Need help. My first saltwater tank. Fighting dinos. Need help.

Frankie8

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Hello Everyone. I have been following this website for months. This is my first post. I have been in fish keeping hobby since over 20 years. But i started my first nano saltwater tank (24g) in July. Cycled with dead shrimp method and everything went according to plan. Cycled completed. Added a clownfish and a blue green chromis and a mandarin goby along with a cleaner shrimp and 5 snails as cuc. Tank parameters have been great. Added a few hardy corals. Like xenia, gsp, candycane, zoas and a torch. They been doing great too. Since 2 weeks i have been seeing dinoflagellates in my tank. They seem to be gooey slimy with bubbles. I dose 2 part also. My lfs guy told me to do a wc which made things worse. They are mostly in the highest flow area but now spreading on sand too. I notice the bubbles return when light is turned on. Bubbles go away when lights are off but brown stuff still there. Been researching alot i came to the conclusion that the wc did it worse as there might be low nutrients in tank. I got water tested. Nitrates were 10 and phosphates 0.8..i use rodi water only with 0 tds. Redsea reef pro salt.
Parameters:
Nitrates: 10
Ammonia: less than 0.05
Nitrites : 0
Calcium: 480
Magnesium 1200
Phosphates: 0.8
Alkalinity :8.3
Salinity 1.025
Temp 24c

Im running a skimmer and have a small refugium with chaeto algae. Seeing dinos approx since 2 weeks. All fish and corals fine and snails too. No deaths so far. Increased flow too by buying jebao sw4 wave maker.. tank is becoming browner each day. I tried to cover everything if i missed anything lemme know. What am i doing wrong or what should i do to eliminate them. Kindly help.
Also tried to manually siphon them worked but they came back. ( can't get it tested under a scope in my area)
Attaching pics and video.

20191113_024831.jpg
 

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Bret Brinkmann

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Looks more like diatoms to me. Dinos don't bloom in tanks with phosphates and nitrates at those levels. They are bottomed out with dinos. I scope would verify but you can take a clump in a cup of tank water and stir it up until it dissolves. Wait 15 minutes and if it reforms, then it's dinos. Otherwise it's probably diatoms.

What snails do you have? Ceriths snails are really good at eating diatoms from the rocks, sand, and glass.
 
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Frankie8

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Looks more like diatoms to me. Dinos don't bloom in tanks with phosphates and nitrates at those levels. They are bottomed out with dinos. I scope would verify but you can take a clump in a cup of tank water and stir it up until it dissolves. Wait 15 minutes and if it reforms, then it's dinos. Otherwise it's probably diatoms.

What snails do you have? Ceriths snails are really good at eating diatoms from the rocks, sand, and glass.

Thanks for the reply. Thats exactly what i was thinking since my phosphates and nitrates a bit high. Dinos are usually when they are low. But it gooey with bubbles some were 2 to 3 inches long and slimy. I blasted them with powerhead before wc. But wc definitely made it worse. I unfortunately cerith snails were not available at my lfs. I got 3 nassarius snails and 2 turbo snails. None of them i have seen interested in this algae.
Unfortunately im unable to scope. I tried to take a clump like you mentioned in a small cup. Some with a syringe and some by pinching. Dont know if i got them correctly since they broke off quickly. Tried to mix them with some tank water and this is how they look after 15 mins in the cup. What do you think?
20191113_113640.jpg
20191113_113631.jpg
 

Bret Brinkmann

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They would form a cloud like clump floating in the water. Yours look more like several individual clumps spread out over the bottom like detritus. This is more consistent with diatoms. Once all the Si in the water is used up they will die off on their own. If water changes make it worth, then their is probably silicates in the new water.

I believe trochus snails will eat it too just not as good as ceriths. You can get some ceriths online from many vendors if you're interested. Just google cerith and a bunch will come up. Get a variety of sizes and types if they are available. The dwarfs don't eat much so don't be afraid of getting too many dwarfs because you almost can't.
 
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Frankie8

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They would form a cloud like clump floating in the water. Yours look more like several individual clumps spread out over the bottom like detritus. This is more consistent with diatoms. Once all the Si in the water is used up they will die off on their own. If water changes make it worth, then their is probably silicates in the new water.

I believe trochus snails will eat it too just not as good as ceriths. You can get some ceriths online from many vendors if you're interested. Just google cerith and a bunch will come up. Get a variety of sizes and types if they are available. The dwarfs don't eat much so don't be afraid of getting too many dwarfs because you almost can't.

Thank you so much this definitely helps alot. Cheers. Ill do that and get more snails. Will keep you updated. Thanks again cheers :)
 

taricha

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@Frankie8 Do you want to try an experiment to distinguish dinos from diatoms? can you get a small fluorescent tube blacklight (not LED)?
 
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Frankie8

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@Frankie8 Do you want to try an experiment to distinguish dinos from diatoms? can you get a small fluorescent tube blacklight (not LED)?

Yes i would love to. Ill try to find the light if its available in my area. Just curious dinos will glow?
 

taricha

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Dinos have a pigment different from diatoms that is water soluble and fluoresces red/pink. It can be released by freeze/thawing the dino cells.

So here's the details if anyone wants to confirm that it works on pest dinos (I've only done it on symbiotic dinos).
Dino Freeze-Thaw Test
DinoFreezeThaw.png

A) Sample a clump of pure dinos - cyano will be a false positive (works even better if dinos are in freshwater, but will be ok in tank water)
B) completely freeze and then fully thaw the sample. Note the water got a little orangey from the dino pigment.
C) place near a fluorescent blacklight - not an LED - and it ought to glow red.
D) if you filter out the cells and debris through filter paper or tight paper towels the orange pigment may be clearer
E) & F) and the red fluorescence will be brighter without the debris scattering the light.


Compare to doing the same test on Diatoms
DiatomFreezeThaw.jpg

A) Diatoms from my aquarium glass
B) scraped off glass and collected in beaker
C) microscope image appears to confirm diatoms
D) Concentrated a bunch of cells down and froze then thawed them
E) Filtered cells to the bottom, the clear liquid is just slightly yellow
F) and gives no fluorescent red response at all to the fluorescent blacklight.
 
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Frankie8

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Dinos have a pigment different from diatoms that is water soluble and fluoresces red/pink. It can be released by freeze/thawing the dino cells.

This is some TOP info. Thanks a lot. Will definitely try this out
 

taricha

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Take pics. You'll be the first to try this. :)
(ask if you have Qs or need more detailed directions)
 

taricha

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This is some TOP info. Thanks a lot. Will definitely try this out
Did you try it? Was it negative (no pink/red) for dinos?
 
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Frankie8

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Did you try it? Was it negative (no pink/red) for dinos?

Hello. No i didnt because i added a few turbo and astrea snails and they ate 70% of it and been doing fine. So i kind of waited to see if this works first if not i will try it out
 

taricha

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Great to hear. Snails munch diatoms pretty consistently.
 

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