Dinoflagellates.

[Mikefromaz]

I have beaten dinos by going ultra clean after my tank crash and dino invasion. I know that doesn'agree with the "dirty" method. The bottom line is they BOTH work for exactly the same reason. The good plankton and micro fauna do better with more nutrients because they require more. This is a biological constant. The more complex the organism is the more fuel it requires. By starving the dinos (clean method), you drive them back in numbers to the time when they were competing with copious other organisms. They were/are always in your reef but held in check. By flooding the tank with nutrients (dirty method), AND adding live phyto, pods, etc. in quanity you the balance in competition for nutrients. I experienced this as the result of a marine algae killer which wiped out my tank.

 

[DNA]

I did a simple test to estimate the amount of detritus my tank produces and how much of it is missed by the skimmer.

Last weekend I vacuumed all my accessible sandbed thoroughly and cleaned 20Kg of live rock in the sump of all detritus.
Today I vaccumed (40cc) 1.4Oz. of detritus from that same sandbed and cleaned (50cc) 1.7Oz from the 20kg live rock.

This volume is like two matchboxes full of detritus plus the skimmer got emptied twice.
I'd estimate that the skimmer removed similar or slightly less detritus than what the other two trapped.

I have (150kg) 300 pounds of live rock and a (3cm) 1" shallow sandbed in my 400g system.

 

[karimwassef]

The "clean" method doesn't exclude enriching the plankton biofauna.

I feed enough and provide opportunities for the plankton to thrive with skimmer downtime and plenty of chaeto and a cryptic zone.

But I also run my skimmer most of the day, do water changes and use a slow UV loop.

Check out my YouTube channel https://youtu.be/q4XY7U4ddwo

 

[cal_stir]

Thanks for the reply. I'll have to look into it. Have you had any noticeable P04 increases? I've read that phyto are loaded with phosphates.

Tested my po4 today and it's 0.025, been dosing fresh home cultured phyto for about 3 weeks now and no increase in po4.

 

[Quiet_Ivy]

Has anyone done a blackout and had their tank get worse? I only went about 30~ hours because my frogspawn receded to show white skeleton. One of my sexy shrimp is dead (pulled its remains out) and the other is missing presumed dead. My toadstool is covered with dinos. I don't see any pods anywhere. They were previously ON the dinos, all over the glass; several types and what looked like predatory isopods chasing them.

Getting worse weekly
Ivy

 

[karimwassef]

Sounds like you may have more trouble than dinos ?

 

[DNA]

FWIW, GFO removes silicate in the same way that PhosGuard does. People have been successful with both products.

This fact could possibly be a part of the problem.
Diatoms are a major nutrient competitor and they need silicate.

I also found out carbon does not bind well to iron. (and alcohol)
A few posts back I mention the opposite.

Palytoxins produced by Ostreopsis are very long carbon chains.
Based on the above I wonder if it's the carbon or the GFO that take up the toxins.

Yet another bit of knowledge about this toxin is that it causes bone resorption, by breaking down bone and releasing the elements. Bones are mostly calcium and so are our corals.

 

[Mikefromaz]

Blackouts do not deter dinos. You must keep in mind that dinos bevome water column swimmers at night. Night time activities appeal to them so it seems likely dark isn't much of a threat. How many times have I looked at my "clean" sandbed in the early morning thinking I was winning the battle? (Show of hands please) UV sterilizers properly applied, meaning as slow as possible water flow through your unit ifyou have one. Stay AWAY from marine algae killers! They do not discriminate between killing unwanted algae (HA in my case), and the micro critters which are keeping dinos in check by out competing them fir nutrients and/ or eating them? I also dosed with vodka to enhance nitrate removal. Essentially the object is to weaken the dinos as much as possible. As soon as you see signs that it takes longet for dinos to dirty up the glass and sandbed flood the tank with live phytoplankton, pods and whatever your LFS may offer along those lines. If you had a crash caused by marine algae killers repopulating the "good guy" micro plankton after weakening the dinos serms to work. It will also benefit your filter feeders.

 

[cal_stir]

Blackouts do not deter dinos. You must keep in mind that dinos bevome water column swimmers at night. Night time activities appeal to them so it seems likely dark isn't much of a threat. How many times have I looked at my "clean" sandbed in the early morning thinking I was winning the battle? (Show of hands please) UV sterilizers properly applied, meaning as slow as possible water flow through your unit ifyou have one. Stay AWAY from marine algae killers! They do not discriminate between killing unwanted algae (HA in my case), and the micro critters which are keeping dinos in check by out competing them fir nutrients and/ or eating them? I also dosed with vodka to enhance nitrate removal. Essentially the object is to weaken the dinos as much as possible. As soon as you see signs that it takes longet for dinos to dirty up the glass and sandbed flood the tank with live phytoplankton, pods and whatever your LFS may offer along those lines. If you had a crash caused by marine algae killers repopulating the "good guy" micro plankton after weakening the dinos serms to work. It will also benefit your filter feeders.

Two things I would add is that water changes encourage dinos when they are blooming and physical removal such as vacuuming them through a 40uM or less filter sock and socks on your drains helps a lot.

 

[Mikefromaz]

I do have a filter sock on the input line to my sump but unfortunately it is a 200 micron type. I did read a report stating that dinos range around 40 microns so your suggestion makes a lot of sense to me. I will get with my LFS and order up a finer one ASAP. Thanks.

 

[DNA]

I've read their structure is not that strong.
Does that mean they break up in the sock letting the carcass and the toxins through?

 

[bertoni]

Dinoflagellates definitely would break down given enough time. I'm not sure how long that'd take, though. I would clean the filter every day or two if I were dealing with a bad infection and was trying to remove it that way.

 

[cal_stir]

I've read their structure is not that strong.
Does that mean they break up in the sock letting the carcass and the toxins through?

Any samples taken from my socks and put under the microscope showed intact specimens, I never saw any broken down.

 

[karimwassef]

In an outbreak, they would clog a filter sock very quickly. Daily cleanup would probably be due, depending on flow rate.

 

[Dfee]

Every day when my lights come on the gravel would be clean. It would take a couple hours for Dino's to show their ugly head. But I just peeked in on the fourth day of a blackout and I can see them in full force!!! How does this make any sense!?!? Can some take a look at my picture I posted 10-20 posts back? I'm 90% sure it's Dino's, I just can't believe what I saw when I just peeked

 

[bheron]

After reading through this thread here's what I've learned - please take a loko and let me know how I've done

1) Dinos are toxic to other living things.

2) There are different types of Dinos. Getting a sample under a microscope is best way to identify and address them

3) Dinos seem to always be there, the challenge is keeping them in check within your system.

4) With lights off Dinos become suspended in the water column;with lights on the reattach to something?

5) Removing Dinos: can be siphoned; or run skimmer, filter sock, UV with lights off. Or both.

6) Keeping Dinos in balance, it seems, is to use other organic materials? I've read people mention macroalgae, phyto, overfeeding, turning off skimmer as ways to fight or starve or just keep them in check?

What did I get wrong / forget?

 

[EvMiBo]

I got amphipod copepod mix from reefs2go
http://www.reefs2go.com/product/INV_POD-1000-BOGO/Live-Saltwater-Amphipods-Copepods-1000---Buy-1-Get-1-FREE.html

Live copepods from algaebarn
http://www.algaebarn.com/shop/pf

Pod+ from reefcleaners
http://www.reefcleaners.org/aquarium-store/pods

And I have an order of pods, worms, stars coming from IPSF
http://www.reefcleaners.org/aquarium-store/pods

Phyto culture and micro macro grow from Florida Aqua Farms
http://florida-aqua-farms.com/shop/microalgae-disks/


My micro fauna was decimated from algaex, I originally started my tank with real live rock and had a very diverse system so that is what I am trying to get back to, diversity is the key.
My system turned the corner when I let the system get dirty and started rebuilding my micro fauna, I grow a nice crop of nice green micro algae on the glass in 3 days and am maintaining po4 at 0.025 and no3 at 2ppm.

thanks :thumbsup:

 

[cal_stir]

Every day when my lights come on the gravel would be clean. It would take a couple hours for Dino's to show their ugly head. But I just peeked in on the fourth day of a blackout and I can see them in full force!!! How does this make any sense!?!? Can some take a look at my picture I posted 10-20 posts back? I'm 90% sure it's Dino's, I just can't believe what I saw when I just peeked

Can't make anything out in the pic, can you get a better one with better lighting?
The individual dinos are green but form chains or strands that are brown and snot like usually with air bubbles trapped within, but I have seen them without. They can be blown off with a turkey baster.
Normally when the lights are off they become free swimming in the water column(and they do swim), I believe this is to avoid predation, however there are many types of dinos and you need a microscope to ID them.
I think you need to physically remove them as much as possible, I used 10uM socks on my drains and blew them off the rocks and corals and vacuumed the sand bed and pumped the vacuumed water back into the tank through a 5uM sediment filter. It's tedious 10uM socks can be hard to come by but your LFS should be able to order them.

 

[Quiet_Ivy]

Blackouts do not deter dinos. You must keep in mind that dinos bevome water column swimmers at night. Night time activities appeal to them so it seems likely dark isn't much of a threat. How many times have I looked at my "clean" sandbed in the early morning thinking I was winning the battle? (Show of hands please) UV sterilizers properly applied, meaning as slow as possible water flow through your unit ifyou have one. Stay AWAY from marine algae killers! They do not discriminate between killing unwanted algae (HA in my case), and the micro critters which are keeping dinos in check by out competing them fir nutrients and/ or eating them? I also dosed with vodka to enhance nitrate removal. Essentially the object is to weaken the dinos as much as possible. As soon as you see signs that it takes longet for dinos to dirty up the glass and sandbed flood the tank with live phytoplankton, pods and whatever your LFS may offer along those lines. If you had a crash caused by marine algae killers repopulating the "good guy" micro plankton after weakening the dinos serms to work. It will also benefit your filter feeders.

I seem to have a toxic variety of dinos. The shrimp showed the same symptoms as my snail population..they slowed down, stopped doing the sexy shrimp 'dance', seemed 'stunned' then died. They were picking at the dinos on the glass. My toadstool might be putting out something that's irritating the frogspawn, it's at 'ground zero' and is the only coral that's covered in dinos.

As for blackouts not working, rats! And dang! And several other words! I don't actually *have* any (other) algae except the ball of Chaeto in my display. (Which isn't growing and actually gets covered in dinos.) Do you think adding the nastiest hair algae infested rock I can find locally would help? I'm serious. I added a cup of dry sand to the back of my display, hoping to get diatoms. Anything to outcompete the dinos. I suspect you and DNA are on to something with the theory about low biodiversity and 'very clean' systems. I started with dry rock and sand too. Infauna kits don't seem to be available in Canada.

I would rather have hair algae. At least it isn't toxic!
ivy

 

[cal_stir]

I seem to have a toxic variety of dinos. The shrimp showed the same symptoms as my snail population..they slowed down, stopped doing the sexy shrimp 'dance', seemed 'stunned' then died. They were picking at the dinos on the glass. My toadstool might be putting out something that's irritating the frogspawn, it's at 'ground zero' and is the only coral that's covered in dinos.

As for blackouts not working, rats! And dang! And several other words! I don't actually *have* any (other) algae except the ball of Chaeto in my display. (Which isn't growing and actually gets covered in dinos.) Do you think adding the nastiest hair algae infested rock I can find locally would help? I'm serious. I added a cup of dry sand to the back of my display, hoping to get diatoms. Anything to outcompete the dinos. I suspect you and DNA are on to something with the theory about low biodiversity and 'very clean' systems. I started with dry rock and sand too. Infauna kits don't seem to be available in Canada.

I would rather have hair algae. At least it isn't toxic!
ivy

Diatoms and dinos seem to live off each other, before I went dirty I removed my sand bed and the dinos moved to the glass and rocks but I could blow them off the rocks and not the glass, when I put a sample of what was on the glass under the scope it was 90% diatoms and 10% dinos. I had to clean the glass daily of the brown film, when I went dirty the green micro algae began to take over on the glass and it out competed the diatom/dinos either for space or nutrients(I think it was space), cyano growing on the bottom of the tank out competed it there.
My "turning the corner" was rebuilding my micro fauna with the addition of many different pods, worms, snails, crabs, critters and feeding phytoplankton.

I don't think you want hair algae either.