Posting for a friend

[Thereefdoc]

Parameters as of sunday-
Po4 0.10 Alk 11.3 Mg 1560 Ca 600 Nitrate 20-40 salinity 1.0245
My friend has a 20 gallon tank that’s been set up for a couple of months. He has mainly LPS and softies. Recently had a bout of dinos and some other algae, tried a blackout and dosing vibrant which seemed to help for a little bit. Now whatever this is came back full force. He is still dosing vibrant with no effect. Please help! #reefsquad

 

[saltyhog]

I tried Vibrant and it made my dinos much worse. For some reason it seemed to drop my PO4....which I'm sure was the reason it worsened my dinos.

There is a great thread in the Nuisance Algae forum that is a big help in fighting dinos. The first and maybe most important step is to get a microscopic video view of the dinos to see what strain it is. That will greatly help deciding the best course of action.

The things that seem to be universal in treating dinos ...... 1) keeping NO3 elevated (which doesn't appear to be problem) as well as PO4 (at least 0.06 but 0.1 or higher is good, 2) dosing silicates to cause a diatom bloom for competition, 3) manual removal, 4) adding biodiversity by adding some live rock/dosing phyto/bacterial additives/etc.

I would stop dosing Vibrant till it's clear what's going on....it obviously isn't helping right now anyway.

 

[Thereefdoc]

I tried Vibrant and it made my dinos much worse. For some reason it seemed to drop my PO4....which I'm sure was the reason it worsened my dinos.

There is a great thread in the Nuisance Algae forum that is a big help in fighting dinos. The first and maybe most important step is to get a microscopic video view of the dinos to see what strain it is. That will greatly help deciding the best course of action.

The things that seem to be universal in treating dinos ...... 1) keeping NO3 elevated (which doesn't appear to be problem) as well as PO4 (at least 0.06 but 0.1 or higher is good, 2) dosing silicates to cause a diatom bloom for competition, 3) manual removal, 4) adding biodiversity by adding some live rock/dosing phyto/bacterial additives/etc.

I would stop dosing Vibrant till it's clear what's going on....it obviously isn't helping right now anyway.

Ok. He just added a mini refugium with chaeto a couple of weeks ago. So it does look like dinos? Every time he tries to bring over a sample of algae with sand it disappears by the time he gets here.

 

[saltyhog]

Ok. He just added a mini refugium with chaeto a couple of weeks ago. So it does look like dinos? Every time he tries to bring over a sample of algae with sand it disappears by the time he gets here.

That's a bit strange. It looks like it would be easy to siphon some off with a pipette or syringe. Does he bring it in a small container with tank water in it too?

A good way to sample would be to use the vial that comes in a Salifert nitrate test kit and scoop up a sample of sand/water. When ready to look at it, shake it up vigorously after removing all but a few cc's of water. Take 1 drop and put it on a slide with a cover slip.

 

[Thereefdoc]

That's a bit strange. It looks like it would be easy to siphon some off with a pipette or syringe. Does he bring it in a small container with tank water in it too?

A good way to sample would be to use the vial that comes in a Salifert nitrate test kit and scoop up a sample of sand/water. When ready to look at it, shake it up vigorously after removing all but a few cc's of water. Take 1 drop and put it on a slide with a cover slip.

He does usually in a bigger container. Definitely will try that next time. Thanks