Dino's or something else?

Marinne13 · Oct 29, 2013

First tank is a 30G with 2 Picasso clowns, cardinal and a very small blenny...I have 8 hermits, 9 astrea snails, 15 nassirus snails, emerald crab and skunk cleaner shrimp

I have a brown stringy algae, very thin and is showing up on my rock not sand bed(the long striny brown algae, there is some turfy looking light brown algae on my sand bed)...it does not seem to just go away when the lights go out

I do have bubbles showing up on my rocks, not all of them only some...no snail deaths at all

I have been doing 5 Gallon WC's every week with reef crystals and a 4-stage RODI unit with filters only a couple months old...I feed every other day with frozen PE Mysis and rods food

I am running a GFO reactor from BRS with carbon as well, a Reef Octopus BH-1000 protein skimmer and around 900GPH of flow...also running LED's at about 70% max for 9 hours a day, most my rock is dry base rock with about 15lbs of LR

here is a picture, some has bubbles and some doesn't

Civicdemon · Oct 30, 2013

What are you using for flow inside the tank ??? I useto get think little layer of brown film on my glass and sand bed and when I got my MP40s it went away. But it could also be the RO/DI filter is starting to go bad, This also happens to me when its about time to change my filter in my ro/di unit. Whats your TDS ?

Marinne13 · Oct 30, 2013

I have a 425GPH on my left wall and a Tunze turble stream on the right that is at about 600GPH, so over 1,000 which is about 30 times turning the tank over

my DI filter has about 50% life and my TDS meter is reading 0...I just put new sediment filters in last month, but I do have another full set of filters that I can swap but they are expensive so I don't want to throw something that's good out

Marinne13 · Oct 30, 2013

it's weird, I have a little 10G nano and it does it in there to...long brown stringy algae that shows up in the morning, it is not snotty more like spider web consistency and does not contain bubbles (it's more of a dark brown/black)

maybe some weird diatoms?? I am having no CUC deaths at all

Sakura2282 · Oct 30, 2013

Marinne13 said:
it's weird, I have a little 10G nano and it does it in there to...long brown stringy algae that shows up in the morning, it is not snotty more like spider web consistency and does not contain bubbles (it's more of a dark brown/black)

maybe some weird diatoms?? I am having no CUC deaths at all

I vote for weird diatoms. It's good to know your CUC is OK and eating the algae.

Do you have any phosphates?

Marinne13 · Oct 30, 2013

hard to tell, my phosphate test kits suck and never read anything accurately...I have one API test kit that reads .25 on EVERYTHING(tap water, RODI, freshwater tank and it would prob read it on a can of beer) and a Salifert that says zero on my 30G

I am using RODI with 0 TDS...also another weird thing is, I moved a zoa frag today from the sand bed to middle of the tank and as soon as I did, BAM some brown stringy web like algae??? weird it would show up that fast

Marinne13 · Oct 30, 2013

here are some more pictures, as you can see the fist pic are some zoanthids that it is on, showed up instantly when I moved them and the other is my Tunze PH

it is very thin algae and not thick snotty looking so it has me thinking that maybe it's not Dinos...I can suck it out or blow it off my zoanthids and it literally comes back in seconds!!!

Marinne13 · Oct 30, 2013

ok so this is exactly what it looks like but not as bad...diatoms? (that's what everyone on this particular thread said it was) should I do a 5G WC, I do have new GFO and carbon in

RockStacker · Oct 30, 2013

Without microscopic examination it would be inconclusive.
But I have seen a lot of dino's in my years, so I am going with a 95% probability that they are nuisance/toxic dinoflagellates.

It might have come in via new livestock/live rock that was introduced to the tank.

They grow (congregate) very fast. Sometimes stringy goo appear within an hour after removing them.

Some things that have been noted in the past that can address the issue:
1. Minimizing nutrients in the tank.
2. Reduce photoperiod - in extreme cases, complete black out.
3. Aggressive skimming (wet skim)
4. Frequent water changes to export the offending organisms.
5. Hydrogen Peroxide dosing (use extreme care, and read up thoroughly on the topic before attempting).

You might have to do a combination of the above steps to fully resolve the issue.

Sakura2282 · Oct 30, 2013

This is a very interesting article about dinoflagellates. He mentions 6 steps to deal with them, maybe it can help you. :)

http://www.reefaquarium.com/2013/dealing-with-dinoflagellates/
1) Reduce available nutrients in the water

Reducing the nitrates to 2ppm or less and keeping the phosphate levels to undetectable levels will help kill off the Dinoflagellates. Using a good phosphate remover and carbon dosing are the two of the most common approaches to achieve this. The theory behind the nutrient reduction is that when dinoflagellates are in a very low nutrient environment, the bacteria inside their bodies will reproduce to the point where they will die off. This is one time that you cannot trust your test kits while you have a lot of dinoflagellates in your aquarium as they will consume nitrates and phosphates almost instantly. You have get assume the levels are high, take steps to reduce them, and start testing once they are on their way out. The following thread explains carbon dosing: http://www.reefaquarium.com/2012/carbon-dosing-in-laymans-terms/

Marinne13 · Oct 31, 2013

it isn't a stringy goo though, it's more diatom consistency that just flakes off

I have fed very lightly the past week, every other day and only use Rods food that is packaged in RODI water...I feed maybe less than a quarter cube size for three fish and it gets eaten immediately and what doesn't my cleaner shrimp eats within a minute

I cut my light schedule down to 6 hours a day, before I had this algae I had zero nitrates and very little algae...heck I don't even have any other hair algae and my sand bed is pretty much completely clear (maybe 5% coverage)

I use GFO from BRS and their activated carbon which is changed out every 2 weeks and am running my Reef Octopus as wet as I can

I did add some LR but its the ecofriendly type and I have never had a problem with his stuff, his tanks have zero algae

Marinne13 · Oct 31, 2013

your right though, I am probably screwed...go figure

Sakura2282 · Oct 31, 2013

I think you are doing your best, you have done almost everything they recommend to get rid of this algae. If you are not seeing it getting worse that must be a good signal. Keep going! :)

Marinne13 · Oct 31, 2013

I did a WC and they seemed to be on more rocks and coral afterwards o_O...I siphon them out and they come back within 5 minutes

super annoying

Marinne13 · Oct 31, 2013

Yeah the WC made it ALOT worse, taped my tank up with dark towels and not removing them until Saturday...if this doesn't work I am screwed as I don't want to keep buying equipment that won't do anything

I already spent hundred's of dollars to do a tank the right way and it slaps me in the face

Sakura2282 · Oct 31, 2013

How could the WC make it worse? Unless, whatever it is that keeps feeding the algae it's in the water. I know you are using RODI water and your TDS is reading zero, so the only component that is left is the salt. I'd say there must be something in that salt that keeps feeding the algae. I remember that in one of the links I sent you before, they recommended to change the salt brand. That's the only think I can think of, because you have done almost everything people suggested to fight this kind of algae.

You cut down your tank photo period to only six hours
You siphon it out
Your readings are good
You're running carbon
You are only feeding every other day.

And right now you are in a very stressful situation, I know is very discouraging when we are doing our best to fix something that just keeps getting worse and worse. I hope the blackout works. Just keep positive! :thumbsup:

Marinne13 · Oct 31, 2013

It's a 95% full bucket of reef crystals :(...maybe my TDS meter is wrong or something

I could change my membrane and DI resign, I hope I don't stress my tank out with the blackout

Aquarian · Oct 31, 2013

This sucks I wish I could help but I have no experience with this.

Jml32788 · Oct 31, 2013

This looks exactly like what I had. Water changes also made them worse for me. I ended up adding a few lbs of rock and beefed up my CUC with some Nerite snails and they went away.

Marinne13 · Oct 31, 2013

I just added around 7 ceriths so hopefully

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