2 Day Blackout vs Dino's

austin93

austin93

Don't Panic!
I have been dealing with this crap for 6 months and decided to fix the problem with 2 days lights out. So, I covered the tank with a blanket and shut the lights off for two days and a night. The excitement was nearly too much for me to handle, but I managed to only peek once!:bum: Well, the big moment finally arrived and WOW did the tank look good. Snow white sand and crystal clear water. Who could ask for anything more.
:thumbdown The good times were short lived, the dino's are back on the sand after only 8 hours. This is a sps tank, so how long do I have to wait before I do it all again?:sleep:
 
I find 2 days is not enough, do three days. give it a few days to to allow your sps to make some nutrients. I also found that i had to skim wet, run carbon, jack my ph up and siphon filter as much of the dinos as possible. Nothing has returned since.
 
OK, thanks for the advice. I have went 1 full day with lights on and covered the tank back up this morning. Will go another 2 days dark and see how it goes. I think the large waterchange which was recommended by the lfs was not the way to go. I will also pull the zeo reactor offline asap. Its just too fine a line for me to walk. Maybe add some pellets once nutrients start to rise. I hate this crap.
 
i didnt do any water changes but i did siphon out any dinos in the water column when i turned offthe flow. Basically i found they all collected around the powerheads so i would wash them out often. I don;t know exactly what got rid of it but i know this combination worked.

HIGH PH FROM KALK
BLACKOUT
MANUAL REMOVAL
SKIM WET
RUN CARBON
 
In addition to the other stuff... run a 100 micron filter sock and clean or change it daily during and after the lights out period until they are gone.

If you can't run a filter sock get yourself a large HOB filter and run filter floss. They are relatively cheap.
 
also don't run the lights at their full cycle all at once. Start with just an hour adding another hour each day so long as they do not reappear.
 
I thought I'd chime in.

I did a 5 day blackout on my tank. It was pitch-black. I had it wrapped in black trashbags and blankets of the tops. The dino's showed back up within hours of removing the blankets. They came back with just ambient sunlight entering the room.

I bought some high grade carbon and am going to get some filter floss next.

Oh, I also did a 30% water change....the dino's just came back worse.

Good Luck!
 
Aquaman, I think that the water change after the treatment is what caused my dino's to reappear. I will be skipping the water change this time. I might go ahead and run the wc water through a filter sock and then return it to the sump. Hoping to get a handle on this stuff. My tank will be unveiled again tomorrow at noon! Wish me luck.
 
There is a lot of speculation that silicates in change water are the limiting factor for Dino's. I battled them for several months. What finally did them in was stopping ALL water changes along with 3 days of darkness, lots of GAC and GFO (changed every 3 days) and new RO membrane with new DI Resin.

Good Luck, Dino's Suck big time
 
I took off the blanket this morning. Everything looked great, which is typical. Real test will be this afternoon. Ill update then.
 
F#(&!!!!!!!!!!!!!!This crap is coming back again!!!

****ed doesn't begin to cover my attitude right now. To make things worse, I have to go give a speech tonight about my golf team in front of a large part of the town. I am very sick of dealing with this. I guess I will give it a week before I try to do it again. Maybe go 3 or 4 days straight this time. Also going to have to look seriously at kalk dosing to raise my ph. This actually scares me to death. I have a little extra money I was going to spend on a couple dosing pumps for cal/alk but i think maybe I need some sort of ph monitoring or controlling device. This really sux!
 
austin93 said:
F#(&!!!!!!!!!!!!!!This crap is coming back again!!!

****ed doesn't begin to cover my attitude right now. To make things worse, I have to go give a speech tonight about my golf team in front of a large part of the town. I am very sick of dealing with this. I guess I will give it a week before I try to do it again. Maybe go 3 or 4 days straight this time. Also going to have to look seriously at kalk dosing to raise my ph. This actually scares me to death. I have a little extra money I was going to spend on a couple dosing pumps for cal/alk but i think maybe I need some sort of ph monitoring or controlling device. This really sux!
Click to expand...

Welcome to my world man. I feel your pain!
 
austin93 and aquaman101 - the dinos are beatin me down too. I can atleast offer what has not worked for me. I physically removed all of my rock and livestock to a holding container and manually scrubbed with a brush all 200lbs of it. I also did a 75% water change, added a phosban and carbon reactor. Also ran filter floss. Looked great for a few days and now they are back with a vengeance. Tank looks even worse. Gonna try the blackout soon. Now that it has smothered my sps, I swear, I am about ready try anything. A blackout would be good because I cant stand to look at my tank anyway.

Good luck!
 
I am now a strong believer that water changes cause the dino's to return after the lights out period. I did a 15% wc after 2 days of lights out and they returned that night. I did 2 days lights out and no wc and they are only very lightly dusting a couple small spots. I have read that this is the case for a lot of people fighting these. My dino advice....................... NO WATER CHANGES!!!!! I don't really like them anyway, but its sad because I just now have a nice system to mix and change 25 gallons quickly. Typical.
 
i have been fighting them also.
last night i watched a cerinth snail eating some, so perhaps they will help.
 
austin93 said:
I am now a strong believer that water changes cause the dino's to return after the lights out period. I did a 15% wc after 2 days of lights out and they returned that night. I did 2 days lights out and no wc and they are only very lightly dusting a couple small spots. I have read that this is the case for a lot of people fighting these. My dino advice....................... NO WATER CHANGES!!!!! I don't really like them anyway, but its sad because I just now have a nice system to mix and change 25 gallons quickly. Typical.
Click to expand...

I usually do do about a 15% water change weekly. I think I'll bump that back to bi-weekly and do another 5 day blackout.

I've also noticed that dino's don't show up as bad with just actinic lights running.
 
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