[Michael Hoaster]

More great info MGP! That's so cool you can collect your own macros. It sounds like you have a tank similar to mine.

I agree, I like four days as well. I've used it for cyano bacteria too. I'm not certain at this point how critical it is to know which species it is either. Taricha has sent me a PM I think will help shed some light on the subject. I haven't had a chance to read through it yet but I will shortly.

I doubt my strain is toxic to invertebrates either, as I still have lots of snails, and I've had it for a while now. However the molly that was eating them has been off for some time, but hasn't died. So I'm not sure.

Bottom line, it seems to me that dinos pop up, just like other nuisance algae, when we have an excess of something, that isn't taken up quickly enough to prevent it. I agree though, that it makes sense to keep the macros happy and processing nutrients, to outcompete the dinos. But how do we favor the macros over the dinos? Phosphate came up in some of the info I've read. Maybe I overfed my fish, and dinos can take up phosphate more efficiently than macros. Or maybe I wasn't dosing enough iron, limiting macro growth, and this allowed the dinos a chance to get a foot hold. And there are tons more possibilities! In all the stuff I've read, there are way more options presented to treat the problem, than to prevent it. There a lot of suggestions to limit available nutrients, and growing macros was also recommended.

"When my power came back on the tank looked great and the macro algae prospered. This lasted for a month, I had to go out of town so I wasn't able to feed the tank which led to my macro recessing and ultimately the Dino's to come back." -This suggests to me that when your macros recessed, they dumped nutrients back into your tank, fueling dinos again.

The median C:N:P (Carbon-Nitrogen-Phosphorus) atomic ratio of benthic marine macroalgae and seagrasses is about 550:30:1. So if macros die back they are dumping mostly carbon into the water. CO2 came up a lot in my research as well. With reduced photo periods and blackouts, lowering CO2 levels and general reduction of nutrients, I'm kind of back where I started. I still believe that the brighter light, and heavy-handed nutrient dosing got me in this mess. Favoring the macros, while killing back the dinos seems to be the way out. Figuring out how to do that is the tricky part! I'm going to look into setting my UV unit up temporarily and also dosing hydrogen peroxide, while I'm doing the blackout. Then I will export all I can, and then get back to favoring the macros with (more careful) dosing.