Dinoflagelletes

skiformance

skiformance racing
well what i thought was daitoms turns out to be Dinoflagelletes. it's on the front side of the reef on the sand bed. i spent most of the day researching solutions. i raised ph to 8.5 and will vac the sand bed. also cut all lighting back to 4 hours. any suggestions other than the 4-7 day lights out. i just don't want to kill my sps doing that.
 
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Nice Steve! Flagellence is no laughing matter, with over 90% of Americans having some issue with Flagellence in their life. JK too funny.
Sorry skiformance I don't think the lights out should hurt too bad, just keep a close eye on it. Kickem on and take a look at everything every other day. I just read a pretty good thread on it a couple of weeks ago but can't for the life of me remember where it was at. I'll try to find it again and let you know.
 
thanks, i'm just glad i figured out what it is before it covered my tank.
i also ordered a tds meter to check my ro water. i just don't understand how i got this crud. i run a gfo reactor weekly water changes, chaeto in the sump.
 
I know what you mean. I'm fighting a cyano issue at the moment. Doing water changes, feeding less, physical removal, and uped the flow in the area, with little to no effect so far. Even added a phosban reactor.
 
I think it is that time of year for cyano Chris. Susies 37 had a sudden out break and It happened just after a water change. I have been trying to syphon it out but it just comes back the next day.
 
knock on wood, i haven't had cyano. i have not lost any inverts, yet!!.
i guess i'm lucky to figure it out now before it got out completely out of hand. i killed all lighting. changed filter socks.
i wonder if the turning over of the lakes we get our water from has anything to do with this
 
I've had it bad for at least a month. I'm on the verge of trying chemi clean but I hate doing it. I've stopped it's spread but I' haven't had any progress in getting rid of it.
 
wait a second, i wonder if the new ati pro color. heavy in the red spectrum could have anything to do with this
 
last night at 6.00 pm i changed filter socks and cleaned the skimmer. i just had to changed the sock again and empty the skimmer. granted i dialed it up to skim wetter. which leads my to believe the die off at night is greater than i thought it would be and that i have a larger problem than my eye's could see. i also changed out the carbon in the reactor. didn't need it but i'm not going to take chances either
 
the way i beat it an i had it real bad , i changed the lights till it went away..like 2 days later it was gone..hope that helps..
 
Mike,

Dinoflageelates can appear for a number of reasons- all of them nutrient related. How old is your tank- I cant remember. The reason is ask is that a DF bloom is often part of the algal cycles tanks go through, and that you are better sufering it and cleaning than you would be kiling it and prolonging the nuisance by using chemiclean.

I have had really good luck with siphoning while brushing. I hook a siphon line upto a toothbrush (using elastic bands) and scrub it from the rocks. The siphon sucks it up and it doesnt get to die elsewhere in the tank and release the nutrients.

Sometimes it can come from a knock on effect. We kill one algae (say with reduced phospahate from GFO) and the nutrients that was using are now free to be used by another. Competition for nutrients is a key element in our tanks- thats why refugiums work so well.

Overall DF are ugly, more than a disaster. Live with it, clean it and generally it sorts itself out.

As an aside, how are things in your refugium? is the macro algae growing well- or slowed.

If it has slowed you may need some magnesium to get it going again and help suck the nutrients from the water.

P.
 
thanks Paul
chaeto is growth is slowed and appears to have some reddish algae growth on it. i have a hydor 1 in there to increase flow through the chaeto.2 weeks ago i had to remove 1/2 of it as it had over grow the chamber. tank is 3 years but 6 months since the crash. i never had any algae problems till now. i do believe you are correct about the magnesium vs growth issue. i did find my old 18 watt uv and put in on for the heck of it. phosphate are reading 0, nitrate < than 5 granted the test are done with api. my new test kits will be here friday with my salt. so i can test mag then. i'm not using any wonder chemicals. those are for mainly cyrano and i have dino's . i'm only going to do 24 hr of darkness and take it from there
 
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I have been fighting the cyano for about two weeks, Lights are only 5mon old, DI is only about 1.5mon old and still reading 0 and no I don't wash all my food. I have to clean the frags daily to keep it off them. I'm making a frag holder to keep them off the bottom and up in the water. I did have the DF really bad when the tank first cycled, but not since. I do need to check my mag I don't have test kit for it and I to have seen slowed growth in the fuge, cheato and mangroves, and some bubble calurpa. I'm not planning on using chemicals unless it continues to attack everything. The only thing I've done different is a 1/4 dose of vit C by seachem, only use a 1/4 of the recomended dosage. Started doing it in Dec after some zoapox on a new zoafrag came in for christmas. So far the zoas look a lot better but the cyano is kicking my butt.
 
I found this on another site:

Many times I have seen people worried about a film of cyanobacteria (slime algae). The helpful people post all of the proper questions to help a reefer solve their problem. I.E.---How old are your bulbs?, Do you use RO/DI water?, What are your nitrate and phosphate levels?, When was the last time you did a water change?, Do you have good flow in your tank?, Did your tank just finish cycling?.....

Then a week later, the same person will come back on and tell everyone that they did what they were told, and the slime algae still exists. This will start a round of questions like.....What test kits are you using?, When was the last time your RO/DI membrane and resins were replaced, etc., etc. They are told to do another waterchange and it will resolve itself---but it doesn't.

IF IT WALKS LIKE A DUCK AND IT TALKS LIKE A DUCK, IT IS ......

Usually a duck---but not always. Sometimes we think we are dealing with cyanobacteria and we are not. Sometimes we are dealing with dinoflagellates. Almost all of us with reeftanks, have dinoflagellates in our tank----Zooxanthellae. This symbiotic dinoflagellate is present in many of our corals. They are from the Kingdom of Protista and the Division of Dinoflagellata. This group possesses two flagella which move them through the water. They have additional pigments in addition to chlorophyll---usually brown or red. Some of them are bioluminescent. I'm sure many of you have heard of bays that glow when the water is disturbed. If you like to experiment, check out this link (BUT DO NOT PUT THIS IN YOUR REEF TANK---ONLY A SPECIALLY SET UP NANO). BL Web: Growing dinoflagellates at home The brown dinoflagellates are present in many of our corals and that is the reason there are so many brown corals. The red dinoflagellates are sometimes known as the Red Tide. I'm sure most of you have read at one time or another about the Red Tide destroying a reef. You do not want this in your tank. Not only do dinoflagellates exist in many corals, they also exist in many Tridacna Clams, anemones, and some sponges. They are never a problem if they are existing in a symbiotic relationship. However, they are a HUGE problem if they are existing in a free-living form.

LUCKILY FREE-LIVING DINOFLAGELLATES ARE RARE IN REEF AQUARIA

Dinoflagellates (hereafter called Snot Algae or Dino's) are one of the meanest things you have ever met in your life. (I unfortunately have had first hand experience). You will follow all of the advice and the problem will keep getting worse and not better. On top of that, some Dino's are toxic (think red tide). If you have a poisonous type, any snail, conch, fish, worm, etc. that eats the bad Dino's will eventually die while you are doing everything people are telling you to do. Then your clean up crew (bristle worms, crabs, etc.) will arrive for clean up duty and will die as a result of absorbing the toxins in the animals they are trying to eradicate. This provides even more nutrients for the Dino's to grow.

They have one interesting characteristic. You will follow everyones advice and go to bed. Then you will wake up in the morning thrilled that the advice worked. It looks pretty darn good---almost everything thing is gone. You go to work---come home 9 hours later and the slime algae is even bigger than yesterday.

If nothing is working, you might have Snot Algae. This algae is different. It is usually brown, has ton's of oxygen and/or Nitrogen bubbles in it, dissapears to a great deal (or entirely) overnight. (Remember it is photosythenetic---that's how it helps your corals grow). It is often called snot algae because it has the same grossness and the same consistency.

HOW DID YOU GET IT AND WHAT DO YOU DO ABOUT IT?

First off, the mere presence of bubbles does not mean it is Dino's or snot algae----cyanobacteria can trap bubbles temporarily that are trying to exit the sandbed or are produced by the cyanobacteria on it's own. As a result, some bubbles can be present with it too. Luckily, most of the time, it IS cyanobacteria. Dino's are usually caused by two things.....Bleaching of corals due to extreme temperatures or a major swing in tank chemistry.

Even if you have non-toxic Dino's, they are still dangerous and precautions must be taken. They have the ability to take up a lot of oxygen. Your fish can "drown" due to the lack of dissoved oxygen not to mention the pH impact.

Again, I want to remind you that this is rare. Usually it is cyanobacteria. However, if you follow a lot of advice and nothing improves, it might be snot algae.

Most of the treatments for cyano's applies to Dino's. However, Dino's require a little more. The pH must be bumped up (8.4 to 8.5) which can be accomplished by dripping Kalk faster than normal. This means your alkalinity is going to be raised higher than normal too. Sometimes you even need to leave the lights off for a couple of days. Before you start your treatment, siphon up as much of it as you can....they reproduce via fission. The fewer you have in your tank, the fewer 'babies'.

Here are a couple of links
Dinoflagellates and Red Tides
Todd Crail - Dinoflagellates, or was that "Boogers with Bubbles"? .... #reefs Article www.reefs.org
AnimalNetwork.com - Home to the publications and services created by Bowtie Inc. - Fancy Publications.
 
I'm a firm believer in cutting down on the amount of food i put in the tank, doing double water changes during the outbreak, and letting it run it's coarse. It is almost always a nutrient problem and will eat up it's source of food pretty quickly if you cut down on the amount you are putting in the system and double up on water changes. It will die, then start back due to the nutrients it releases a few times before it goes away completely.

You are just fighting yourself trying to get it to go away over night. The problem that caused it didn't happen over night, and the cure won't either. Just because your test come back reading 0 or close to it really doesn't mean much. The algae can consume the nutrients to the point that your tests will show there is nothing there when there actually is.
 
well i uncovered the tank after 24 of darkness. tank look lots better, no bubbles so far. going to run t5's for 4 and halides for 2 hours. here is the part i don't get my chaeto looks better,ie more green from sitting in the dark that just doesn't make sense to me. also i was worried that my pod population was going down. not, when i uncovered the tank and shined my flashlight in every glass surface was cover and i mean covered. so i won't be sweating about my mandrin and scooter
 
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