Dinoflagellates.

Some of us seem to be lost or stuck on square one.

A few pages ago the intergalactic dino-committee agreed on that plankton was the way to go.
We have already seen positive signs from that direction so step on and join the collective on a journey to glory.

Sometimes the pages rush by in a whoosh and people today demand fast facts, wrapped in cellophane.
I've already started to edit the original post so people can enjoy just that in not so distant future.

77 pages read at 2 minutes a page should take about 2.2 hours of life, death, suspense and action.
If you have dinos it's the wise thing to do.
 
if we can nail this down and get multiple people confirming that plankton and pods solve the issue for a good % of people maybe someone can write up a summary and howto and get it posted as a sticky.
 
DNA- is there a specific pod that you, or others, have introduced, that is showing more victory then others?

Pods are not easily come by around here. The lfs in my area are a joke. And the ones who do have a bit of knowledge, won't bring them in unless it's a special order. The shelf life isn't great.

I have read 40 of the pages in this thread alone. I appreciate all the time and effort that has gone into this. I'm just trying to hold mine back until I can get an ID on them.
 
Where would you release the pods? I would suspect they would quickly become fish food in the display. How would releasing them in the sump help?
 
natas said:
if we can nail this down and get multiple people confirming that plankton and pods solve the issue for a good % of people maybe someone can write up a summary and howto and get it posted as a sticky.
Click to expand...

I've been toying with making a chart of efficacy from this and the older dino thread. I dunno how to account for multiple methods tho.

I can tell you that pods and phyto alone cured at least 2 people's tanks just in the last 4 pages of this thread. If you start including 'dirty method' in general that goes way up. Also it's the only method with zero adverse effects.

I can link several scientific papers (and the biology post-grad from the other thread who was trying to culture dinos) saying that copepods are the major predator, and that dinos don't compete well at higher nutrient levels.

Pod stuff:
-Try to get benthic pods. Might be difficult as tisbe and tigriops are both pelagic iirc. Nothing wrong with either type, fish just love pelagic

-add a chunk of live rock/sand from your LFS, local reefer to your sump, will seed pods. Doesn't have to be big. Someone must have a cheap mushroom frag for sale. Bonus if the piece includes some kind of algae

-Americans have zillions of options. Order a kit or live sand or a small piece of live rock from TBS, IPSF, ReefCleaners. Non usains are kinda hosed. Check local reef club, online classifieds

-Adding a bunch of macro algae will seed with many different types. Someone local with have chaeto for super cheap, it has to be harvested regularly

-just feeding phyto should cause a population explosion. It doesn't have to be live phyto. I'm using phytofeast which is dead and super concentrated

-if you can't get any of the above, overfeed. Many pods are detrivores. Overfeed anyway, it helps

hth
ivy
 
90% dinos gone. Had them since May. One more dose of dinox tonight and siphon the remains tom! So exited. ImageUploadedByTapatalk1443054687.737515.jpg
 
Im going to jump on the pod/plankton bandwagon. Going tomorrow (pending time) to pick up pods. It's an hour drive so fingers crossed I make it before closing.
 
I'm on day 6 of peroxide and things are looking a lot better. My trochus snails seem more active and are eating the remaining visible algae on my rocks. My glass and sand have never been so clean. The amount of Dino's visible after 4 hours of lights is less each day.

I've stopped water changes, did a 2.5 day blackout to start with, stopped skimming and have been feeding more and using frozen food.

I have pods and microalgae coming in next Tuesday as well. I may get some chaeto for my sump too to help keep suck up nutrients.
 
I personally stopped using red sea coral pro salt because I believe it was making my dinos worse. It's a great salt but they do add a lot to it to get levels raised to extremes. When I switched to Fritz salt the dino blooms were not as bad after a water change (take note they were still there)
 
amphipods are benthic aren't they? i don't particularly know what copepods are benthic other than the tigger pods but every single time i've tried to add them to my water they always all end up in my filter sock because they are free swimming...i cannot keep tigger pods alive in my tank past a few hours
 
PorkchopExpress said:
amphipods are benthic aren't they? i don't particularly know what copepods are benthic other than the tigger pods but every single time i've tried to add them to my water they always all end up in my filter sock because they are free swimming...i cannot keep tigger pods alive in my tank past a few hours
Click to expand...

Yes, amphipods tend to be benthic. And huge. That just means they hang out on the sand, rocks in your tank. Tiggers (Tigriops spp) are free swimming pods, so they are classified as pelagic, ie in the water column. Fish loooooove pelagic pods so they don't survive long in a display tank. If you see pods on the glass, they could be either type. Just to confuse you. :)


@Karimwassef Don't make me come over there and say eh at you! ;) PS. Tried putting some cheesecloth in my tank with an led light on it overnight. Pulled out epic numbers of pods and a thick coating of dinos. Yech!

@Billybatz I was using IO when I got dinos. When I couldn't keep alk up I switched to IO/Reef. Then switched to D&D H20 when my LFS got some in 2kg bags. Didn't seem to make a difference. Bro in law gave me his salt stash so I've now got several types. Red Sea is real seawater with the water evaporated out, it may have a lot of random stuff in it.
 
Update! Not that anybody reads these loooooong messages, but it keeps me organized. :)

Mass confusion reigns. I got the microscope. The yellow sludge on my glass which was id'd by pros as dinos doesn't seem to contain *any* life. That implies it's bacterial, too small to see with my little scope. Dinos do like to live in a bacterial sludge, but I should see some cells. I suspect user error.

Looking at filter pads, zomg! Ostreopsis ovata very clearly. BUT also some much smaller very suspicious brown, round cells. (And a virtual carnival of microcritters, including some kind of amoeba which was happily eating everything else. Very cool). Could I have several types of dinos? Is this why I'm having so much trouble getting rid of the stupid things?

Don't know if I mentioned it here, but I dosed nitrate in my tank to 3ppm with potassium nitrate. 3 days later- green algae on the glass! Very exciting as this is literally the first time I've had green algae of any sort in the tank. The algae has persisted without further additions of KNO3.

Ivy
 
That is fantastic and gross all at once! (Yes I read the posts. I read all the posts pertaining to this horror).

My update. 92 hours in the dark and they are still snotty and stringy and all sorts of eww, but I only count a handful of bubbles (so far, knock on wood)

Lfs is a joke. Calling multiple ones trying to get a scope ID. One told me to bring in a sample and they can tell from just looking. They are "trained". Uh huh. Sure you are.
 
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