For several months I battled a scourge in my tank known as dinoflagelettes, and had a hard time finding a definitive cure so I figured Id post mine for the next person who gets stuck with them and searches for "dinoflagelettes". Mine kept getting worse and wrose untill it prety much covered every suface, including the surface of the water. It had shown no signs of ever "going away" on its own after several months so I decided to try and kill it off on my own. After a lot of research I found that there were many suggestions out there but some were contradicting, and many did not seem to work at all on their own. Trough trial and error I came up with the proccess below and it worked like a miracle. People who came over couldnt believe the difference in the tank after just a few days, so for all you folks who struggle with the Dino curse, know that there is hope! FYI, Dino's look like a brown snot thats filled with air bubbles. Its different then cyano which froms mats, or diatoms which lack the extreme amount of bubbles.
Heres what worked like a charm for me:
1. added a carbon reactor
2. Lights off for two days straight. Empty skimmer every few hours because it will be going nuts.
3. did a water change and siphoned as much detritus as I could out of the sump.
4. Reduced litghting period and extremly wet skimming for the next two weeks. I probably changed out 8-10 gallons of water just through wet skimming.
Its been several weeks now and it has not come back!
Keep in mind however, that I believe that the sign of dinos means there is a problem in your system. For me I believe the accumulation off too much detritus in my sump combined with an insuffiecnet amount of LR to house good bacteria allowed the dino bacteria to take hold and become the dominant bacteria. For others it might be a lack of flow combined with weak skimming which allows detrituts to pile up in unseen areas. And Im sure there are many more scenarios that can result in dinos. The important thing is to figure it out and and adjust your maintenance accoridngly.
Peace,
Jesse
Heres what worked like a charm for me:
1. added a carbon reactor
2. Lights off for two days straight. Empty skimmer every few hours because it will be going nuts.
3. did a water change and siphoned as much detritus as I could out of the sump.
4. Reduced litghting period and extremly wet skimming for the next two weeks. I probably changed out 8-10 gallons of water just through wet skimming.
Its been several weeks now and it has not come back!
Keep in mind however, that I believe that the sign of dinos means there is a problem in your system. For me I believe the accumulation off too much detritus in my sump combined with an insuffiecnet amount of LR to house good bacteria allowed the dino bacteria to take hold and become the dominant bacteria. For others it might be a lack of flow combined with weak skimming which allows detrituts to pile up in unseen areas. And Im sure there are many more scenarios that can result in dinos. The important thing is to figure it out and and adjust your maintenance accoridngly.
Peace,
Jesse
