Dino's......Help before I give up.....

[chrishayes]

Just so people understand... you all realize that zooxanthellae are dinoflagellates? That if you chemically dose your tank to kill dinos you WILL kill zooxanthellae? You will probably bleach or kill SPS colonies, anemones, and any other invert that depends on zooxanthellae?

Far better to get your tank into natural balance, remove the extra nutrients that are causing algae growth, increase dissolved oxygen levels/reduce CO2, and increase your alk. Doing this is general good husbandry and won't harm your inverts that have symbiotic colonies of zooxanthellae.

BTW... unless you are running UV, blasting dinos off rocks is just going to spread the dinos around. At least if you run UV, you know that the dinos that go through your filter are getting zapped. You ever try siphoning them off with a long plastic pipette/tube attached to a length of hose, and have the siphoned water run into a filter sock before going into your sump?

What are you doing to oxygenate your water? Are you running a nice-sized protein skimmer with access to a fresh source of air? Do you have plenty of air flowing into your overflow lines?

I agree with the comments about dripping kalk. I'm a big believer - just make sure that nothing can cause you to overdose the tank all at once.

Of course all the ways of getting rid of dinos that have been said have the potential/likelyhood to kill coral as well...but the point is to upset the status quo that is allowing them to flourish over more ideal bacterias and algaes. Youll never be rid of them as they are likely dormant in all aquaria but something happens to tip the scales in its favor. Almost every method for ridding them is a drastic change in chemistry which I assume is what allows this retipping if you will to occur. Thats why no ONE thing is known to cure it in every instance.

I also agree with the methods and suggestions you give, that is how i got mine out. Heavy skimming for oxygen, a CO2 scrubber on the intake as I didnt want to drill a hole in the wall and doing constant basting while using a HOT magnum canister to filter out the loose dinos. I feel this also helped by dislodging a good portion of detritus as well which can only help. I also used kalk in my ato but not to raise PH above what it naturally went to just to keep cal and alk up. I think my PH went to 8.4 at a max with all the things I did. I also tried running an airstone in my sump but it didnt seem to help much with the skimmer putting the bulk of the O2 into the water. I just wish there were a magic pill...

 

[Nano sapiens]

I've dealt with this plague on two occasions and I can sympathize with the feeling of tossing in towel on the whole reef-keeping thing. The last infestation was really bad, but after 2 months of diligent work I was able to clear it. The tank has been clear of this curse for over a year now.

I believe that my last infestation occurred when I overly disturbed the sand bed and moved LR around. As far as fixing this problem I went back to basics with increased water changes (from 10% to 20%) and using a filter sock plus a HOB filter with every week's WC. I also reduced food additions and stopped using nutritionally dense pellets (only rinsed frozen food). I kept PH, Alk and magnesium a bit on the high side). Besides these measures, I feel the most important one was a systematic cleaning of the detritus in/on the LR and especially the SB. I thoroughly vacuumed 1/6 of the SB each week and then vacuumed each successive week under each piece of LR that was on the SB.

Keep with an aggressive maintenance schedule/good params and you could very well beat this without having to remove your corals. Good luck.

 

[deeznutz1]

:uzi:
Agressive water changes with siphoning out dino and basting rocks and cleaning sand is your only hope. Don't get into chemicals. Since when, does a water change hurt???

I did use red slime remover, but that was for cyano. I only used it because I was ready to give up anyways. So I didn't care about negative effects if any.

I did end up using an air stone due to using red slime remover. So you might want to oxygenate the water as well, like others have suggested.

Roll up your sleeves and dig in

-dan

 

[acroholicreefer]

I think over skimming is a key part to getting eliminating dinos. I went out of town for a week and found that my skimmer wasn't working. I'm not sure how long it was off but with the skimmer being off, I was starting to get an outbreak of dinos. So I decided to dose Hydrogen Peroxide and got rid of them 100% so far. After they are gone, hopefully a good water change schedule will keep them at bay.

Without any doubt, a good water change schedule and good husbandry is the safest route to go. However, I wouldn't say that dosing H2O2 will kill your corals. I wish it did kill my maxi mini carpet but it didn't. During the elimination on dinos, I saw much more growth and colors than before the treatment.

 

[sahin]

Hi there John, after my post yesterday, I was left rather bothered about your situation. Your setup for me is beautiful. Equipment wise your tank for me has the best of everything. So to see such a system let down by Dinos really bothered me.Anyway, I looked up Dinos again, and came to this article:http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/how-i-beat-dinoflagellates-and-the-lessons-i-learnedLooking at the article, it is clear to me, that the author managed to deal with the Dinos in a very targetted and multi point approach.I honestly think you should try the method exactly as described.I can tell you that I did push my pH very much higher than 8.4, I dosed Hydrogen peroxide, I carried out blackouts and eventually dosed FM Ultra Algae X. But what I didnt do was try the method described in the article in the multiple approach way.I really think you should try it. I will end this by saying that with pH at or above, 8.4, a 3 day blackout, and even dosing of H202; your corals should be fine. Just be sure to to maintain Alk and oxygenate the tank extremely well.Good luck and let us know how it goes. Sahin.

 

[prop-frags]

Have you had your top-off water checked?

 

[chrishayes]

Hi there John, after my post yesterday, I was left rather bothered about your situation. Your setup for me is beautiful. Equipment wise your tank for me has the best of everything. So to see such a system let down by Dinos really bothered me.Anyway, I looked up Dinos again, and came to this article:http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/how-i-beat-dinoflagellates-and-the-lessons-i-learnedLooking at the article, it is clear to me, that the author managed to deal with the Dinos in a very targetted and multi point approach.I honestly think you should try the method exactly as described.I can tell you that I did push my pH very much higher than 8.4, I dosed Hydrogen peroxide, I carried out blackouts and eventually dosed FM Ultra Algae X. But what I didnt do was try the method described in the article in the multiple approach way.I really think you should try it. I will end this by saying that with pH at or above, 8.4, a 3 day blackout, and even dosing of H202; your corals should be fine. Just be sure to to maintain Alk and oxygenate the tank extremely well.Good luck and let us know how it goes. Sahin.

Yeah, youll have to keep in mind that the 8.4 I got to is SUPER high for my system which usually runs from 7.7-8.0. Oh and I also blacked out the tank as well.

 

[chrishayes]

Have you had your top-off water checked?

This is a good question as well! When mine started my prefilters were at the end of their service so post RO was up to 004 instead of the 0-002 normally. Of course this then went through a DI but it may be worth noting.

 

[acroholicreefer]

Hi there John, after my post yesterday, I was left rather bothered about your situation. Your setup for me is beautiful. Equipment wise your tank for me has the best of everything. So to see such a system let down by Dinos really bothered me.Anyway, I looked up Dinos again, and came to this article:http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/how-i-beat-dinoflagellates-and-the-lessons-i-learnedLooking at the article, it is clear to me, that the author managed to deal with the Dinos in a very targetted and multi point approach.I honestly think you should try the method exactly as described.I can tell you that I did push my pH very much higher than 8.4, I dosed Hydrogen peroxide, I carried out blackouts and eventually dosed FM Ultra Algae X. But what I didnt do was try the method described in the article in the multiple approach way.I really think you should try it. I will end this by saying that with pH at or above, 8.4, a 3 day blackout, and even dosing of H202; your corals should be fine. Just be sure to to maintain Alk and oxygenate the tank extremely well.Good luck and let us know how it goes. Sahin.

That link isn't working for me. Did the page get removed?

 

[Allmost]

honestly, as some have said ... all it takes is a week or two of aggressive maintenance ...

I am not sure why no water changes, if any reason for this, please enlighten me

I would run GAC, and GFO [ GFO depending on set up, if bactrioplankton, then no GFO] you want to lower DOCs.

Have ALOT of salt water ready.

turn off return pump, and socks on the drains.

with return off, get in the tank and remove the dinos as much as you can. specially from the frags.
then take a MJ1200 power head, and clean all rocks, and corals and ... [alot of detritus settles where rock and sand meet, also within the dinos ! so do BLAST them all]

then do a water change [siphoning out sand and or dinos freely swiming], and turn return back on, and collect all loose pieces,

they day after, do the same, cleaning the sock first.

the reason they grow so well is they block flow within themselves, collect detritus and fuel themselves to grow ! aggressive blasting them alone would even lower their growth rate !

lastly, wish you the best, and this is part of the hobby too you will enjoy your algae free reef MUCH more after getting rid of this Issue j

 

[chrishayes]

The no waterchanges is stated to be because of assumptions that the dinos are directly using some trace minerals to fuel their growth...Im not sure if it worked for me or not but it was part of my muti-pronged attack on them.

 

[chrishayes]

And I do feel the same that the aggresive removal of the dinos themselve along with the detritus that comes with it is a big part of success. However, I have read some folks doing this with waterchanges that it just fuels their growth even more. So who knows, and who cares as long as whatever you do works.

 

[Reef_Noob]

Hi bro
This is a sad thing!!
But please don't say ur gonna give up coz there is a reason we are humans and they are micro algae. Right?
So fight it, there are so many suggestions that have been floated on this thread. Read em try the one that you think is most reasonable.
Don't quit water changes. Do even a 5% daily water changes.
I'm pretty sure its the Aquavitro fuel you had added. It has definitely fueled the dinos
Run GFO
Run Activated carbon (good grade like Rowa or Tropic Marin)
Test your DI water. (check it with 2 different TDS meters to avoid errors)
Over skimming. (add/borrow an additional skimmer if you can accommodate it)
Lower temperature (24-25 deg C)
Reduce lighting period
3 day black out
Test for Silicate
24 hour lighting in Refugium
Algae scrubber
More flow
Oxygenation
Ozone addition.

Hope you will try the above less drastic steps before u do something radical.

Your coral investments are pretty staggering. Why don't you try to set up a good QT tank ASAP with good flow and lighting. With some eggcrate stands and transfer/frag as many SPS or other corals into it. Being freshly made saltwater and low in nutrients the dinos might be killed off. Then once uv won the battle (im sure you will) transfer them to the main display (minus the bases)

Really feel for you. It's frustrating, but dont give up. I'm sure you will win the battle.
All our best wishes are there for you.
Cheer up and fold up ur sleeves bro. Battle time!!
:uzi: Die Dinos....DIE :hammer:

 

[Allmost]

The no waterchanges is stated to be because of assumptions that the dinos are directly using some trace minerals to fuel their growth...Im not sure if it worked for me or not but it was part of my muti-pronged attack on them.

hmm I see, although, logically, corals are algae as well. so if you are able to cut off the fuel for dinos fully, you are in fact killing all corals and making salt water table salt ... not the path Id take, but thanks for the reasoning

 

[chrishayes]

This could also be because like my RO water, it was high in tds at the time of the outbreak so cutting off the supply of whatever was making it through perhaps was the key...

 

[sahin]

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/how-i-beat-dinoflagellates-and-the-lessons-i-learned

Reposted the link above, sorry I posted earlier while at work and with all Javascript disabled links and even simple paragraphing and spacing doesnt work...:headwally:

 

[joeyvu]

Hello JG1
I know you have run zeovit in the past and if you still have these ZB, CS and ZZ. Try zb+cs and ZZ (incubate for 6 hour) with light out for three days, it works very well on my tank...

 

[Dog boy Dave]

JG Call me you are chasing your tail. All the things you are doing is making your problem worse. I am not going to post anymore here but give me a call, your problem isnt a big deal at all.

 

[deeznutz1]

It's funny because i got the dinos not long after I switched salts as well.
If you switched salts, change back to the original product.
I think the theory of water changes fuelling the dinos is bogus. Trust me I followed that same theory for months and so I decided to go against it and succeeded. Not doing water changes is prolonging your problem.

Plus tds of .010 is fine but should be replaced. Should worrying about your tds at .004 is not your problem.

Do you blast your rocks often or as part of your husbandry? If not, then that is part of the problem. I never basted my rocks and I ended up with dinos at the 1.5 year mark.

What have you done lately???

-dan

 

[apt220]

Hey JG, I've noticed your posts for a long time and even noticed your ZEO forum postings in the earlier days of your tank.

You have really nice corals, but maybe they are so colorful because all the food you've been giving them (and been feuling the dinos). Those pics you posted are not really that bad. I don't have the answer of how beat them, but I do know there is a lot of anecdotal information floating around (see dzhuo's signature). Although this will not likely help you, I quoted some good information, at least IMO; and, in general, are good things to do whether or not you are dealing with dinos.

The pH trick isn't guarantee to work. It's only known to work on a certain types of dino (and no one knows exactly what those are)... ...encourage other types of algae to out compete them.

Just so people understand... you all realize that zooxanthellae are dinoflagellates? That if you chemically dose your tank to kill dinos you WILL kill zooxanthellae...

Far better to get your tank into natural balance, remove the extra nutrients that are causing algae growth, increase dissolved oxygen levels/reduce CO2.... ...What are you doing to oxygenate your water?...

I also reduced food additions... ...I feel the most important one was a systematic cleaning of the detritus in/on the LR and sandbed...

In addition, I recommend having your sump clean of detritus.

Have you had your top-off water checked?

Listen to this man, he has a beautiful tank. IMO TDS = 0 is misleading. Change all filters, especially the DI resin--even if the resin hasn't changed colors. Heck, add a second DI canister.