Some type of cyano or dinos?

nemofish2217

New member
Trying to get a positive ID before proceeding down various paths of eradication...doesn't really look like dinos to me, but from what I understand, there are many different types. Tends to be more noticeable in the evening after the lights have been on for a while.



 
Best way to distinguish between the two is to siphon some through a paper towel or sump sock into a cup. Shake the cup and let it sit. Dinoflagellates will re-coagulate quickly, but cyano will not.

Here's an example from when I had dinos.

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So are you saying to actually strain the water through the sock to see if the invaders re-appear or suck some of the substance up and put it into a cup?
 
Might also confirm it isn't spirulina. It's hard to find info in spirulina since there's another form of it that is good algae-based food, so if you google "reef tank spirulina" you just get a lot of ads for food. But it is also a pest in our tanks that is really hard to distinguish from cyano. Iirc they behave differently in hydrogen peroxide and maybe spriulina doesn't either as fast overnight in the dark.

But it might also be a moot point, like just for curiosity's sake. You will probably want to do the usual easy / low-risk stuff first: play with flow and turn off your light for a few days; back off on carbon dosing; wet skim; feed appropriately; manually remove as much as possible; clean your sump and overflows... etc etc. I wouldn't bother with a super positive idea until that basic stuff fails, since it can be effective on such a broad range of pests.
 
Might also confirm it isn't spirulina. It's hard to find info in spirulina since there's another form of it that is good algae-based food, so if you google "reef tank spirulina" you just get a lot of ads for food. But it is also a pest in our tanks that is really hard to distinguish from cyano. Iirc they behave differently in hydrogen peroxide and maybe spriulina doesn't either as fast overnight in the dark.

But it might also be a moot point, like just for curiosity's sake. You will probably want to do the usual easy / low-risk stuff first: play with flow and turn off your light for a few days; back off on carbon dosing; wet skim; feed appropriately; manually remove as much as possible; clean your sump and overflows... etc etc. I wouldn't bother with a super positive idea until that basic stuff fails, since it can be effective on such a broad range of pests.
 
So are you saying to actually strain the water through the sock to see if the invaders re-appear or suck some of the substance up and put it into a cup?

Yeah, filter the water through paper towel, sump sock, coffee filter etc. Dinos are tiny and will pass through all but the smallest micron mechanical filtration.

And agreed on spirulina. I have it in my tank currently, pain in the neck compared to cyano. It's near invulnerable to H2O2 but Chemiclean wipes it out. If you have a microscope, you can tell the difference between the two by their shape. Spirulina, like its name suggests, is spiraled and looks like a woven guitar string under a microscope where cyano looks linked together.
 
So, a little update...still trying to figure out what this stuff is. I tried filtering some water through some paper towels and swirl it around. I checked back periodically every few minutes for about an hour or so and never saw any type of re-coagulation.

I've noticed that if I have the lights turned off a little longer than usual, when I turn them on the tank is almost cloudy from this stuff being suspended in the water column. However, within a half hour or so the water has cleared up and the stuff seems to have settled back on the sand bed/rocks. Does this help give any info as to its ID?

I picked up some chemiclean the other week but wimped out on using it as I've seen some mixed reviews on it. Also, it would seem that using Chemiclean would be addressing the symptoms but not the issue. Thoughts?
 
Sounds like cyno then. I noticed when I had Dino even if I would blow it off the rocks it would end up re-coalgulating in the tank. It would blow off in peices but if I had my pumps off it would start coming back together in long strands in the water column
 
Is it a new tank? It might be a combination of diatom & cyno & that is why it has more of a rusty color
 
Tank is fairly new, but only partly. Upgraded from a 30 to a 75. Started noticing the "slime" a few weeks prior to making the switch over. The only change in the 30 that I can think of was that I was running skimmer less, so maybe there was a build up of some type? I was dosing carbon, purigen, and aqua vitro remediation. I thought maybe once I got more water volume, more water flow, and a little more stout filtration things might clear up, but they have not.
 
The tank looks like it's cyano heavy, I don't normally promote the use of chemi- Clean..... but if that was my tank I would do it. Sometimes you have to beat bacteria with an enzyme
 
Yeah, was going to do it, but then read specifically that some folks had issues with treating and nems... I have one that I've been nursing a little bit as of late, so I was extra sensitive about adding chemi-clean.

Overall, is chemi-clean fairly safe so as long as you follow the directions precisely?
 
I used it a couple times in a tank with a bubble tip & carpet without any issues. I would definitely make sure to follow the directions though. The last time I used it, it wiped out the cyno but I got Dino after using it. That's what makes me think twice about using it now. Not so much it hurting any livestock in the tank, but I don't want Dino again.
 
I used red slime remover which got rid of mine. I followed the instructions and did the follow-up clean a few days later. 2 treatments 2 weeks apart killed it and it never came back. Ny nitrates were under 5 and phosphates at .03 so it wasn't a nutrient issue but it was a few months old tank.

I didn't have SPS at the time so I don't know how it affects them but it didn't affect my rose bubble tip or my rock flower anemone or any of my soft or lps corals.
My skimmer went nuts and I had to replace a lot of water to get it to calm down. I connected my skimmer cup to a buck and had it overflow there and replaced with new salt water. Took about 15 gallons on about 60 gallon volume before the skimmer went back to normal.
 
You could try Korallen-Zucht Cyanoclean and Coral snow, not much info on KZ products but I can tell you from experience with these 2 that with the proper dosage it will get rid of all if not most of that cyano.


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Following.

Having similar issues with going on 4 year old mixed reef tank. Siphoning once/twice a week as schedule allows but returns. I have some nice Nems and Acropora colonies that I don't want to harm by wrongfully dosing the wrong thing.

Sincerely,

David
 
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