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Unread 08/25/2014, 06:25 PM   #326
yeldarbj
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I finally can share some positive results with my dino battle. I had an ostreopsis variety. I posted a microscopic video on one of these dino threads, and Pants is the one who suggested I had ostreopsis due to the tether-ball like motion showed.

My theory is that the dinos bloomed when there was an absence of other competing algaes. I had zero nitrates and zero phosphates at the time my dinos starting presenting last January. Like others, I've tried all the various methods without success. I started a small, homemade algae turf scrubber just to see if I could grow green algae. It was moderately successful. I cleaned the screen about every 4-6 weeks but saw no impact on the dinos. I tried increased feeding and dosing nitrate, silicate, and iron just to try to grow algae.

By June, I decided I needed to make more drastic changes and increase the nutrient levels. My goal was to try to grow some sort of nuisance algae/diatoms/cyano in the display tank. I unplugged my skimmer and stopped dosing nutrients. I didn't do water changes. I stopped running carbon and gfo (hadn't used much gfo anyway). I reduced my lighting by a couple hours - MH runs for 4.5 hours, LED's for 7-8 hours with a 1 hr ramp up/down, so about 6 hours at higher intensity.

The only filtration that I used was the algae scrubber, an occasional filter sock in the sump, and short periods with a diatom filter (Marineland). The diatom filter is a great tool for cleaning out debris without changing the water. I connected it to a gravel vac to clean the dinos from the sand bed and would blow the rocks off with a powerhead. The dinos would always be back within a couple days but at least it was periodically reducing the population.

I should mention that I have an sps dominant tank, 105g with 6 fish. I fed the fish once per day and maintained Ca/Alk with dosing pumps and dose kalk every hour with the dosing pump. By the middle of August, my nitrate levels have climbed to about 2.5 ppm and phosphate to about 0.06 on a Hannah checker.

AND THE DINOFLAGELLATES ARE GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I do now have some hair algae and cyano in the display tank that is a welcome sight. The only form of filtration that I'm using now is the algae scrubber, but it doesn't even seem to be growing much. I'm starting to see pods on the glass that I haven't seen since last fall.

Hopefully this information can help someone.


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Unread 08/26/2014, 01:40 AM   #327
DNA
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We have the same strain of dinos and used very similar methods for postive results so this is good news for sure.

I only got rid of about 99% and they have returned again to some extent after the cyanobacteria left.
It's a balancing act keeping nitrates and phosphates and still maintaining healthy sps.
Please keep posting your methods and how things progress.


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Unread 08/31/2014, 04:23 AM   #328
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I have less than 50 Astrea snails from an original batch of 10.
They have been in good health, but last week I was helping 2-3 a day back on their foot.
Last Friday I found 5 facing up so I investigated.

It turned out the pump for my Carbon and GFO reactors had failed some days ago.
Dead snails can be a sign of dino toxins. Carbon/GFO seem to work well at lessening the effect.


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Unread 08/31/2014, 07:25 AM   #329
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I also turned off my protein skimmer, and haven't turned it back on. After reading Randy's post about his pH climbing when he turned his skimmer off, I decided to unplug mine to hopefully keep the pH higher to help irradicate my dinoflagellates. It's been off for over 2 months now, and things have never looked better. I export nutrients with water changes, gfo, carbon, and by harvesting algae from my refugium. I also decided to keep the 25watt AquaUV sterilizer on the tank permanently.

Leland


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Unread 08/31/2014, 01:52 PM   #330
yeldarbj
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I did not notice any pH change after removing the skimmer. Do you feel like it was the raise in pH that helped with the dinos or something else?


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Unread 08/31/2014, 04:36 PM   #331
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It's hard to say if turning the skimmer off did anything for the dinoflagellates. The hydrogen peroxide made the biggest difference. The UV and increased water flow were also a big help.

I dosed kalkwasser during the day to raise the pH, fed the fish less, ran GFO and carbon as well, but I didn't see huge differences with them in the past, so I can't say they contributed much individually, but doing all of them together with the peroxide, flow, and UV removed all the Dino's.

Leland


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Unread 09/01/2014, 08:03 AM   #332
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LelandF. View Post
I also turned off my protein skimmer, and haven't turned it back on. After reading Randy's post about his pH climbing when he turned his skimmer off, I decided to unplug mine to hopefully keep the pH higher to help irradicate my dinoflagellates. It's been off for over 2 months now, and things have never looked better. I export nutrients with water changes, gfo, carbon, and by harvesting algae from my refugium. I also decided to keep the 25watt AquaUV sterilizer on the tank permanently.

Leland
You might find this an interesting thread
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...018134&page=15
And this one
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh....php?t=2430897


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Unread 09/01/2014, 08:30 AM   #333
LelandF.
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I've read both of those threads, and continue to follow both of them. The skimmerless thread is getting a bit off topic, and turning into using uv to kill ich thread lately. My tank is 3 years old, and I've wanted to turn the skimmer off for some time, to support more forms of sponges and macroalgaes, as I plan to add a few more caribbean photosynthetic sponges soon. I have a large number of gorgonians so I hope to see increased growth from them due to turning off the skimmer.

Leland


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Unread 09/01/2014, 09:01 AM   #334
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LelandF. View Post
I've read both of those threads, and continue to follow both of them. The skimmerless thread is getting a bit off topic, and turning into using uv to kill ich thread lately. My tank is 3 years old, and I've wanted to turn the skimmer off for some time, to support more forms of sponges and macroalgaes, as I plan to add a few more caribbean photosynthetic sponges soon. I have a large number of gorgonians so I hope to see increased growth from them due to turning off the skimmer.

Leland
Noticed any increase in nuisance algae on the glass?


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Unread 09/01/2014, 10:25 AM   #335
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Quote:
Originally Posted by yeldarbj View Post
I did not notice any pH change after removing the skimmer. Do you feel like it was the raise in pH that helped with the dinos or something else?
I've run my tank anywhere from pH 7.9 - 8,5 for weeks or months and it's safe to say pH alone in that range will not kill or leave a significant dent in Ostreopsis dinoflagellates.


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Unread 09/01/2014, 10:43 AM   #336
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Nuisance algae has shown up in very small amounts. Dersesia in a golfball diameter x 1/16" high patch, and a couple small lines of cyano on a few rocks where they meet the sand. The glass greens up in a day or two, instead of a brown or clear film once a week before. Sand is bright white, and rocks are cleaner than they've been in years. Coralline is starting to make a comeback too. Alkalinity stays around 9.3 dKH with kalkwasser dosed at night via an automatic top off & BRS peristaltic pump.

Leland


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Unread 09/01/2014, 10:53 AM   #337
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LelandF. View Post
It's hard to say if turning the skimmer off did anything for the dinoflagellates. The hydrogen peroxide made the biggest difference. The UV and increased water flow were also a big help.

I dosed kalkwasser during the day to raise the pH, fed the fish less, ran GFO and carbon as well, but I didn't see huge differences with them in the past, so I can't say they contributed much individually, but doing all of them together with the peroxide, flow, and UV removed all the Dino's.

Leland
I've been really lucky with Dino's but I think I will install uv on any of the tanks I look after if I come across it again


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Unread 09/06/2014, 01:41 AM   #338
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DNA View Post
I have less than 50 Astrea snails from an original batch of 10.
They have been in good health, but last week I was helping 2-3 a day back on their foot.
Last Friday I found 5 facing up so I investigated.

It turned out the pump for my Carbon and GFO reactors had failed some days ago.
Dead snails can be a sign of dino toxins. Carbon/GFO seem to work well at lessening the effect.

I found one snail on it's back the day after I fixed the pump, but none after that.
It's a drop of knowledge into this vast uncharted sea.


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Unread 10/06/2014, 04:10 PM   #339
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I posted on another thread where your thread was mentioned, but I will also post the link to my thread. If you're interested take a look at what I did to rid my tank of my particular problem.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh....php?t=2428496

My tank is now completely free of the stuff after a battle for almost 5 months.

Daniel.


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Unread 10/06/2014, 05:33 PM   #340
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I've had a problem with a brown green growing mat I thought was a dinoflagellate, but I think I've IDed it as Eudorina sp algae in the volvocaceae family. I posted on a local reef site, but figure I'd also put it out here.
The tank

The algae :scale bar is 22.5 um


The history:
This is a 10 gal tank with a 10 gallon sump I used to use as a coral Q tank.
I was running it bare. A few snails, some random small fragments of live rock,
and this thing started growing -- taking over. I have completely cleaned out the tank at least 3 times, scrubbing every rock, cleaning the whole tank, draining all the water, and then using water from my reef tank at a water change to fill the q tank back up. I haven't put ANY food in the tank for the whole period ~ 6 months, but each time this thing starta to grow and by 6 weeks it looks like the picture I posted.
LED lighting 450/daylight ( 50:50) maybe 20 watts total. dimmable, not sure exact what the wattage is running at.
No skimmer, just a little carbon and GFO.
Circulation is modest.
pH 8.2, NO3=0 phosphates =0, calcium 400, KH 8 Mg 1350 - specs of the tank from which each of the full change outs has come from.
I haven't tried any of the high pH, lights out, H2O2, etc treatments since they seem to have very variable and I'd argue low probability success.

What I am thinking of trying:
I am going to try oryzalin (commercial name Surflan) on the recommendation of a plant microbial biologist colleague. It is a "plant specific" microtubule poison that is used as a pre-emergent herbicide. It has low human toxicity, moderate fish toxicity. I have no idea about invertebrates or zooxanthia. But since I only have a few pieces of soft coral in the tank, I don't think there is much to lose. At least I can determine if it will stop this outbreak - sort of- no good control. I can then add carbon, and try and seed the tank with some algae from my other tank with the hope of having a better algae take over.


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Unread 10/09/2014, 05:28 AM   #341
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I wanted to share my current plan for Dinos and how it has been going. I am currently lights out, cover the tank, 10ml of H202 once daily, and only feeding at night in a pitch black room with my blues on for about an hour. I have seen a massive decline in Dinos. Today is day 4.

I also took an infected rock with Dino on it and moved it to me other tank to test the theory of competing algae. This tank has some cyano, diatomes, and green algae all over it. I noticed within 1 day the Dinos spread to a few spots where there wasn't any competing algae. Day 4 into test and the Dinos have stayed secluded to these specific spots. On a powerhead and a few spot on an existing rock. I will continue to monitor and see if it gets out competed. I am not dosing anything in this tank. It is being ran as a normal tank with 6 hours of white and blues and 9 hours of blues.


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Unread 10/11/2014, 03:26 PM   #342
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I to am in the midst of a battle with ostreopsis, about six weeks now, I to am convinced that water changes feed it, I have 0 po4 and 0 no3 and lately have noticed very little if any micro algae on the glass just dinos. I have been feeding every other day thinking it's nutrients but now I think the opposite so have started feeding everyday again, I was blowing the rocks and siphoning 20 gallons every other day only to watch it get worse, so how to aggressively siphon the sand bed without doing water changes I asked. So I got a 100 micron sock and siphoned through it only to watch most of it pass through, I tried a 10 micron sock and it looked good till I put a sample of the filtered water under the microscope and saw tons of the buggers, then I tried pumping the siphoned water through a 5 micron sediment filter in a BRS reactor with a maxijet 1200 and BAM, no little buggers got through. So now I am aggressively blowing the rocks and siphoning the sand everyday without changing the water and I am finally seeing results, I have also installed a 5 micron filter in place of my GFO to catch some of the free swimming buggers, I've taken my po4 binder and my sulphur denitrator offline to raise those levels a bit because I now believe the dinos out compete the micro algae in very low nutrient conditions.


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Unread 10/11/2014, 03:47 PM   #343
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photos I that did not post properly before
The mess

the buggers scale bar 22.5 um



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Unread 10/11/2014, 05:29 PM   #344
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cal stir

Ostreopsis Ovata has a dorsoventral diameter of ~50µm and transdiameter of ~30µm so It can pass through a 100µm sock.


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Unread 10/11/2014, 05:41 PM   #345
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I have some 10um socks as well which it got through but who can vouch for the quality of a 10um sock, definitely not getting through the 5um sediment filter.


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Unread 10/11/2014, 06:54 PM   #346
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PhQUOTE=LelandF.;23061166]I also turned off my protein skimmer, and haven't turned it back on. After reading Randy's post about his pH climbing when he turned his skimmer off, I decided to unplug mine to hopefully keep the pH higher to help irradicate my dinoflagellates. It's been off for over 2 months now, and things have never looked better. I export nutrients with water changes, gfo, carbon, and by harvesting algae from my refugium. I also decided to keep the 25watt AquaUV sterilizer on the tank permanently.

Leland[/QUOTE]
Are you sure you have this right Leland?
Your protein skimmer removes some carbon dioxide producing organisms and aerates the water. A decrease in carbon dioxide will raise the pH


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Unread 10/12/2014, 05:11 AM   #347
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When photosynthesis is occurring, the skimmer might act to bring carbon dioxide back into the water. So cutting back on aeration can raise the pH.


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Unread 10/12/2014, 08:05 AM   #348
yeldarbj
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cal_stir View Post
I have some 10um socks as well which it got through but who can vouch for the quality of a 10um sock, definitely not getting through the 5um sediment filter.
Sounds like the sediment filter is working for you. I used a Magnum 350 canister filter with the micron cartridge and diatom powder to reduce dino populations periodically without doing water changes. Running it a couple hours a day twice a week helps a lot. Using the diatom powder makes the micron cartridge very easy to clean off and re-use.


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Unread 10/12/2014, 12:30 PM   #349
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Originally Posted by yeldarbj View Post
Sounds like the sediment filter is working for you. I used a Magnum 350 canister filter with the micron cartridge and diatom powder to reduce dino populations periodically without doing water changes. Running it a couple hours a day twice a week helps a lot. Using the diatom powder makes the micron cartridge very easy to clean off and re-use.
I use the magnum also but just with their water polishing filter( 10 microns)

How do you run the diatom powder with that?


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Unread 10/12/2014, 01:45 PM   #350
yeldarbj
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After getting the filter going, I place the input and output from the filter into about a quart sized plastic container filled with tank water. I usually start this submerged in the tank and then raise the container a couple inches above the water line in the tank. I then add about 1/2 to 2/3 cup of Vortex diatom powder into the container. After a couple minutes the water in the container is crystal clear as the diatom powder coats the micron filter. Submerge the container again and carefully remove the input and output lines. The filter runs the whole time during this process. I then go about blowing debris off the rocks and have even attached a gravel vac to the input line to clean dinos from the sand bed. You just have to be careful with the flow and crimp it as needed to keep from sucking sand into the filter. You never want to completely stop the flow into the filter or the powder will fall off the cartridge and create a mess.


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