Dinoflagellates.

[taricha]

And just to add questions to a topic that has too many questions already...

I wasn't even planning on putting my samples under the scope until 2 or 3 days, but after less than 24 hours... I found this.

All my beakers looked like brown, stringy, bubbly happy dinos

...except one that looked like this

That's my What The Heck beaker. It's the only beaker with a treatment that no one would be willing to do in a tank.
Had extra dino and mix, put 1 drop of 4-12-4 miracle grow quick start in 50ml of dinos mix. My sketchy math says that's 94 ppm nitrate and 89 ppm phosphate!
So I figured I'd put it under the scope and see a complete dead wasteland. Nope.
Lots of micro life swimming. 1 species of dino totally wiped out, but the other (amphidinium) still moving but in very reduced numbers.
So weird.

 

[karimwassef]

No way... seriously?

 

[karimwassef]

can you try the standard stuff? 24-8-16? That's more rich in Nitrogen.

If that works, then maybe the freshwater nitrogen food?

 

[DNA]

And just to add questions to a topic that has too many questions already...
... So weird.

Some results already in, I'm loving this.
What the heck moments are perfectly normal. I have them all the time.

 

[DNA]

Today I am looking in the tank and the dino's are returning.

This is how dinos operate. Their seemingly blinding fast growth rate have not been explained properly yet.
Even though you don't see any in your tank there may still be in their millions spread out though the sand, rock and water column.
That very slight yellow tint of the water....

 

[taricha]

can you try the standard stuff? 24-8-16? That's more rich in Nitrogen.

If that works, then maybe the freshwater nitrogen food?

The stuff I had doesn't include metals in any significant amounts. So I'd shy away from adding something that does.
Fewer ingredients, fewer unknowns (but still plenty of those)

But yeah, if this is effective long term I'll see if I can test a higher N version as well, hopefully test what ingredient is having an effect and see if a more sane dose can be effective.

 

[W1ngz]

Can you run an ammonia test on that sample? Ammoniacal nitrogen is a common ingredient in fertilizers.

I do the I.T. at a fertilizer plant where we produce all manner of soluble and liquid fertilizers. I've picked up a lot of this sort of knowledge over the years.

 

[taricha]

Can you run an ammonia test on that sample? Ammoniacal nitrogen is a common ingredient in fertilizers.

My ammonia test kit seems to have wandered off, but yeah, what I added had 4% N, with a breakdown of 1.8% ammoniacal N, 2.2% urea.
I screwed up the tests somehow, contaminated all the beakers. Killed everything dino sized and larger in every beaker.
Back to the drawing board.
I did add a small dose of dino sand into my clean cultured 10 gal sandbed as suggested. Fingers crossed, hope it's established enough.

 

[reefcentral123]

anybody know what kind of dip will kill ostreopsis? my tank is still squeaky clean but i have one SPS that's getting overwhelmed by the last few spots of dinos

 

[bertoni]

You might look around for a hydrogen peroxide dip recipe, if you're willing to take some risk. Something like Coral RX might be safe, but I don't know how well it'd kill dinoflagellates. Companies generally keep their products' ingredients under wraps.

 

[mannyhernz]

You might look around for a hydrogen peroxide dip recipe, if you're willing to take some risk. Something like Coral RX might be safe, but I don't know how well it'd kill dinoflagellates. Companies generally keep their products' ingredients under wraps.

Tried the coral RX pro dip, didnt make a difference with the dinos on my sps.
Btw i am on my 3rd water change since ridding my dinos..hopefully they are gone for good.

 

[karimwassef]

Peroxide. You need the ozone like effect to rip them apart.

 

[reefcentral123]

yeah i did a 1:3 ratio of h2o2 with tank water @ 500 ml.

moved the coral around for 2 minutes and put it back. I'm kind of new to this whole dipping thing how often can this be done?

 

[34cygni]

Quiet_Ivy, I took a run at your first draft of the FAQ. The changes look extensive but aren't -- my biggest contribution was probably noticing that you didn't include a recommendation against carbon dosing. Mostly I reorganized it and added karimwassef's description of his implementation of the Clean Method and cal_stir's description of the Dirty Method, partly for their value as primary source documents and partly for their value as practical guides.

I encourage others to look over Quiet_Ivy's draft FAQ and help the process along. This is really about identifying a set of "best practices", so it's important.

And I encourage everyone, especially DNA, to take a moment to appreciate the fact that things have progressed to the point where pulling together a useful FAQ to help other hobbyists deal with dinos is now a reasonable goal.

 

[seamonster124]

Tried the coral RX pro dip, didn't make a difference with the dinos on my SPS.
Btw I am on my 3rd water change since ridding my dinos..hopefully they are gone for good.

Are you sure they are dinos on your SPS? is it greenish, on the tips, mostly on birds nest?

Above image shows what proceeded the disappearance of dinos in my tank. It is a plant and they are still there.

 

[mannyhernz]

Are you sure they are dinos on your SPS? is it greenish, on the tips, mostly on birds nest?

They were dinos..when i had them i tried dipping the sps but they would come back. Most of those sps did not make it through the dino period.

 

[34cygni]

Thanks so much for crystalizing the idea for me. That idea connects a lot of things I've had knocking around in my head

Thanks for doing your homework and stepping up. I've said before that there's an enormous amount of energy and creativity in this hobby... All that's missing from the mix is some fresh science to help get people pointed in more or less the right direction when they're inspired to venture off the edge of the map and see if they turn up something interesting to bring back and share with the rest of us.

Speaking of which -- is it my imagination, Quiet_Ivy, or are you Up To Something?

I've also thought maybe I should cultivate the skimmer mix in the dark, that way the organisms in the mix would be undisturbed by lights out, and I could hit the dinos with a 1-2 of darkness + skimmer mix. I couldn't call it "green tea" though, Maybe I'll call that skimmer "black tea."

That reminds me...

If I'm right about TDA-making, coral-friendly rosies in shed mucus getting skimmed off, then this is clearly a good idea...

01/11/2016, 09:08 AM #2618
seamonster124

6) Opened skimmer's collection cup drain to allow it to drain right back into the sump.

...but could be there's a better way. If a skimmer drained or overflowed into a bioreactor of some sort, perhaps we could culture coral-friendly bacteria before returning the skimmate to the system. Maybe the Montireef Protocol can be automated, enhanced, and made to work reliably.

If taricha's upgrade to the Montireef Protocol shows promise, some of the makers on RC might consider executing such a skimmer mod if for no other reason than because publicly doing so would demonstrate prior art and make it less likely that the idea can be successfully patented by the Aquarium-Industrial Complex. Come to think of it, a patent-preventing proactive build along these lines might be an even better idea if it doesn't work, as it looks like something that might make good snake oil...

I screwed up the tests somehow, contaminated all the beakers. Killed everything dino sized and larger in every beaker.

There's not a lot of ecological resilience or thermal mass in teeny-tiny systems, so it may just be that they crashed... But since you mentioned that you're working in a classroom, if you repeat the experiment, consider preparing two control beakers and putting one in an undisclosed secure location to make sure they weren't intentionally contaminated.

This is just vague paranoia, but a few years ago in the area where I live, 2 or 3 of the SW LFS's were struck by poisoning -- probably an OTC garden chemical surreptitiously dumped into their DTs. That didn't strike me as significant until I came across this paper while I was doing my homework...

Changes in microbial diversity associated with two coral species recovering from a stressed state in a public aquarium system
https://www.researchgate.net/profil...ium_system/links/0046352724295301c1000000.pdf

It appears someone attempted to poison the reef tank at the Horniman Museum and Gardens in London in November, 2010.

I have no idea if this was purest vandalism or some sort of moral misfire -- the aquarium version of monkey wrenching -- but it has crossed my mind that poisoning aquariums may be a thing in some social circles.

 

[DNA]

Quiet_Ivy, I took a run at your first draft of the FAQ.

It looks pretty good already.
Perhaps it's best not to over engineer it since hopefully we will rewrite it soon with even more effective methods.

Since most reefers with a dino problem don't have a clue, add some photos to get their attention.

 

[DNA]

"Opened skimmer's collection cup drain to allow it to drain right back into the sump."

Just realized this happens to my tank at least twice a year when the skimmer overflows for some reason.

 

[DNA]

Two months ago I had Ca at 350 and Alk at 5 and almost no dinos left.
Now it's Ca at 380 and Alk at 7 and the dinos are blooming again.
This is quite a thin line.

The levels took only a week to reach where they are now and they have hit the titanium wall.
Looking at my logs for the last 4 years the only times they have peaked across the wall is with chemicals on top of my oversized Calcium and Kalkwasser reactors.

I measure my Calcium reactor occasionally and last time it read:
Alk at 29 and flow 30ml/minute

Is anyone able to solve this mystery?