Documenting my fight with Dino's
- Thread starter Miller535
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Miller535
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So I have not updated in a while. There are still dinos in the tank. I had a instance last week where my house got hot, and the tank temp spiked from it's normal 76.5-77.5 up to 82, and next day dinos exploded in the tank. I can not say for sure that it was the temp, but that was the only thing that changed.
I have started taking a turkey baster and vigorously blowing off the sand and rocks. This seems to be very effective. My theory is that it is forcing the dinos up into the water column where my UV is getting them. I have noticed if I do this on one day, there will be little to no visible dinos on the sand for 3 or 4 days. And even when there is a sign of them, it's much less then the day to day amount if I didn't do it at all.
I am also noticing a shift from the red/rust colored algae to green algae and film algae in the tank. It is slow, but improving I think. I also bumped up my clean up crew. To my surprise the red footed snails I bought and the hairy urchin to not seem to care what kind of algae they are eating. They are indiscriminately eating all the nuisance algae just the same as the green.
I have started taking a turkey baster and vigorously blowing off the sand and rocks. This seems to be very effective. My theory is that it is forcing the dinos up into the water column where my UV is getting them. I have noticed if I do this on one day, there will be little to no visible dinos on the sand for 3 or 4 days. And even when there is a sign of them, it's much less then the day to day amount if I didn't do it at all.
I am also noticing a shift from the red/rust colored algae to green algae and film algae in the tank. It is slow, but improving I think. I also bumped up my clean up crew. To my surprise the red footed snails I bought and the hairy urchin to not seem to care what kind of algae they are eating. They are indiscriminately eating all the nuisance algae just the same as the green.
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Miller535
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So I figured an update was due. I have not seen any dino or cyano in my tank for at least over a month. As I said in previous updates the uv really helped, but getting my water chemistry back in line was a crucial part also. But the final nail on the head was when I started checking phosphates more often and when I started dosing more. Before I was trying to stay around .04ppm PO4, now I am trying to stay more like .08-.1ppm. I do have diatoms in my tank, but I bumped up my clean up crew and they are doing a pretty good job at keeping it in check. All and all, I am pretty pleased with my progress.
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Miller535
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Still no dinos, i am ready to throw the victory flag now. And has been a few months without dinos. After the dinos I had diatoms pretty bad, but even those have subsided to a large degree. There are still some diatoms in my tank. But not really enough to bother me.
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Miller535
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It is still working great. I do not regret buying it at all.
Jilly92
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Were you wearing gloves? My first experience with dinos I did the same and became ill. Be careful! I had 2 tanks with dinos, I blacked out main tank they were gone within 3 days and still gone. A week ago they returned to frag tank so I will be battling those again this week. My nitrates always stay around 10-15 my phosphates were .02
Jilly92
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I just installed fluval uv sanitizer 2 days ago and will be putting a sample under microscope tonight and having someone on here help with id. I will probably film the process I could post a link if you would like to watch
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Miller535
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I did not wear gloves. But I was actually most worried about grabbing a rock that had a bristle worm on it.
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