I had dino in my main tank with 14 year old rock that killed nearly all my snails. I bottomed out nitrates and phosphates in both tanks I have issues with but the main tank has resolved by dosing nitrates and phosphates but I think the dry rock in my other tank is sucking it up? I dont know if this is a thing?

 

[ktn87]

Do you have corals in your tank? Try lowering the light intensity to as low as you can.

 

[Miller535]

If I had to choose the number one catalyst for a dino bloom, it would be cyano / Chemiclean.

From what I have read from others, I would say you are right. Biggest mistake I made was letting my NO3 and PO4 bottom out (which I thought at the time was ideal), and then using chemiclean as a close second.

 

[Miller535]

Do you have corals in your tank? Try lowering the light intensity to as low as you can.

No I do not. My tank is currently is a "black out". Today is day 3 of that.

 

[ReefHomieJon]

I should say that i dosed NEONITRO and NEOPHOS to levels of NO3 4ppm, and PO4 .04ppm. And am keeping them there

This is what I’m aiming for about now too. I’m fighting both also

 

[ScottB]

I use the same rodi in all 3 of my systems, once I have to be stuck at home, this will give me the time I need to spend on the tank.
I had dino in my main tank with 14 year old rock that killed nearly all my snails. I bottomed out nitrates and phosphates in both tanks I have issues with but the main tank has resolved by dosing nitrates and phosphates but I think the dry rock in my other tank is sucking it up? I dont know if this is a thing?

Yup. It is a thing with PO4. It binds in the rock. Once the rock and the water are at similar concentrations, you won't have to dose as much. It is actually helpful in reverse. If my dosing bottle goes empty, at least I will have a storage buffer in the rock that will leach back out to the water buying me a few days to discover my empty PO4 doing bottle.

Nitrates do not bind.

 

[ScottB]

Yup. It is a thing with PO4. It binds in the rock. Once the rock and the water are at similar concentrations, you won't have to dose as much. It is actually helpful in reverse. If my dosing bottle goes empty, at least I will have a storage buffer in the rock that will leach back out to the water buying me a few days to discover my empty PO4 doing bottle.

Nitrates do not bind.

It's funny. In typing this out, I just answered a question I had about my systems last week wherein I moved some old Display rock down into my Frag system sumps. And put new Marco rock into the DT. About 60lbs out and 40lbs in.

I could not figure out why my PO4 tests seemed to be "shifting". My display was testing low relative to "expectations" and my frag system was testing higher.

 

[ScottB]

Alright, You persuaded me. I bought one on Amazon that is SUPPOSED to be here on Sunday.

Yeah, I am just now receiving stuff that I ordered so long ago I forgot about it.

When it comes in and you get some pics (good pics/movies are the hardest part IMO) you can ID them with this doc:
Courtesy of the dino whisperer @taricha

 

[Miller535]

Yeah, I am just now receiving stuff that I ordered so long ago I forgot about it.

When it comes in and you get some pics (good pics/movies are the hardest part IMO) you can ID them with this doc:
Courtesy of the dino whisperer @taricha

Thank You. I am pretty anxious to get an ID. Hopefully I can capture a good image and possibly video. The microscope I bought is supposed to go from 120X-1200X. But it's a cheap $39.99 one, so we'll see.

 

[Nicholas Dushynsky]

Yup. It is a thing with PO4. It binds in the rock. Once the rock and the water are at similar concentrations, you won't have to dose as much. It is actually helpful in reverse. If my dosing bottle goes empty, at least I will have a storage buffer in the rock that will leach back out to the water buying me a few days to discover my empty PO4 doing bottle.

Nitrates do not bind.

Thanks for clearing that up.