Starting a 2-day blackout

[highfive52]

How about puffing it into water column, dose some lanthium to bind it. Run skimmer wet to draw it out. Slow roll on feeding while your doing this. Use on water change day. Run tube from skimmer to bucket. Get it out of system. Turn off carbon while doing this. Couple of these it will begin to allow another bacteria in system to pop up. Check your overflow, turkey baste it out. Might be something fueling it. I'm not a big fan of blackouts. Bandaid.

 

[davev]

Hey @chadfish - How goes the dinos battle? Any update?

 

[chadfish]

Hey @chadfish - How goes the dinos battle? Any update?

Thanks for asking. Here’s an update:

I extended the blackout from 2 days to 3.5 days as advised. Dosed Dr. Tim’s as per the recipe. Used UV at night. Then turned on lights as dosed waste away as per the recipe with UV at night.

Dinos are not gone. They were still present on sand bed after the blackout. What I really needed to do was siphon them out and clean up the sandbed, but I never got the chance. I’m now on vacation, I stopped the waste away and UV and it seems like they are growing again.

To add insult to injury, the blackout negatively impacted a few Acros. The Rainbow Milli frag that was bouncing back seems completely dead, the new pink-is acro I got from Dong is looking pale, and the Miagi Tort from MixedReefer is also on the outs. But everyone else is fine and thriving.

So I’m going to have to try again in a few months. I did not follow my own advice this time. I didn’t perform some necessary steps such as mechanical filtration at or below the cell size of the dinos. And I didn’t vacuum the top layer of the sand bed to manually remove the visible dinos.

Before I put my tank through any more trauma, I think I’ll try something different. I’ve siphoned off a lot of sand in the past year from regular maintenance. I think I’ll put it in a bucket with some starter bacteria and a piece of rock and seed it. Do the best I can to make it “live”. Maybe mix in some sand from another reefer too. Culture that for a few weeks and then add it in as a top layer. This will block out the light for the Dinos and introduce competition. Maybe that, along with UV and manual water column filtration will help outcompete? Maybe even no UV or filtration. It’s a double edged sword because it’s such a broad treatment killing the dinos and its competitors.

And so it goes. I’m open to other ideas too. Dong offered me his water. That goes against everything I’ve ever been taught in reef keeping. But he has a healthy system (it seems) and mine can’t get worse (I suppose)

 

[ChrisV]

Thanks for asking. Here’s an update:

I extended the blackout from 2 days to 3.5 days as advised. Dosed Dr. Tim’s as per the recipe. Used UV at night. Then turned on lights as dosed waste away as per the recipe with UV at night.

Dinos are not gone. They were still present on sand bed after the blackout. What I really needed to do was siphon them out and clean up the sandbed, but I never got the chance. I’m now on vacation, I stopped the waste away and UV and it seems like they are growing again.

To add insult to injury, the blackout negatively impacted a few Acros. The Rainbow Milli frag that was bouncing back seems completely dead, the new pink-is acro I got from Dong is looking pale, and the Miagi Tort from MixedReefer is also on the outs. But everyone else is fine and thriving.

So I’m going to have to try again in a few months. I did not follow my own advice this time. I didn’t perform some necessary steps such as mechanical filtration at or below the cell size of the dinos. And I didn’t vacuum the top layer of the sand bed to manually remove the visible dinos.

Before I put my tank through any more trauma, I think I’ll try something different. I’ve siphoned off a lot of sand in the past year from regular maintenance. I think I’ll put it in a bucket with some starter bacteria and a piece of rock and seed it. Do the best I can to make it “live”. Maybe mix in some sand from another reefer too. Culture that for a few weeks and then add it in as a top layer. This will block out the light for the Dinos and introduce competition. Maybe that, along with UV and manual water column filtration will help outcompete? Maybe even no UV or filtration. It’s a double edged sword because it’s such a broad treatment killing the dinos and its competitors.

And so it goes. I’m open to other ideas too. Dong offered me his water. That goes against everything I’ve ever been taught in reef keeping. But he has a healthy system (it seems) and mine can’t get worse (I suppose)

Sorry to hear that it didn't go well. Hopefully it will be resolved soon.

 

[davev]

Hi @chadfish -

Sorry to hear about your struggles. In my own battle I'm using the Elegant Coral method which is definitely about inducing a bacterial bloom using Dr. Tim's Waste-Away and a beneficial bacterial (ATM Colony). I've been doing a deep vacuum of my whole sand bed daily into a 5 micron filter sock and so far, I'm pretty happy with the results.

This is actually my second back-to-back round of this treatment and I feel like I've got something on the order of a 90% reduction of dinos in the tank. At this point, I think I'm going to finish up this current round and then give the tank about a week and see where I am. At that point, if I need to, I'll go a third or maybe even a fourth round.

Clearly, fighting dinos isn't an overnight thing but for me, I just need to feel like I'm actively doing something rather than the other treatment I read about - dose waterglass to induce a diatom bloom to out compete the dinos. I started that process but it was a whole lot of waiting for the diatom bloom that (so far) hasn't happened.

Good luck with your battle if I end up beating these things, I'll be sure to let you know what works.

 

[highfive52]

Thanks for asking. Here’s an update:

I extended the blackout from 2 days to 3.5 days as advised. Dosed Dr. Tim’s as per the recipe. Used UV at night. Then turned on lights as dosed waste away as per the recipe with UV at night.

Dinos are not gone. They were still present on sand bed after the blackout. What I really needed to do was siphon them out and clean up the sandbed, but I never got the chance. I’m now on vacation, I stopped the waste away and UV and it seems like they are growing again.

To add insult to injury, the blackout negatively impacted a few Acros. The Rainbow Milli frag that was bouncing back seems completely dead, the new pink-is acro I got from Dong is looking pale, and the Miagi Tort from MixedReefer is also on the outs. But everyone else is fine and thriving.

So I’m going to have to try again in a few months. I did not follow my own advice this time. I didn’t perform some necessary steps such as mechanical filtration at or below the cell size of the dinos. And I didn’t vacuum the top layer of the sand bed to manually remove the visible dinos.

Before I put my tank through any more trauma, I think I’ll try something different. I’ve siphoned off a lot of sand in the past year from regular maintenance. I think I’ll put it in a bucket with some starter bacteria and a piece of rock and seed it. Do the best I can to make it “live”. Maybe mix in some sand from another reefer too. Culture that for a few weeks and then add it in as a top layer. This will block out the light for the Dinos and introduce competition. Maybe that, along with UV and manual water column filtration will help outcompete? Maybe even no UV or filtration. It’s a double edged sword because it’s such a broad treatment killing the dinos and its competitors.

And so it goes. I’m open to other ideas too. Dong offered me his water. That goes against everything I’ve ever been taught in reef keeping. But he has a healthy system (it seems) and mine can’t get worse (I suppose)

See if dong can spare a rock to toss in your sump. Diversify

 

[chadfish]

See if dong can spare a rock to toss in your sump. Diversify

I have some already

 

[chadfish]

Removing the chaeto from my tank seems to be having a positive effect.

My nitrates are up to 5ppm - historically they have read 0ppm. Phosphate at 0.05ppm (also historically 0.0)

And after 8 days on vacation, All of my montipora are flourishing, growing and have great color and polyp extension! The Slimer looks fuzzy again, and the acan seems to be on its way back.

My theory is that I was starving the coral. The dinos eat first, then the chaeto, then the coral (maybe?). Without the chaeto there, the coral have plenty of nutrients.

(now to get rid of the dinos)

 

[Bandit13]

I got softie/anemone tank so take this for what its worth. A while back i dealt with dinos, popped up when i was running less food into my tank, as i was trying to get rid of hair algae/etc. More water changes seemed to make dinos worse and eventually tried out competing the dinos by pumping nutrients back up by feeding more to grow algae.

Seemed to work and have had occasional reoccurrence of dinos but up my feeding when i start seeing the stringy, bubbly mess and seems to go away. Now always have a healthy amount of algae growing on the back wall that my blenny keeps in check. Dont go overboard with the extra nutrients either, gotta find that balance, and slowly ramp up dont just dump a bunch of extra food in out of the blue!

Also read alot of success stories running UV but didnt have one to try

Heres the crap i was dealing with, blow it off returns in a hour or two, leathers hated it.

Dont know if the algae competes directly with dinos or maybe helps zooplankton flourish which in turn eats dino, who knows? Best of Luck, you can pull through!

 

[MarkSzy]

I am dealing with a Dino bloom after my nitrate and phosphates dropped to 0 in a week, well almost zero. Unreadable by API test kits. My LFS said they had success using phytoplankton in fighting off Dino’s. I put some in the other day and added another dose today. Along with the blackout and running blue light at 4% for less then 6 hours a day I can see progress after 2.5 day blackout.

 

[chadfish]

I got softie/anemone tank so take this for what its worth. A while back i dealt with dinos, popped up when i was running less food into my tank, as i was trying to get rid of hair algae/etc. More water changes seemed to make dinos worse and eventually tried out competing the dinos by pumping nutrients back up by feeding more to grow algae.

Seemed to work and have had occasional reoccurrence of dinos but up my feeding when i start seeing the stringy, bubbly mess and seems to go away. Now always have a healthy amount of algae growing on the back wall that my blenny keeps in check. Dont go overboard with the extra nutrients either, gotta find that balance, and slowly ramp up dont just dump a bunch of extra food in out of the blue!

Also read alot of success stories running UV but didnt have one to try

Heres the crap i was dealing with, blow it off returns in a hour or two, leathers hated it.
View attachment 173583View attachment 173584

Dont know if the algae competes directly with dinos or maybe helps zooplankton flourish which in turn eats dino, who knows? Best of Luck, you can pull through!

Thanks. That looks nasty. My situation is way better- just on the sandbed.

 

[wcj_ink]

I’ve been dealing with dinos along with gha for the past 2 weeks, im considering a 3 day blackout myself

 

[chadfish]

I’ve been dealing with dinos along with gha for the past 2 weeks, im considering a 3 day blackout myself

Most of my corals did just fine. The corals that were recovering from previous events didn’t do as well.

 

[chadfish]

Update on the algae/dino situation.

First I got rid of the chaeto and my nutrients came up to standard low levels: 5-10ppm NO3, 0.01-0.06ppm PO4.

Second I got rid of the the briopsis with Reef Flux. I managed to get rid of a bunch of hair algae too. Did not get a nutrient spike.

Third I let the tank sit a couple of weeks. Alternated between doing nothing and disturbing the top layer of the sand bed where the dinos gathered. This did nothing.

Fourth I ramped up the lights. That’s right, up. The corals thanks me and growth is good. I’m up to 40% blues and 5% whites on my ReefBreeders. Historical PAR readings tell me this is still low-ish PAR and I can go higher.

Fifth I increased my biodiversity! Greg Hiller wasn’t around to get sump sludge so I bought Live Florida Keys sand and mineral mud and added that to the sump.

Lastly I covered the sand with filter floss to block the light. I did a 24 hour full tank black-out and left the floss there for 3 full days. I increased the temp up to 82F and rand a 5 micron filter sock. Last night I took the floss out, the sand was white again. I vacuumed the sand and dosed Dr Tim’s Waste Away at full strength. I’ll keep the temp up until Wednesday and turn back down to 77 over three-four days.

Now it’s wait-and-see time.

Biodiversity- check
Low numbers of dinos -check
Adequate nutrients- check
Clean(ish) sand - check
Impediment to dino bloom (temp) - check

In theory the microbiome will come to some equilibrium that includes dinos but doesn’t let them bloom out of control.

Place your bets.

 

[Beto]

I had a dino in my aquarium, a very aggressive type, it covered the SPS until it suffocated them. I tried everything, dark, phyto,UV (45w) my tank is 55 gallons , bactéria , fish….everything. So I went all-or-nothing and used DinoX as a last resort before hammering my tank. I had to do 2 treatments. No SPS survived, but they would die anyway because of Dino. LPS and zoas were ok, just had the slowest growth for a while. After that I dosed silicate for a while. I never had dino again

 

[chadfish]

I had a dino in my aquarium, a very aggressive type, it covered the SPS until it suffocated them. I tried everything, dark, phyto,UV (45w) my tank is 55 gallons , bactéria , fish….everything. So I went all-or-nothing and used DinoX as a last resort before hammering my tank. I had to do 2 treatments. No SPS survived, but they would die anyway because of Dino. LPS and zoas were ok, just had the slowest growth for a while. After that I dosed silicate for a while. I never had dino again

Ouch