HELP! Cyano? Dinos? Losing fight

[aquatic26]

Hi everyone. My recently beautiful little nano 20g cube is now overrun by something. Started 4 days ago and absolutely decimated the tank. I did a 40% water change, siphoned it all out, it was back the next day. Added Dr. Tim's bottled bacteria, reduced my feedings, removed phosgard. (Phos was very, very low, almost undetectable and nitrates were 10ppm). After it started covering my corals, I did ChemiClean treatment on Monday night with carbon removed, skimmer off, and added two large airstones. I followed the exact dosing instructions and absolutely nothing changed. The next day (Tuesday) I added another round of dosing (essentially doubling the recommended dosage) and immediately after noticed some of the gunk starting to break free from the bottom and float into the water column.

It's now Wednesday evening and there is really no visible improvement. I am leaning cyano because of the air bubbles trapped under the mats of this stuff (see photo of back tank wall) and how quickly it overcame the tank, but why would it not be responding to 2x dosing of ChemiClean?! Is it dinos???

Lighting set to 100% whites only for these photos.

 

[CoralB]

Yes looking at it and usually if you see the trapped bubble it’s more than likely Dino’s . First if you have access to a microscope try to identify which type of Dino’s you have and then post a it with a picture if you can . If you don’t have the access to a microscope see if your lfs has one . In the meantime keep your phosphates and nitrates from zeroing out and keep out competing with a good bacteria like dr Tim’s or microbactor 7 . Cut your lighting schedule back in length and intensity. Keep vacuuming the sand . Add flow to the tank and keep the surface tension agitated at the surface .

 

[Reeflix]

a sign of Dinos is:
snail death (if toxic)
As mentioned above, try and get your hands on a microscope, by means of LFS, or you can always ask a local reefer for one as well. if you cannot find a microscope, you can use this jar method which worked for me. Also definitely buy some mircobacter 7, which should help for both cyano and dinos.
here is the jar method.
get about 1 cup of water with a good amount of dinos in it, then put the water in a jar, then shake very roughly for about 30 seconds. then a coffee filter (or paper towel) and a new jar, and pour the saltwater into the coffee filter (make sure none of the water gets through without going through the filter) and then once the water goes through the filter leave the jar in a bright place for about 1 or more hours (took my dinos about 2.5 hours to come back togther). if dinos you will see snot like strands start to reform in the jar.