Dinoflagellates?

[cniemira]

So I'm about 2 weeks into my first SW tank (a BC14, tank details here), and I think I've got a problem on my hands. When I first set up my tank, I used 16lbs of LR from liveaquaria.com. It was below freezing when the rock arrived, and because I was worried about dieoff (and for aesthetic reasons), I supplemented that with ~3lbs from the LFS. A few days ago, my diatom bloom started, and I noticed brown algae starting to grow all over. I noticed some of the "algae" had little bubbles on it, but I thought that was normal. Fast forward to today when I started to research CUCs. I was perusing reefcleaners.org, and noticed a description of "dinoflagellates" in their Nuisance Algae ID Guide. "Hey, that looks familiar," I think to myself.

 

 

Now, this stuff seems to be growing primarily on the rocks I picked up from the LFS. The tank is still cycling, covered in diatom, and the params are only starting to normalize (again, see the tank thread linked earlier for details). I'm wondering if I should yank the affected rocks (if that would help) and either boil the tar out of them, or replace with dead rock (which I'd also boil before adding).

 

I've been running my lights during the cycle, but I've read that running a tank w/ no lights (and covering it to avoid letting any in) for 2 weeks is supposed to be an effective treatment for dinos. Since there's nothing else in my tanks other than the LR, sand, and water, I don't mind doing something extreme... I just want to avoid having to start over.

 

Any input would be much appreciated. Like I said, I'm pretty new to the world of SW.

[Jacobnano]

Since you are already 2 weeks in your tank may still be cycling. What are your parameters?

[nemmy]

Ugh, they are the worst.

What type of sand did you use?

 

Just wait it out, they will burn out eventually.

Do you have any hitchhikers on the live rock that require lighting?

 

I would lights out for two weeks if nothing needs the light.

[cniemira]

The sand is CaribSea "live" sand, but I'm pretty well convinced they came in off the rock from my LFS. I haven't seen hide nor hair of any hitchhikers at all (I haven't even seen a single worm of any sort), so I'm not worried about killing the lights for a couple of weeks.

[justinT]

I had the dreaded ''red algae'' cyano, and after I treated that with chemi-clean i got a nasty bought of the dinos. This was on a cycled tank with livestock already, but to my amazement, I cut my lighting by 30 min and it disappeared within a few days after the last water change. Its been a couple weeks now and hasn't returned.

 

So surprisingly just cutting your lighting to about 8 hours a day DOES work....i was a skeptic.

 

 

Oh, and I also had the LR from liveaquaria and the caribsea live sand too. Nice stuff, both of them!

[cniemira]

Thatnks justinT, good to know that a lighting adjustment worked for you. I believe that's the solution I'm going to try. Wish me luck!

[cniemira]

The lights-out treatment seems to be working. There are no longer any obvious signs of the dinos' presence. Still, I'm going to keep the lights off for a while longer. Just to kill 'em dead.

[Arkayology]

The lights-out treatment seems to be working. There are no longer any obvious signs of the dinos' presence. Still, I'm going to keep the lights off for a while longer. Just to kill 'em dead.

 

I doubt that you will ever totally get rid of them by keeping your lights out for a prolonged period of time and then going back to a normal schedule. Seeking out the cause of them is a much better way to deal with the problem. Check your tank's flow and params as well as keeping up on water changes and reducing feeding to a minimum is a good way to start.