Dinoflagellates - Dr. Shimek or somebody - HELP!!!

[Anonymous]

Well, I think I've come to the conclusion that the brown skanky stuff, growing threads on my substrate and rocks is dynoflagellates. I told my husband to turn off the lights and crank up the Emperor with all the carbon it will hold. I was contemplating vacuuming the rocks and gravel tonight but then I would have to add more water with more trace elements so that might not be a good idea. I'm going to feed a little less and cut out the phytoplankton as well as cut down the photoperiod for a while (lights are low anyway, a ballast blew) and this may be why the stuff hasn't spread like crazy.

Is there anything else I can do???This makes me sick - we are so particular with this tank.

Thanks for any help or suggestions anyone can supply.



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Laurie
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I came, I saw, I bought.

 

[Anonymous]

Do they have bubbles in them? If they really are dinoflagellates, I would say just keep siphoning them out directly. Since they bind up whatever it is in the tank that they are feedinf off, if you keep vaccumming, you'll eventually remove it and they'll fade away.

Good luck
James Wiseman

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Reefs.org Channel Operator

 

[Anonymous]

Dinoflagellites comprise a pretty large family of algae that include red tide, amyloodinium, and the zooxanthalae that inhabit photosynthetic invertibrates. At any rate, they span a wide spectrum between harmful and helpful, and it is hard to know from what you have described whether or not what you are observing is a dinoflagellite or just some brown algae that everyone gets when setting up a new system. How long has yours been going? Is this a new or ongoing problem? In general canister filters help generate nitrates (algae food). Mechanical removal (scraping, siphoning) is probably the most effective way to get rid of algae, combined with a "clean up crew" of snails and hermit crabs.

If it is a dull-red slimy film, it is cyanobacteria, and again can be a fairly normal thing, and the best way to get rid of it is mechanical removal and also by increasing water circulation and oxygenation, and perhaps lighting.

[This message has been edited by flounder (edited 22 February 2000).]

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the quick responses. The tank is a little over 4 months old and this problem has been with us for about 1 week. It started as just brown algae in the most well-lighted areas of the tank. I didn't think much of it because we had just recently upgraded our lights. As I said in my other post, one of the ballasts blew so now we have less light than ever while we await delivery of our new system. The other night I noticed a smell which I can only describe as under the pier at low tide and the brown algae was on some of the rock as well as the substrate. It also now has clear threadlike tendrils extending from it which have air bubbles trapped in them. We also have air bubbles covering most bare areas of rock whether or not they have algae cover. Ammonia, nitrite, and nitrates have been 0. Temp. 81, salinity just under 1.024. I'm really scared - I don't want any of my animals to die!

Thanks - Laurie

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Laurie
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I came, I saw, I bought.

 

[Anonymous]

I have to say that I am puzzled, especially by the smell you describe. Do you have a lot of water circulation? I would recommend water changes, siphoning off as much goo as possible, using several powerheads to get a good current going, and maybe using activated carbon in case there are some decay products to mop up (although this seems unlikely given your water tests). Do you run a good protein skimmer? This too is essential. My rock smells a little bit, which concerns me, but so far everything appears to be ok.

If the algae is like a film, possibly with air bubbles in it, and you can easily siphon it away or blow it apart with a powerhead water stream, it is cyanobacteria, and an increase of water circulation combined with a good protein skimmer should do the trick. If it is just brown algae, it really is no big deal, and I would just wait it out, removing as much as you can along the way. If you have what looks like white threads or filiments or a fine white film on the rock, this is evidence of bacterial decay, especially if you have it on sponges. You should scrape off such material and remove it. This however is usually accompanied by a huge ammonia spike, and occurs during the rock curing process. If you don't have good water circulation, it coudl be doing it now.

 

[Anonymous]

Hi Laurie,

Yes, it sounds like dino's. No too worry, too much, but control takes some time. I would suggest a three pronged attack.

First, siphon out the stuff and do a series of regular but fairly large water changes. If you have gravel vacuum it. If you have a sand bed don't vacuum it. The aim here is to reduce the dissolved nutrients.

Second, either in your main tank or in the sump, start growing some macroalgae. Caulerpa is okay, Halimeda, etc. Anyway, these algae will compete with the the dino's for nutrient and will bring it down. Takes a couple of months for the full treatment. Use 24/7 lights on the macroalgae if you can, and harvest it periodically.

Third, try to get some animal that will eat the stuff. The sand fauna of a good sand bed will have some animals that do this. Queen conch snails will generally eat it, but they need a large sand area to crawl on. As far as I know no fish or sea urchin will touch it, though.

Concentrate your attack using water changes and macroalgae competition.

Aerate your tank well, when the lights go out the dino's respire and can lower the oxygen concentration rapidly. Then some algae and/or critters can die. This accounts for the odor you described.

Good luck!

Cheers, Ron

 

[Anonymous]

Are the bubbles she describes caused by release of N2 from LR and LS that gets caught under the algae? Or is this oxygen that the algea produces?

BTW Ron, I had thought about getting a conch. How large of a sand area do they need. I am setting up a standard 55 with 50-70 lbs of figi LR. Do you think that this will be a large enough footprint?

Also, do you think that a large sand "bulldozer" like a conch has any affect on the microfauna in the sand bed? It seems to me that any large animal that disturbs the sand would be detrimental.

 

[Anonymous]

I tried to respond last night but wonderful aol kept kicking me off. I spent yesterday evening siphoning and running tests (ammonia =0, nitrates between 0-2.5, nitrite =0, phosphates non detectable, pH 8.4, dKH = 10) I have also been fanatically cleaning the polycarbon bags in my Emperor filter. When I got home I turned the tank lights on indirectly and couldn't see any sign of algae but that's not unusual when the lights are first on. I vacuumed the substrate and rocks and replaced about 5 gallons of water. All of my animals looked fine and when I fed them (lightly) they all ate.

Re some of the questions about my set-up - 75 gal. with 80 lbs. LR, Berlin HO skimmer, Emperor 400 filter, 4 powerheads (3 on a wave strip. I do weekly 5-7% water changes using well water which has gone through a large home water treatment system. I mix my water up to a week in advance. My tank is overstocked at this point but all fish are small except the tang and we are in the process of planning another tank before they get much bigger (currently have 18" of fish).

I hate to admint it but I think we caused this mess by cutting back on filtration time with the Emperor thinking that we would ultimately just go with the LR and Berlin. It didn't occur to us until several days of running the emperor only at night that water had been sitting stagnant in the filter all day (growing all kinds of gunk) and that at night we were suddenly spewing it back into our tank. How could we make such a STUPID mistake? Well, hopefully we've caught it in time and can fix it.

Thanks again for all the advice. If after reading my specs anyone has anymore suggestions or if you just want to call me a dummy to my face please feel free - believe me, I'm saying that myself.

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Laurie
_____________________

I came, I saw, I bought.

 

[Anonymous]

Hi MFisher,

>Are the bubbles she describes caused by release of N2 from LR and LS that gets caught under the algae? Or is this oxygen that the algea produces?>

It is oxygen from the algae.

>BTW Ron, I had thought about getting a conch. How large of a sand area do they need. I am setting up a standard 55 with 50-70 lbs of figi LR. Do you think that this will be a large enough footprint?

No. It depends on your tank and the amount of algae of course, but they need a lot of walking space.

>Also, do you think that a large sand "bulldozer" like a conch has any affect on the microfauna in the sand bed? It seems to me that any large animal that disturbs the sand would be detrimental.

Queen conchs don't disturb the sand. They move over the surface of it. They are harmless to the sand fauna.

Cheers, Ron