Reef nutrition

Just found dinoflagellates, anyone with experience?

I went ahead and bought both dinox, and a new bulb. i'll try the new bulb first, hopefully get it by next week.

I just found out, that the last time i changed my MH bulb was January 2014. I wonder if that's been the problem with most of my tank issues.
 
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I hope the bulb change helps. What other issues have you had? The other algae?

Personally I'd recommend stepping up your water changes for awhile, doing a daily small wc and siphoning as much as I could like Mario recommended seemed like a good plan to me.

I found a lot of different and conflicting info on rc etc.

Like many reef pests, you'll win with patience and diligence. I think of any tank as constantly cycling through various blooms of lifeforms on a gradual slide towards entropy. Wait long enough and as long as you keep your parameters in range you'll cycle on to the next bloom.

I have absolutely no input on any commercial products. You are in good hands with Gresham though.
 
anathema said:
I hope the bulb change helps. What other issues have you had? The other algae?

Personally I'd recommend stepping up your water changes for awhile, doing a daily small wc and siphoning as much as I could like Mario recommended seemed like a good plan to me.

I found a lot of different and conflicting info on rc etc.

Like many reef pests, you'll win with patience and diligence. I think of any tank as constantly cycling through various blooms of lifeforms on a gradual slide towards entropy. Wait long enough and as long as you keep your parameters in range you'll cycle on to the next bloom.

I have absolutely no input on any commercial products. You are in good hands with Gresham though.
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The dinos came after green cyano-like carpeting. I think they were working hand-in-hand.



If anyone is curious, I dosed H2O2 last night after sucking out as much as i could; and so far it appears that the dinos have had a difficult time restablishing... though still present
 
update for everyone:

I didn't siphon out anything yesterday, and dosed last night right after lights went out. During the middle of the night, I still saw bubbles caused by the dinos. There were noticeable dinos during the day, as I saw them grow slightly, just not anywhere near how they developed before.

However, this morning, I barely see any dinos, let alone some other green algae I saw the night before. There are a few tiny strands, but so far, so good. The same bubbles I saw last night, have disappeared. So far, no deaths.

I will update tomorrow if dinos continue to grow.
 
neuro said:
I just finished battling green cyano, and realized now I have small patches of dinoflagellates starting to develop. I'm not sure who I got it from, but I have an idea.

Bubbles, brown sludge like hairs.

They're multiplying fast as hell. Can't keep up with the manual removal. I've read how people are stopping water changes to raise their nitrates, or using hydrogen peroxide.

Can anyone confirm? Has anyone had problems?
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What did you do for the green cyano. Got some in my frag system and haven't had much luck.


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I had something like that in my display tank. I don't think it was cyano....like a thin layer or film algae that I could blow off and would not grow back fast. Water changes and more snails did the trick. Steve what happens if you blow it off with a turkey baster? Grows back really fast?

My experience with cyano is that it grows back really fast after manual removal.
 
Merith said:
What did you do for the green cyano. Got some in my frag system and haven't had much luck.


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This is how I get rid of any cyano (red or green):

- Stop feeding so much
- Siphon out the cyano:
-- Stop power heads
-- Brush off cyano
-- Siphon out the cyano into a filter sock that's (securely) hanging in my sump.

I do this as often as needed. My cyano is usually gone within a week
 
Thanks man I'll have to try the ones I can. The area that is having an issue is right below the power head that really needs to be cleaned or did you mean turn it off when messing with the cyano? I'm pretty sure the bulk of the problem is from feeding. I was able to snag a really nice copperband that eats frozen and am holding him in one of those tanks as my 60 is already over stocked and the upgrade is taking so so much longer than expected (grumble grumble %*\><€]=[!}] not being able to do things yourself sucks)

I used to just feed flakes once a day in that system but have had to increase the food to keep the copperband fat and happy. Also I'm out of corals I'm ok with sacrificing to him and can't really afford to buy more for him right now. Hopefully that all makes sense 3 dr apts this week have done me in.


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Enderturtle said:
I had something like that in my display tank. I don't think it was cyano....like a thin layer or film algae that I could blow off and would not grow back fast. Water changes and more snails did the trick. Steve what happens if you blow it off with a turkey baster? Grows back really fast?

My experience with cyano is that it grows back really fast after manual removal.
Click to expand...
Yah it comes back pretty quickly. It acts kinda like the normal cyano but a little different. The green seems to have a better hold on things than the red.


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Merith said:
Thanks man I'll have to try the ones I can. The area that is having an issue is right below the power head that really needs to be cleaned or did you mean turn it off when messing with the cyano? I'm pretty sure the bulk of the problem is from feeding. I was able to snag a really nice copperband that eats frozen and am holding him in one of those tanks as my 60 is already over stocked and the upgrade is taking so so much longer than expected (grumble grumble %*\><€]=[!}] not being able to do things yourself sucks)

I used to just feed flakes once a day in that system but have had to increase the food to keep the copperband fat and happy. Also I'm out of corals I'm ok with sacrificing to him and can't really afford to buy more for him right now. Hopefully that all makes sense 3 dr apts this week have done me in.


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Click to expand...


I had the exact same problem as you do now, but I had anthias that would not eat flakes or other dry foods, only frozen stuff. As soon as I introduced frozen foods, my cyano went bonkers. I never found an inexpensive way to export enough of the waste to keep the cyano at bay when it comes to over feeding.

I mean turn off all of your power heads while you brush off any cyano. Then siphon it all out while it's still floating in the water column. Then you can turn your power heads back on. Be sure to clean out your filter sock that you use to capture the cyano before reusing it for the next time. I can take a pic, but I have a hose holder that holds one end of my siphon and the filter sock together on the rim of my sump.

Reefing is a give n take. Can't always beat 'em!
 
Do you filter out the frozen food residue?

I thaw out my cubes of mysis/brine/rods food and then dump it into a little net before washing it back into a cup.

Too many food particles floating around. I only want the food to go into my fish's bellies. :)
 
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I didn't filter out frozen food residue. When I feed, I feed with half a cube of mysis, some reef chili, and some reef roids. I used to broadcast feed, but I do an occasional target feed when algae isn't so bad (like it is now). I agree with @Coral reefer.

To update folks, I didn't dose last night, but the previous night I did and I had sucked out as much algae as possible. There is even less dinos now, but there still are some existing. It's under control, so I won't be using the dinoX that I got in the mail today unless it gets worse. I did lose a colony of zoas that was close to the light, but this had been happening long before the dosing.

Also, I got my replacement bulb today, and I have installed it. I wanted to be sure there was a difference besides noticing that the new light was much brighter. I took a before & after pic, and did an eye-ball comparison in Lightroom. Sure enough, the old lamp was drifting toward the red spectrum with a bit of purple/red in it. Lets hope this solves a lot of other problems that I haven't mentioned.
 
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