Dosing phosphate leading to Dino bloom

[Biddence]

I have a 176 gallon system i have been on and off struggling with dinos

I got rid of most of the Dino in my tank, but they refused to go completely away. My nitrate is 10ish(Red sea) and my phosphate is .02 -.03 (Hannah ULR phosphorus) so i try to dose phosphate(food grade trisodium phosphate mix) i get a Dino bloom ever time i dose... it happens every time. Tank is still young 4 months old.

The phosphate doesn’t go up at all even though i dosed close to .2 per day for 2 weeks (assuming that it is binding to the rocks)and the Dino is starting to get thicker and really bothering my corals. So should i stop dosing phosphate or keep going to get it to a safe range?

Theres one issue with not dosing anything, my corals start to look pale if i stop dosing phosphate, so it seems that my tank is phosphate deficient. Where should i go from here?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Prepare by starting with a water change and blow this stuff loose with a turkey baster and siphon up loose particles.
Turn lights off (at least white and run blue at 10-15%) for 5 days and at night dose 1ml of hydrogen peroxide per 10 gallons for all 5 nights. If you dont have light dependent coral- turn all lights off.
During the day dose 1ml of liquid bacteria (such as bacter 7) per 10 gallons.
Clean filters daily and DO NOT FEED CORAL FOODS OR ADD NOPOX as it is food for dinos.
Day 5,, you can start with blue lights - ramping up and work your white lights up slowly

 

[reefinatl]

Happened on this thread because your Alk thread came up. A 2-3 month old system is going to be chaotic. IMO there is ZERO reason to be dosing Alk and phosphates in a 3 month old system. Cut back on your filtration and/or increase food. You are making this way to hard on yourself.

Exception here is an all liverock start/transfer operation.

 

[rmurken]

Also sounds like you might want to ID what kind of dinos you have, and go with a more tailored strategy. I’d read up on the many excellent threads here by @taricha and others.

And agree with @reefinatl that a new tank is gonna be all over the place so that’s part of it too. But plainly if dinos are bothering your livestock, you need to manage them.

 

[MONTANTK]

I agree with the above that it’s important to ID your Dinos for the best treatment. I will say I had something similar happen (based on what you have said) and my Dinos went away once I started dosing phyto

 

[Biddence]

Happened on this thread because your Alk thread came up. A 2-3 month old system is going to be chaotic. IMO there is ZERO reason to be dosing Alk and phosphates in a 3 month old system. Cut back on your filtration and/or increase food. You are making this way to hard on yourself.

Exception here is an all liverock start/transfer operation.l

This is my second tank start and the first one went a lot smoother than this one, i have 8 fish in a 176 gallon system right now.. I’m running skimmer 3 hours a day on my apex. I have coral in there and seem to be doing good as long as the Dino is at bay. Only other filtration i have is a fuge but right now I’m only running that 2 hours a night. I feed 3 times a day and dose live phyto from algae barn. The only filtration that’s running full time right now is a GAC reactor.

As far as the alk i stall have a considerable alk depletion as i dose 2000 mls of saturated kalk and about 60 mls of b ionic alk i have some coralline growing and a handful of LPS and some snails but it seems like its way more than it should require at this point.

I did bring over some live rock from my old system to “help the transition” but i feel it hasn’t helped much

 

[reefinatl]

This is my second tank start and the first one went a lot smoother than this one, i have 8 fish in a 176 gallon system right now.. I’m running skimmer 3 hours a day on my apex. I have coral in there and seem to be doing good as long as the Dino is at bay. Only other filtration i have is a fuge but right now I’m only running that 2 hours a night. I feed 3 times a day and dose live phyto from algae barn. The only filtration that’s running full time right now is a GAC reactor.

As far as the alk i stall have a considerable alk depletion as i dose 2000 mls of saturated kalk and about 60 mls of b ionic alk i have some coralline growing and a handful of LPS and some snails but it seems like its way more than it should require at this point.

I did bring over some live rock from my old system to “help the transition” but i feel it hasn’t helped much

New tanks, especially dry rock, will have erratic alkalinity consumption. In my opinion setting up a dosing routine is just going to shift your highs and lows. Don't stress over it, LPS and such will survive fine. If it gets real low toss in some baking soda. Waterchanges alone will generally get you through it.

As for dinos I've never had to really deal with them on any of the 3 tanks I've had. I came close on my new tank, definitely had an outbreak but immediately ramped down on lighting and started feeding heavier.

What could be happening is the phyto is stripping the water. It can outcompete GHA which is why I assume you are doing it. That could be the setting up the Dinos for success. Letting the GHA move in in my opinion is just part of the cycle. Keep it from getting too crazy but it's just part of the deal. Once things settle out hammer it with CUC, manual removal, and up the fuge lighting. It's one of the easiest things to deal with in this hobby and it growing usually has coralline coming along on the surface, and does not have Dinos which are probably among the worst things to deal with.

Bear in mind I'm not stating just let things go to hell in a hand basket for 6 months, just embrace the easier issues instead of aiming for pristine conditions and end up battling dinos. I guess I just work from the stand point perfection is not possible in a dry or mostly dry start so I'd rather slightly favor conditions for easier pests and work on controlling those.

Apologies for derailing a bit and good luck in your battle. This hobby is tough.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

It is quite unusual to have dosing of a nutrient cause a dino bloom, but adding other trace elements seems to soemtimes.

Are you certain it is dinos?

What are you dosing for phosphate?

 

[Biddence]

It is quite unusual to have dosing of a nutrient cause a dino bloom, but adding other trace elements seems to soemtimes.

Are you certain it is dinos?

What are you dosing for phosphate?

I am as certain as i can be it’s dinos without putting it under a microscope, I’ve done the coffee filter test. It has the typical Dino look with the bubbles in it in the sand and the rock

As for the phosphate, I’m doing trisodium phosphate from loud wolf. I haven’t dosed it since Friday and the dinos are just about 90%off the rocks and 50% off the sand, if i were to dose the phosphate within the hour the Dino will start to return

The only other thing I’m dosing regularly is phytoplankton from algae barn, b ionic calcium and alk and BRS pharma Kalkwasser.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I am as certain as i can be it’s dinos without putting it under a microscope, I’ve done the coffee filter test. It has the typical Dino look with the bubbles in it in the sand and the rock

As for the phosphate, I’m doing trisodium phosphate from loud wolf. I haven’t dosed it since Friday and the dinos are just about 90%off the rocks and 50% off the sand, if i were to dose the phosphate within the hour the Dino will start to return

The only other thing I’m dosing regularly is phytoplankton from algae barn, b ionic calcium and alk and BRS pharma Kalkwasser.

Water changes?

One of the hypotheses about why water changes spurs dinos in low nutrient settings is that it adds back a nutrient that something else (say, algae) is competing with the dinos for. An additive like phyto may also be bringing in that same trace element as a leftover of the growth medium, which might in turn spur dinos.

 

[Biddence]

Water changes?

One of the hypotheses about why water changes spurs dinos in low nutrient settings is that it adds back a nutrient that something else (say, algae) is competing with the dinos for. An additive like phyto may also be bringing in that same trace element as a leftover of the growth medium, which might in turn spur dinos.

I’ve only did one water change, it was during one of the Dino blooms when i was dosing phosphate. In efforts to clean the sand and blow it all off the rocks, which was largely unsuccessful.

I stopped dosing the phyto and phosphate for now, i just don’t want to starve my tank of phosphate because it’s pretty low on my Hannah ULR phosphorus checker between.02 -.03

 

[Biddence]

New tanks, especially dry rock, will have erratic alkalinity consumption. In my opinion setting up a dosing routine is just going to shift your highs and lows. Don't stress over it, LPS and such will survive fine. If it gets real low toss in some baking soda. Waterchanges alone will generally get you through it.

As for dinos I've never had to really deal with them on any of the 3 tanks I've had. I came close on my new tank, definitely had an outbreak but immediately ramped down on lighting and started feeding heavier.

What could be happening is the phyto is stripping the water. It can outcompete GHA which is why I assume you are doing it. That could be the setting up the Dinos for success. Letting the GHA move in in my opinion is just part of the cycle. Keep it from getting too crazy but it's just part of the deal. Once things settle out hammer it with CUC, manual removal, and up the fuge lighting. It's one of the easiest things to deal with in this hobby and it growing usually has coralline coming along on the surface, and does not have Dinos which are probably among the worst things to deal with.

Bear in mind I'm not stating just let things go to hell in a hand basket for 6 months, just embrace the easier issues instead of aiming for pristine conditions and end up battling dinos. I guess I just work from the stand point perfection is not possible in a dry or mostly dry start so I'd rather slightly favor conditions for easier pests and work on controlling those.

Apologies for derailing a bit and good luck in your battle. This hobby is tough.

Thank you for the advice it really puts things in perspective and maybe i should slow down chasing numbers and just let what’s going to happen, happen to a extent.

 

[dvgyfresh]

Thank you for the advice it really puts things in perspective and maybe i should slow down chasing numbers and just let what’s going to happen, happen to a extent.

This is the way, let the tank run itself but intervene if Dino’s become bad / toxic, I just beat Dino’s a second time and all I had to do was reduce lighting and dose nitrate (also have UV running)

 

[serez]

have u identified which kind of Dino you have? If u get a microscope and take a picture I can help u figure out which species?