Oh no here we go!

[Reefer1978]

To starve them out, my suggestion is to get them down to .01 or a trace and have you nitrates at 3 to 5 to starve them out for two weeks. Then bring the phosphate up to a .02 and see how the tank looks. If you want to get the phosphates down fast us a product with Lanthanum Chloride in it. Run GFO as normal. Are you running as filter media such as sprox, life bio fil? I run the life bio fil with a little zeomix to keep my nitrates in line, for the reason I feed heavy for the corals and I have fat fish

I don't think that's a good idea. They strive in ultra-low nutrient systems and quickly take over the entire tank, within 24-48 hours.

 

[jsker]

I don't think that's a good idea. They strive in ultra-low nutrient systems and quickly take over the entire tank, within 24-48 hours.

Dino's live on high nutrients link , and getting the nutrients under control seems to be the issue here.

 

[Reefer1978]

Dino's live on high nutrients link , and getting the nutrients under control seems to be the issue here.

How come so many people fight them with the dirty method then?

My advice is from my personal experience. My high nutrient system became ultra-low within days. Then my corals started to go, first with sps Stn from the base, followed by Montis loosing color.

I was dosing phosphates and nitrates for a while.

 

[klp]

Trying one procedure and letting it resonate for awhile. Often times something in the tank changed which allowed these organisms to flourish. So back to your last sentence-

Actually becomes more clear or makes more sense. In my case, I know how mine started, and I know that part of it wasn't something I could control or foresaw coming. But my procedure for example, is to keep things consistent. Not to jump into trends of mix matching procedures and just let it ride. If down the road, in say a month or two, things don't change, I will change something. In the meantime my focus is to keep thinking about areas that could improve, look at water change reactions, keep a journal of parameter tests and look for patterns or discrepancies. My goal is to figure what works for my situation so that I can share that with others.
For instance Rev told us about adding cheato. I questioned it because my cheato died at the first sign of dinos. The last bit that was left was covered in brown slime. On the other hand, we don't know what caused his, no pictures, or ID.

What started yours that you could not control?

 

[jsker]

How come so many people fight them with the dirty method then?

My advice is from my personal experience. My high nutrient system became ultra-low within days. Then my corals started to go, first with sps Stn from the base, followed by Montis loosing color.

I was dosing phosphates and nitrates for a while.

There are different methods that work for each system, I have found that getting the nutrients down during a bloom bring outbreaks under control. Rev has a large system and what I am suggesting instead of large water changes is to bring down the nutrient levels temporally then brink the nutrient levels up to find the balance of phosphate and nitrates.

It was suggested to me a couple of years back to feed, feed, feed to bring up my levels if needed and I did with and combination of frozen and reef nutrition products. I use filter media and GFO to keep my nutrients in line. My thinking is instead of black outs and cutting the lights, is to run the system as normal and tweaking the nutrients. Rev has been busy on the road and maintenance could not be done on a regular schedule and with a newer system the outbreak happened.

One way to prevent the build up of nutrients and waste is setting up a auto water change. This is one thing I am going to do with my schedule to export extra nutrients and waste so they do not build up.

 

[Reefer1978]

There are different methods that work for each system, I have found that getting the nutrients down during a bloom bring outbreaks under control. Rev has a large system and what I am suggesting instead of large water changes is to bring down the nutrient levels temporally then brink the nutrient levels up to find the balance of phosphate and nitrates.

It was suggested to me a couple of years back to feed, feed, feed to bring up my levels if needed and I did with and combination of frozen and reef nutrition products. I use filter media and GFO to keep my nutrients in line. My thinking is instead of black outs and cutting the lights, is to run the system as normal and tweaking the nutrients. Rev has been busy on the road and maintenance could not be done on a regular schedule and with a newer system the outbreak happened.

One way to prevent the build up of nutrients and waste is setting up a auto water change. This is one thing I am going to do with my schedule to export extra nutrients and waste so they do not build up.

I fully agree with everything you are suggested as a general practice, nice writeup. I guess my responses are purely from the standpoint of dino's that I personally don't think can be defeated, thus my suggestions are first, to ID.

Too many hobbyists (I know Rev is not your general customer) are reading "Try blackout, it cleared me out" and will stop with identification, proceeding to try things in hope it works. Some of these suggestions will take weeks to try, only to find things got worse.

So, to summarize, as the only description we have from Rev is long, snotty looking brown strings with air bubbles, I am assuming it's Ostreopsis of some kind, most likely O.Ovata, as that's the exact strain I am seeing reported most often. All "easy" methods of fighting, might lower the numbers initially, but are not a permanent cure, and as soon as the proposed nutrient balance gets out of whack just a tiny bit, they take over the tank.

 

[Black Pearl]

Large water changes Fuel Dinos, no water changes, just top off

 

[revhtree]

To starve them out, my suggestion is to get them down to .01 or a trace and have you nitrates at 3 to 5 to starve them out for two weeks. Then bring the phosphate up to a .02 and see how the tank looks. If you want to get the phosphates down fast us a product with Lanthanum Chloride in it. Run GFO as normal. Are you running as filter media such as sprox, life bio fil? I run the life bio fil with a little zeomix to keep my nitrates in line, for the reason I feed heavy for the corals and I have fat fish

I feed pretty good as well. I added some Chaeto to the fuge yesterday so I am hoping that helps as well. Oh and I don't run any filter media at this time.

 

[Black Pearl]

I Reiterate

And my filter socks were black with Dino by removing them you deminish proliferation, less of the troops to battle also use no carbon source= fuel

 

[revhtree]

I Reiterate

And my filter socks were black with Dino by removing them you deminish proliferation, less of the troops to battle also use no carbon source= fuel

How did you set this up?

 

[Black Pearl]

Setup easy top has two hoses, it drains runs thru filter then pumps back in. I have this and a vortex. I have the magnum running right now just to tidy up the water of fine particles, plus I thought I saw white spot on a tang I recently introduced into my tank. These filter down to one micron, that will catch a lot of Dino, better than trying to skim them off the surface. You can set this up in sump or display. Note the Vortex with Diatomaous Earth cleans like nothing else, just my opinion(it's old school)

 

[Velcro]

@revhtree Add chaeto and hold the tank steady for a couple months. From my experience with ostreopsis in two tanks, and step I took to erradicate the dinos led to a new imbalance that would eventually lead to... MORE DINOS.

When I stopped caring about them and just kept the tank stable it took care of itself. I will say that I stopped water changes during this time as they really do seem to increase strands noticeably the next day. Once you no longer see Dinos for several weeks do a very small water change every week and increase the size weekly as long as you don't see them anymore.

 

[bubbaque]

I agree with @jsker. High nutrients is what got me in the dino mess. Dosed nitrates and literally a day or two later they exploded. Peroxide is the only think that killed them off.

Same thing happened in my old 75gallon. If you look in my history I made a post about dosing nitrate and "cyano" a day or two later showing up on that tank also. The cyano ended up being dino, confirmed with a microscope (posted a pic of the dino under a microscope). @Diesel at the time told me the low no3 kept everything in check and when I raised nutrients it was enough to feed the unwanted issues.

 

[klp]

I copied the below comments in quotation marks below to a file but failed to note the reference that I copied it from. I just saved the conversation for future reference. It may have been on R2R. I do not know what happened after the first week or when it was supposed to stop. I put this in mostly for the dosage recommendations for you to try in a "if all else fails" situation. Maybe someone else has tried this and can report on it. I suspect the Kalwasser comments are not germane to anyone else as this appears to be specific to a particular tank and should be ignored.

"Answer below was from a conversation with Julian Sprung.
I spoke to him at MACNA about this problem on a reef tank someone gave me. He told me to add 1/2 teaspoon Kalkwasser for a 90 gallon mixed with about 1/2-3/4 galllon tank water and pour in every day.
He also had me speak to a colleague of his who has a technique using Hydrogen Peroxide for my 90 gallon.
1 ml every day for a week
2 ml. every day for second week
3 ml. daily for 3rd week
Stepping up like that until 9 ml every day during 9th week and maintain 9ml daily after.
In a little over a week my tank is 95% free of Dinoflagellates( and red slime)! Amazing!"

 

[jsker]

I fully agree with everything you are suggested as a general practice, nice writeup. I guess my responses are purely from the standpoint of dino's that I personally don't think can be defeated, thus my suggestions are first, to ID.

Too many hobbyists (I know Rev is not your general customer) are reading "Try blackout, it cleared me out" and will stop with identification, proceeding to try things in hope it works. Some of these suggestions will take weeks to try, only to find things got worse.

So, to summarize, as the only description we have from Rev is long, snotty looking brown strings with air bubbles, I am assuming it's Ostreopsis of some kind, most likely O.Ovata, as that's the exact strain I am seeing reported most often. All "easy" methods of fighting, might lower the numbers initially, but are not a permanent cure, and as soon as the proposed nutrient balance gets out of whack just a tiny bit, they take over the tank.

Great thought, and so true

 

[jsker]

I feed pretty good as well. I added some Chaeto to the fuge yesterday so I am hoping that helps as well. Oh and I don't run any filter media at this time.

As we all say, reefing is making a change the wait patently to see what happens.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

I'll go back to my original post.
High nutints and low nutints both seem to cause and stop Dino's.
Odd isn't it?

 

[reeferfoxx]

What started yours that you could not control?

I had a rock in the tank that was dissolving on the inside. Found out cause I went to pull the rock to break it down into pieces to reattach and found that it was dissolving. Started a 7 week curing process for some new rock. After 7 weeks, went to clean the tank for the new rock addition and about a week after adding the rock, my nutrients plunged to No3-0 and PO4-0.001. At the same time we had a heat wave hit and I didn't get the AC on in time which caused the temp to increase about 1.5 - 2 deg. Then the brown dusting started.

 

[reeferfoxx]

At the same time we had a heat wave hit and I didn't get the AC on in time which caused the temp to increase about 1.5 - 2 deg.

I'm not sure if the temp had anything to do with it. I do attribute it to the lack of nutrients though.

I think the hardest part is watching my acros that were STN'ing are actually rebounding with all this crap growing around it. I just want it to look pretty....that's all ;Drowning

 

[kennedpa]

Tomorrow I end my lights out. I'll post my strategy and prelim results here for you rev tomorrow. I had a monstrosity of an outbreak.