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Unread 06/18/2014, 09:23 AM   #251
TheKman
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I have a lot of brown powdery stuff in my tank I though it was Dino but it's not under a microscope. But the Cyano I've been fighting has been unreal..


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Unread 06/18/2014, 04:35 PM   #252
clar29
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Interested to know what species I have. Anyone ?


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Unread 06/18/2014, 05:11 PM   #253
DNA
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Take a look at http://www.algaeid.com/identification/
If you are not sure, post a video or describe how they move.

My guess is Prorocentrum, Cyano strands and a Diatom.
Wait for Pants for a proper id.


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Unread 06/18/2014, 05:18 PM   #254
reefkeeper2
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I had a tank crash last month after moving all my livestock to a new tank. There was a pump in the sump that had a broken wire and whatever it leeched into the water killed all my sps. It was all very tragic and traumatic but it's not the reson for this post. The aftermath of the die-off was a huge dino explosion. They covered everything. All I had left was fish, rocks, two sick anemones and lots of dinos. After a lot of searching and reading this is what I did. I took my diatom filter, put a large fresh charge of powdered carbon in it and tied a bag of Cuprisorb on the end of the discharge. The carbon, which I changed daily, was to remove toxins and organics. I tied the bag of Cuprisorb onto the discharge end because I knew the diatom filter would fluidize it in the bag for maximum exposure and the bag would never get clogged. Then even though I run biopellets, I dosed 25ml of vodka daily. My total system volume is about 600gal. In about 9 days all the dinos were gone.
From my experience you have to starve them out using fresh high quality carbon, resins like Cuprisorb to remove all trace metals (just a guess of how it might work), and carbon dosing to bring your nutrient levels as low as you can. The carbon and Cuprisorb pose no danger to sensitve livestock, but the appropriate care needs to be taken with carbon dosing if you have never done it before.


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Unread 06/18/2014, 05:35 PM   #255
DNA
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Reefkeeper2, I tried all that you mention, besides from Cuprisorb which is not available here. I used up my Polyfilter though.
Sounds like you got copper and metals in the water.

Did you not have any ground fault interupter? It could have saved your tank?


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Unread 06/18/2014, 05:54 PM   #256
reefkeeper2
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Yes, there is a ground fault interrupter. I'm assuming it did not trip because the Tunze pump had a two pronged plug and not a grounded three prong.
Polyfilter does not remove metals as completely as Cuprisorb. It is pre-treated so it will not remove trace elements. Cuprisorb will continue to remove metals until the resin is exhausted or the water is stripped. Polyfilter will not work as well for this application.


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Unread 06/18/2014, 06:08 PM   #257
GQuinn
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DNA
Are you still dino free? Did you just let it run its course?


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Unread 06/18/2014, 06:32 PM   #258
Pants
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Quote:
Originally Posted by clar29 View Post
Interested to know what species I have. Anyone ?
It is hard to tell form a single still, but that looks an awful lot like Gambierdiscus. Gambierdiscus is a close relative to Ostreopsis. Its the one I've seen least often in marine aquaria. I haven't gotten good pictures because all the samples have come from over seas and have taken so long to get here they have died in transit. Are you in the United States?

Gambierdiscus produces a bunch of different toxins, including the familiar Palytoxin. They are also cyst formers. In my experience though they are the least resilient of the benthic pest dinos bothering aquarists.

This video is pretty good. (close-up at the end)


It could also be Prorocentrum. There are a few species of Prorocentrum that are more circular like that (Prorocentrum levis). I've seen Prorocentrum species in every tank I've looked at under the scope, but I've yet to personally observe a Prorocentrum bloom from an aquarium. At a macro level it will look the same as the rest of these dinos, so I might have simply not looked at enough aquarium blooms.


Can you get some pictures where some of the dinos are more on their side or other orientations?


[EDIT]Some pictures I have of Prorocentrum levis that haven't made their way to my website[/EDIT]



Last edited by Pants; 06/18/2014 at 06:41 PM.
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Unread 06/19/2014, 03:58 AM   #259
DNA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by GQuinn View Post
Are you still dino free? Did you just let it run its course?
I still have a few left. Less than 5% of the original plague. (Even 1%)
You can see the daily swing on the animation from yesterday evening and this morning.
It's also interesting how they don't sit on the purple, green, white, coraline that covers the rocks.

The macro-algae on the rocks is almost all gone, Cyanobacteria is fading and I'm hoping dinos will not take it's place.
I deviced a way to see Cyano in the water column. It's millions of 1/4" (5mm) super thin strands, swirling in the currents at great densities.
At the same time the water looks clear in normal lighting.
Some reefers think Cyano is the plague, but at the moment it's my friend and it's an absolute joke compared to dinos.

---

I'd like to mention it again.
The effect Ostreopsis dinoflagellates had on the tanks health are very clear.
Drastic changes in coral growth and color came back days after the dinos faded.








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Unread 06/19/2014, 05:26 AM   #260
clar29
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I live in the UK. The sample was identified as dino's at my LFS in March. I have had these for about a year so their pretty resilient. I've tried a 3 day blackout whilst dosing peroxide. This knocked them back but they soon returned. I then tried a blackout and dosed Zeobak, same result. So I just kept on top of them with cleaning and syphoning. Tried again recently with a 6 day blackout while dosing a mixture of coral snow and Zeobak. I also removed half the sand bed and live rock. The rock is in a small tank in complete darkness. At the moment the DT is on reduced lighting 7 hours blue 2 hours white. I am waiting on some DinoXAl to finish them off. The thing is I get a nitrate reading in the blackout period and as soon as I increase the lighting I lose the nitrate and they start to appear. On previous tanks I always had nitrate and no dino!s


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Unread 06/19/2014, 07:12 AM   #261
clar29
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Forgot to add I have tried nitrate additions but I think you need to have them
On the run otherwise they'll love you for it. I also have a bag of Cuprisorb in the sump.


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Unread 06/20/2014, 08:21 AM   #262
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Reefkeeper2. Some equipment has double insulation and don't "need" to be grounded.
I find that unsuitable for reef tanks unless you ground the saltwater in your tank.

I do this with my titanium heaters so there is no chance for a incident like yours.
Metal will fly off bare wires with even the slightest of voltage and that means copper and coral death.

I don't recommend those titanium probes, because that means you are using a glass heater.
They tend to stick on or off when you least expect them to, leak or break with regular use.

I've had close to 10 glass heaters fail throughout my fishkeeping years.
Reefkeepers should not even consider them.

---

Now, back on topic. Dinos.


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Unread 06/20/2014, 08:25 AM   #263
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I hope this isn't veering off topic here, but since so many of you have them - can I get a recommendation on where to get a good scope? My notes (probably from talking w pants) tell me 4 or 10 objective and 40x magnification but a quality lens is most important. Any brand suggestions? I'm not sure how I would assess the lens. TIA.


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Unread 06/20/2014, 08:45 AM   #264
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I have discussion of that on my website here. I still want to get my adviser to look over it as he knows way more and will have strong opinions.

The gist of what I say is if you just need a quick look at something try borrowing one. Asking a HS Bio teacher is a good option.

If you want to buy one, then buy used. Go to your local university surplus store or hit ebay or some other auction site.

You will need a low power objective (2-10X) and a higher magnification objective (40X-60X).

Make sure there are no missing parts (including light sources) and no dents or big scratches.

Look for brands you would recognize and respect when buying a camera. Zeis, Leica, Olympus, Nikon.

If you aren't terribly interested in high magnification needed to differentiate types of dinos, a dissecting scope might be cheaper and have wider utility. With a dissecting scope you could check corals and fish for parasites, hitchhikers, infections. That would not be possible with a compound scope. But you lose magnifying power for that trade-off.


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Unread 06/20/2014, 09:12 AM   #265
DNA
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I personally like the "turn on your charms and borrow one" advice from pants.
That could also work for borrowing access to one which worked for me.

Looking at his pictures you can see what to expect with the magnification you have.
That is the information I didn't find when needed.

Due to high local cost and low quality products I decided to pull it off with my own optics and photography.
A standard 100mm macro lens gives you 1:1 ratio and is hardly going to be enough, but it's much better than nothing.
The Canon lens MPE 65 is better with 5:1 from life size, but it will put you back by more than a $1000 and is difficult to use.

I also considered USB devices claiming 100X magnification, but that turned out to be white lies.
It's not 100X from life size but from much less than life size wide angle of the device.

There is a reason microscopes are out there.
I'd love to own a good one and will buy it used when I find it.


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Unread 06/20/2014, 05:55 PM   #266
reefkeeper2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DNA View Post
Reefkeeper2. Some equipment has double insulation and don't "need" to be grounded.
I find that unsuitable for reef tanks unless you ground the saltwater in your tank.

I do this with my titanium heaters so there is no chance for a incident like yours.
Metal will fly off bare wires with even the slightest of voltage and that means copper and coral death.

I don't recommend those titanium probes, because that means you are using a glass heater.
They tend to stick on or off when you least expect them to, leak or break with regular use.

I've had close to 10 glass heaters fail throughout my fishkeeping years.
Reefkeepers should not even consider them.

---

Now, back on topic. Dinos.

I agree. I have been using titanium heaters for almost a decade now.


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Unread 06/20/2014, 06:22 PM   #267
Randy Holmes-Farley
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I never learn. I have had lots of glass ones break over the years, and I still use them.


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Unread 06/23/2014, 10:17 AM   #268
TampaSnooker
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Huh, I've shelved several titanium heaters after finding them to be the cause of stray current - might have been the probes or cheap manufacturing.

Pants, DNA - great info on scopes - thanks for sharing.

Now, back on topic. Dinos...


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Unread 06/23/2014, 10:42 AM   #269
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I keep syphoning... No positive changes no matter what I do. In desperation I tried Algae X... just finished the treatment. Nothing. Dinos keep smiling at me. I'll give the tank a few days to recover and my next thing might be Randy's high PH drill along with 3 or 4 days in the dark.

LOL - I'm so frustrated with this that my wife asked me if I have a problem with her or at work...


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Unread 06/23/2014, 12:54 PM   #270
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Mandrieu, did you have Pants ID them for you? If so, what strain of dinos do you have?


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Unread 06/23/2014, 02:20 PM   #271
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Check mine out. I started bio-pellets and it has slowed the growth on them.
Next I will try zeolites and ozone Im using uv right now as well. This monster came from some dry rock I used from a past tank.
I've had tanks in the past but never anything like this in my tanks.
The coral line algae has only started growing on the rocks



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Unread 06/23/2014, 02:22 PM   #272
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Is that a bunch of aiptasia in there too?


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Unread 06/23/2014, 03:03 PM   #273
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Yeah you can only see it if you look really closely. I have to buy another led to put my acans in the sump and get some pepperment ship to eat it


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Unread 06/24/2014, 10:16 AM   #274
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Surly: Unluckily I have not had Pants ID my Dinos. I bought a cheap microscope so I managed to verify it's Dinos and not Diatoms or Cyano though by comparing with pictures Pants and others have posted. But the device is really bad so I can't see much detail to ID the actual strain. I wish I could take a picture of what I see. Something interesting though: I have yet to see this thing to produce bubbles...

As I mentioned before, I started raising PH from my normal 8.1-8.2 to 8.4 or so. When I get there I'll o lights off for 3 or 4 days.

Question [a really dumb one] for Pants: How do I get a decent sample? The stuff is in the sandbed. Not much in the rocks or anywhere else.


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Unread 06/24/2014, 10:23 AM   #275
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Collecting a sample doesn't need to be complex. Use your hand or a turkey baster type coral/fish feeding tool to remove some from the tank. Its not a problem if you get sand in there with it. If you find the sand to be problematic when trying to view it with your scope, take your sample and put it in a ziplock bag then shake vigorously for a few seconds. Use some of the water from the bag. Whatever was in the sand will be in the water column now.

If your resolution is really poor on your scope, try paying attention to movement instead of shape. If they are spinning around like a tether ball then it is Ostreopsis. If they are scooting along the surface its probably Amphidinium. If they are really really tiny and just sit suspended in mucous with the odd one swimming in circles then its the tiny guy who looks like symbiodinium that I don't have a name for yet.


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