Serious "algae" problem please help!!!

greg1786

greg1786

Active member
please help me!! Three days ago, upon returning home from work , I noticed a small amount of this brown stringy algae growing on some of my lr. I immediately did a ten percent water change and used a power head to blow it off the rock. I tested my water and everything was in line as usual and all my corals seemed good as did my fish. Well , yesterday when I got home the problem had multiplied quite significantly. the stuff had now begun to grow on some of my zoas causing them to close up, my xenia had quite a bit on them and the tips of one of my acros. It was growing a little on my sandbed and even on my chaeto in the hob refugium. I took a turkey baster and blew it off the corals and took the chaeto out and washed it clean in some tank water in a bucket. Tonight when I got home it has gotten really out of control. Its growing all over everything. every coral, the chaeto, sandbed is COVERED in it like weeds popping up in a garden, live rock, tank glass, powerheads, literally everything. it is also getting bubbles along the strands of it. I'm really worried because while I've had typical green algae problems in the passed, its never affected my corals like this. And I've been pretty much algae free since I started runnimg gfo about two months ago. The only change ive made in the tank in the passed few weeks is my mg was low 1180, so I have slowly been raising it. Using red sea mg supplement I've gotten it to 1320 in 7 days. Other than that, about two weeks ago a powerhead fell off the wall and stirred my sandbed up REALLY bad. but after getting that back in order my tank was clearer and cleaner than id ever seen it the next day. Here is a picture of my encrusting gorgonian. its all closed up because the algea is all over it, its the best picture I could get of the algae and of it affecting my coral
IMG952295.jpg
. Ill do another water change tmw but I don't know what this stuff is, where it came from, how bad it is, or what to do about it . Any help is greatly appreciated please. Thanks in advance -Greg


Posted from ReefCentral.com App for Android
 
Looks like dinos. I feel for you, they are tough to get rid of.

You will need to get aggressive with these in order to take them out. First things first, IT IS a nutrient problem contrary to what you may read elsewhere. At least it was in my tank.

Second, stop doing water changes, they have been shown to exacerbate the issue (for whatever reason).

Next, you need to get aggressive with GFO/GAC. I changed every day when I had this issue. I also inserted a pura filtration pad into my return which was also changed daily. Next, set your skimmer to skim really wet and leave it.

Lastly, try vacuuming out what you can (it will grow back fast with lights on) and then set at least a 3 day lights out period. No lights AT ALL. After three days, slowly begin increasing the lighting period but DO NOT go right back to your standard lighting routine. You may need to run at a reduced rate for a week or two in order to knock this stuff back.

Good luck.
 
thanks for the articles they were very helpful....
csauer52 said:
Looks like dinos. I feel for you, they are tough to get rid of.

You will need to get aggressive with these in order to take them out. First things first, IT IS a nutrient problem contrary to what you may read elsewhere. At least it was in my tank.

Second, stop doing water changes, they have been shown to exacerbate the issue (for whatever reason).

Next, you need to get aggressive with GFO/GAC. I changed every day when I had this issue. I also inserted a pura filtration pad into my return which was also changed daily. Next, set your skimmer to skim really wet and leave it.

Lastly, try vacuuming out what you can (it will grow back fast with lights on) and then set at least a 3 day lights out period. No lights AT ALL. After three days, slowly begin increasing the lighting period but DO NOT go right back to your standard lighting routine. You may need to run at a reduced rate for a week or two in order to knock this stuff back.

Good luck.
Click to expand...

Thanks a lot for the reply. I just changed my gfo a week ago. I will change it every two days for the next week or so the only problem is I use a cup of it at a time and only have two left and it'll take a while to get it from brs with the weekend so near. Would it make a difference if I get it from my lfs even though its a different brand? I only ran my lights for four hours yesterday and will now keep them off for the next three. I use chemi pure elite instead of granular carbon so ill need to buy some. I'm at work until ten tonight but ill set my skimmer to skim very wet when I get home. while the lights are off for the next three days should I try syphoning my sandbed since the dinos are covering it basically ? Also should I begin trying to remove it from lr and corals now or wait until dark period is over. In either case what would be the best method? Anything else I can do that I may be missing? thanks again -Greg


Posted from ReefCentral.com App for Android
 
now that I've had the whole day to worry about the state of my tank I'm finally home. The lights have been off since yesterday and they were only on for 4 hours then. Well I used a flashlight and looked in to a good surprise. The dinos are not nearly as abundant as they had been previously so that's good. I am however very nervous about this blackout period. I have one acropora, branching monti, stylo pistillata, encrusting gorg, a ton of zoas, short temtacle fungia plate, two ricordea, and a nem. that makes up everything that is photosynthetic. Is any of these things in danger for the three day darkness. I'm wovrried ill lose something. I know in the long haul losing one or two to darkness is better than everything lost to the dinos but I have another option. my brother said he will house anything I need for time being and he's got a four bulb tek light that is essentially the same strength as my four bulb fixture w a very similar bulb combo. should I take anything out and move to his tank and if so what? or will everything do fine wout light for thrree days? thanks -Greg


Posted from ReefCentral.com App for Android
 
Yep, dinos. Vacuum out what you can, don't stress over the rest. It will take time to pass...

Kevin
 
Don't stress about the lights out period. Your corals will be fine. My tank is all SPS and the only corals I lost with my bout were a blue echinata and a green birds nest. That said, it was nothing to do with lights out, the dinos suffocated both of them.

For some reason the birds nest was highly susceptible to the dinos.

Your corals may brown out from a lack of light but they will return to normal eventually. The more important battle is the dinos.

As for the GFO, I think any brand would work. Just make sure you keep changing everything daily and siphoning out what you can. It can be beat, it just takes persistence.
 
csauer52 said:
Don't stress about the lights out period. Your corals will be fine. My tank is all SPS and the only corals I lost with my bout were a blue echinata and a green birds nest. That said, it was nothing to do with lights out, the dinos suffocated both of them.

For some reason the birds nest was highly susceptible to the dinos.

Your corals may brown out from a lack of light but they will return to normal eventually. The more important battle is the dinos.

As for the GFO, I think any brand would work. Just make sure you keep changing everything daily and siphoning out what you can. It can be beat, it just takes persistence.
Click to expand...
ok thanks. one more question tho. in your first post you recommended I stop doing water changes because it may exasserbate the issue. But in this most recent one you said I should siphon out as much of the dinos daily as possible . Should I be siphoning them out and not adding new water or do you think it'd be best to siphon them and change water and play it by ear. meaning try it and then if it gets worse, stop the siphoning ? thanks you've been a huge help








Posted from ReefCentral.com App for Android
 
The way I did it was I siphoned through a filter sock into a bucket and poured the water back in. I had my daughter help with the hose and the sock. Worked pretty well...
 
In the two articles I provided in post #3, one by RH-F, provided fairly detailed method's of dealing with this problem. I would read them and follow those recommendations, since some of it is contrary to some suggestions you've been getting here.

Are you using RO/DI water?
 
downbeach said:
In the two articles I provided in post #3, one by RH-F, provided fairly detailed method's of dealing with this problem. I would read them and follow those recommendations, since some of it is contrary to some suggestions you've been getting here.

Are you using RO/DI water?
Click to expand...

yea I've read and re read them since you posted them, thanks for doing that for me they were great reads actually. since getting dinos I've been doing a lot of research on them. there are a few constants that everyone seems to agree on so I've really been focusing on them. Keeping ph and alk up is one of the big things discussed in the two articles so I've been adding a ph and alk buffer and its kept them at 8.4 and 12 respectively. the blackout period has been another so I haven't run any lights and covered the tank in blankets, its been three days without light. The one thing nobody can seem to agree on is water changes it seems some claim it made their dinos worse while others say do them everyday. I read one theory from a guy here on rc from 2011 that thought the gfo fueled them, I don't give a lot of credit to that though. As for your question, I do use ro/Di I have a handheld meter and its never read more than 5 tds but its usually always zero


Posted from ReefCentral.com App for Android
 
I'm in the camp of doing WC's. I think that there are two primary reasons for this: one is, along with skimming, GFO, etc, the reduction of N and P in the system, secondly, along with the use of GAC, the removal of possible toxins associated with the dino's. But, if you're not using RO/DI water you would be adding to the problem by doing WC's. Also, if you're diluting you pH, as a result of the WC, the problem my seem to be coming back. So, I think that doing serial WC's while keeping the other components of this "cure" where they are recommended, i.e. pH, etc., would be a prudent course of action.
 
At the end of the day you have to find out what works for *YOU* and for *YOUR* tank. I was merely sharing what worked for me (and quite well I might add).

I wish I had a picture of my tank when the dinos were in full bloom. It looked like I had airlines hooked up to my live rock there was so much photosynthesis going on. It's now completely clean.

FWIW, I started my battle by following the advice in those articles and got nowhere fast. Your mileage may vary though so try everything you can.

Once again, good luck!
 
Anemone said:
Yep, dinos. Vacuum out what you can, don't stress over the rest. It will take time to pass...

Kevin
Click to expand...

^^ That. Don't overreact. We dealt with it for a month before it went away at the 2 month mark. All I did was suck out all I could every day with a turkey baster, cut the light cycle in half, and finally stopped water changes the 2nd month (skipped 2 water changes), and then it disappeared. We slowly ramped the light cycle back up over a month or two & it never returned.
 
SushiGirl said:
^^ That. Don't overreact. We dealt with it for a month before it went away at the 2 month mark. All I did was suck out all I could every day with a turkey baster, cut the light cycle in half, and finally stopped water changes the 2nd month (skipped 2 water changes), and then it disappeared. We slowly ramped the light cycle back up over a month or two & it never returned.
Click to expand...

update: Ive had my lights back on for four days now only running two of the four bulbs for 5 hours instead of the usual 11. The dinos so far have completely disappeared but I guess it has not been long enough to be for sure. All of my zoas and palys look better than ever. I guess the lower light has done them good. The sps corals have gotten significantly lighter but have good pe still. The nem has definitely been in better shape but once the lights are back a full power I expect it to come around. thanks for all the advice ill give another update in about 5 more days.
 
Good luck. Follow the same routine if the Dinos start to come back. They can appear 3-6 days once you go back to full lighting. I batlled these things twice and lost. But they can be beaten, I just didnt have the patience I guess. Give your corals a bit of rest with near full lighting before you do another bout of dark period and hopefully within a couple of months you will have them beat.
 
Excellent update! I'm glad to hear it's working for you Greg! Sounds like you're well on your way to a full recovery.
 
Don't want to hijack the thread, but I've had the same thing happen to me suddenly. It's a rather new tank where I've moved all the rock, corals and fish from my 7g nano to the new 65g tank.

I did add a lot of new rock and probably that's what started the new cycle. It's as if the tank was "stuck" somewhere in cycle and then the dinos appeared, more than 2 months after starting the new tank.

My birdsnest was the only loss, those seem to be very sensitive to dinos. It was gone within one day. Syphoning and cleaning didn't do me any good - as soon as I would turn on the lights, an hour later everything (corals, rocks, bottom) would be covered in dinos.

I switched off the lights for 3 days, started changing carbon and GFO every 2 days and adding Fauna Marin Ultra Bio bacteria daily. This seems to have worked, I'm back to 6 hours of light per day and dinos are almost completely gone. I can see a little of the brown stuff on the bottom, I really don' know if this is dinos or not. After reading a lot of threads and articles I decided not to change the water.

I don't know if the reason for Dinos is some bacterial instability, a tank that is not fully cycled or what, but it was really pain in the *ss to get rid of. I'm still not sure I'm 100% clean, if you know what I mean :)
 
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