Dinoflagellates, help!

I’ve had a similar problem. I used an every other day schedule of lights out, cut back on food 25%, and did twice a week 20% water changes. 2 weeks and everything was cleared up, no sign since

 

Hey Jeff, how are things going with the dinos?

I had them in my 10 gallon reef back in early 2017.. almost made me quit the hobby because I tried almost all of the above and nothing worked, I even tore the whole system apart and soaked everything in 50% hydrogen peroxide to 50% water. I remember reading that most dinos are different but what worked for me was Dr. Tim's Waste Away. I put half the recommended dose at night and the next day there was not a trace of them. They would come back occasionally for about a month after that but i would add more medication when I saw them.

I think I still have my bottle of waste away that I haven't touched since I got rid of them. If you want i can drop it off in cedar Rapids when i get back to town

I also heard that vibrant works very well, if not better. There is quite a big price difference, however.

 

Everytime I did a blackout they always came back.
I'll contact you when I get into town

 

Just a quick question. Are you sure if it's dinoflagellates? I thought I had them myself, but kind of threw caution to the wind and dosed chemiclean on a whim. Turns out it was cyano, because it's totally cleared up now! Everything I've found shows that chemiclean won't harm anything if it's not cyano.

 

Might want to look into the elevated magnesium method. Some people have had success by bringing Mg up to 1800+. I know BRS had a good post on this at one point.

 

Did they come back? @jeffmr4

 

I am fighting them myself! Chaeto seems to be a very solid common denominator. I've yet to try a blackout, but may consider it. What I'm attempting is daily doses of phyto, weekly doses of Vibrant, miracle mud, and boosting NO3 and PO4 through feeding more. So far, PO4 comes up, but NO3 is still absolutely unreadable on a Salifert kit. Debating on SLOWLY dosing Brightwell nitrogen to see what happens. From the looks of your parameters, it does look as though you have a little room to boost those two nutrients.

 

Oh, and with these methods so far I've seen an improvement in dinos, but they're still present.

 

For what it's worth....

I had been fighting dinos and/or cyano for quite some time in my frag tank. Tried numerous things: lights out, not changing the water, replaced T5 bulbs, added flow, used a polyfilter, didn't use a polyfilter. Nothing seemed to help. At the same time, nitrates and phosphates were running zero - using Red Sea and Salifert test kits. I tried dosing both nitrates and phosphates. Readings went up generally for a couple days, and then dropped back to zero. I tried feeding more. Tried increasing alkalinity. Every day I was blowing cyano/dinos of frags and/or sucking it out.

Finally I got around to fragging a chalice colony off of a rock (4"x 4" x4") that had been in the frag tank for a few months previous when I redid some aquascaping in the Display tank. I didn't frag it as much as used the dremel to remove all of the chalice from the rock. Then I put the rock back in the display tank in the sump. The rock had probably been in my main tank since day 1 (almost 15 years ago). Anyway within 2 days of removing that rock, the cyano/dinos disappeared completely. I MEAN COMPLETELY. And my nitrogen and phosphate started to rise. Nitrogen is now between 2 and 4. Phosphates are at about .05 I haven't had any cyano or dinos since. Thats been about 3-4 weeks ago.

 

That's an interesting conundrum you had, Jeanette. Do you think that the chalice was utilizing all the nitrates that you had in the frag tank? That would be a pretty interesting experiment to perform so see if there is any correlation between NO3 and PO4 levels and the presence of of blooming dinos. I don't necessarily believe cyanobacteria and dinos can be completely eliminated from an aquarium, but I do think they can hold very small populations that don't harm anything. But hey, I'm neither a microbiologist or a marine biologist! Lol

 

Most of the chalice was left in the frag tank - minus the rock. My theory was that the rock had so much beneficial bacteria built up in it over 15 years that it was just too efficient at removing all the nitrates and phosphates.

 

Hrmmm... I wonder if I have a similar issue with my rock. I got my rock from Tampa Bay Saltwater 9 years ago. I have moved this rock a few times (started in a 125g, then a 180g, and now a 400g). Even in an immature tank I never reached NO3 levels above 0.50 (red sea and salifert). For the vast majority of the time I've been at undetectable NO3 and PO4 < .04.

I've had cyano ever since I moved into my 400g system two years ago even with floored nitrate and phosphate. I recently started dosing nitrates and have noticed a dramatic improvement in SPS coral colors, growth, and polyp extension. So far I haven't seen cyano eliminated but I'll stay the course for a while. I'm dosing 1 ppm of nitrate daily and it seems to get sucked up immediately. PO4 is also 0.00 ppm (had been around .04 before dosing nitrate). We shall see how things progress..