Want to add pods to tank.

[Clown79]

So I have dino's and after doing extensive reading I have learned that adding biodiversity to the tank and nutrients is the way to go.

 

My plan is adding microbacter7, phyto, and copepods.

 

 

Most get their pods from algae barn but being in canada that's not possible.

 

I have limited choices apparently. I have found 2 sources so far.

 

These are what I have been able to find so far.

 

https://copepods.ca/collections/packs/products/copepods-and-rotifers-live-concentrated-zooplankton-blend-16-oz

 

Or 

https://sustainablemarinecanada.ca/products/reef-nutrition-tigger-pods

 

Would either option work?

 

 

 

[jservedio]

The easiest way is to go the nastiest, most disgusting LFS you have in your area and buy a fist sized clump of chaeto. Toss it in your DT and give it a shake every few days and remove any filter socks you have.

 

Your main lighting is probably way too powerful compared to the likely cheapo CFL bulb they had it under and it'll most likely bleach instead of growing, so it won't mess with your nutrients.

[Clown79]

1 hour ago, jservedio said:

The easiest way is to go the nastiest, most disgusting LFS you have in your area and buy a fist sized clump of chaeto. Toss it in your DT and give it a shake every few days and remove any filter socks you have.

 

Your main lighting is probably way too powerful compared to the likely cheapo CFL bulb they had it under and it'll most likely bleach instead of growing, so it won't mess with your nutrients.

Cheato doesn't live in my tank. I've tried do many times.

I have dragons breath making it but chaeto just seems to melt away.

 

I have a hard time trusting my lfs, what's in their tanks I like to avoid as much as possible.

 

The issue with dino's is I need to add a lot of pods to compete with them.

[jservedio]

15 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

Cheato doesn't live in my tank. I've tried do many times.

Exactly - if it isn't growing, it isn't reducing your nutrients and making your dinos worse. Whatever was living it it, is now living in your tank.

 

I've dealt with dinos several times now (every time I move, they pop up, without fail, 4-6 months after I move) and with a way-too-big-for-my-tank wrasse, haven't had the luxury of pods to help. The only thing I offer is something I know you have plenty of - patience.

 

The last two times I dealt with it, I went a more unconventional route and had extremely good luck. I blasted the tank with tons of unrinsed frozen food every day and did 5g water changes weekly, manually removing dinos with a toothbrush while leaving all of the other nasty crap. Took about 2 months, but eventually, my tank was pretty well covered in cyano, green film algae, bubble algae, etc. and the dinos stood no chance against them. Slowly backed off the feeding and kept up with the water changes and the other stuff started dying off and went back to normal.

 

Your corals are super healthy - so they should be able to be fighting off the dinos while growing. Plus, all that extra, unrinsed food will make all your corals even happier. So much food for them. If you are dosing, replace some of the 2-part with Kalk in the ATO to boost the pH and boost the mag a little if you aren't already. I know people go nuts with the magnesium and Kalk for Bryopsis, but I boost that when dealing with dinos to prevent that from taking it's place.

 

If you go this route (or really any route), just go slow and ramp up the food, water changes, and any kalk or mag very slowly. No reason to rush it and end up angering your corals. You've got a mature tank, and I find the older my LR gets and the more mature my tank gets - the easier it is to deal with outbreaks of any sort.

[Clown79]

15 minutes ago, jservedio said:

Exactly - if it isn't growing, it isn't reducing your nutrients and making your dinos worse. Whatever was living it it, is now living in your tank.

 

I've dealt with dinos several times now (every time I move, they pop up, without fail, 4-6 months after I move) and with a way-too-big-for-my-tank wrasse, haven't had the luxury of pods to help. The only thing I offer is something I know you have plenty of - patience.

 

The last two times I dealt with it, I went a more unconventional route and had extremely good luck. I blasted the tank with tons of unrinsed frozen food every day and did 5g water changes weekly, manually removing dinos with a toothbrush while leaving all of the other nasty crap. Took about 2 months, but eventually, my tank was pretty well covered in cyano, green film algae, bubble algae, etc. and the dinos stood no chance against them. Slowly backed off the feeding and kept up with the water changes and the other stuff started dying off and went back to normal.

 

Your corals are super healthy - so they should be able to be fighting off the dinos while growing. Plus, all that extra, unrinsed food will make all your corals even happier. So much food for them. If you are dosing, replace some of the 2-part with Kalk in the ATO to boost the pH and boost the mag a little if you aren't already. I know people go nuts with the magnesium and Kalk for Bryopsis, but I boost that when dealing with dinos to prevent that from taking it's place.

 

If you go this route (or really any route), just go slow and ramp up the food, water changes, and any kalk or mag very slowly. No reason to rush it and end up angering your corals. You've got a mature tank, and I find the older my LR gets and the more mature my tank gets - the easier it is to deal with outbreaks of any sort.

I have started feeding corals daily since my phos is at 0. I was really surprised by this because I had cut back on waterchanges and was feeding corals 3 times a week.

 

I have the worst strain of dino's and it's already effecting my corals. 

Some haven't been open in over a week now. They aren't even covered yet and already reacting.

I am sucking the dino's out with a Turkey baster daily.

 

The one common consensus with ostreopsis, is doing waterchanges is the worst thing and adding biodiversity is the best thing. 

 

 

[jservedio]

19 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

I have started feeding corals daily since my phos is at 0. I was really surprised by this because I had cut back on waterchanges and was feeding corals 3 times a week.

 

I have the worst strain of dino's and it's already effecting my corals. 

Some haven't been open in over a week now. They aren't even covered yet and already reacting.

I am sucking the dino's out with a Turkey baster daily.

 

The one common consensus with ostreopsis, is doing waterchanges is the worst thing and adding biodiversity is the best thing. 

 

 

Have you considered dosing nutrients directly and getting your C, N, and P back in balance if you actually have nitrates? The only reason I was doing pretty heavy water changes is because I was able to siphon more out and was putting enough nutrients in to actually build up quickly - if I were in your boat, I 100% agree and definitely wouldn't have changed water either.

 

My tank was Nitrogen limited, so I heavily dosed Potassium Nitrate to get it back in balance. Once everything was back in balance, I had no issues keeping P and N up through just feeding - LOTS of feeding. I didn't have to deal with a Phosphate limited, but I know there are plenty Phosphate fertilizers out there you could likely safely dose if you haven't looked that route yet.

 

Also if your city water is high in phosphates, consider running just RO water - usually lots of algae-feeding ions in there.

 

Edit: I'm sure you researched basically everything, just like I did all those times, I'm just hoping unsolicited advice might bring up a prong of attack you happened to overlook or hadn't considered. I know you are awesome at this whole reefing thing, just trying to throw ideas out there. Even if it doesn't help you, maybe it'll help someone else out!

[luckie1966]

3 hours ago, Clown79 said:

So I have dino's and after doing extensive reading I have learned that adding biodiversity to the tank and nutrients is the way to go.

 

My plan is adding microbacter7, phyto, and copepods.

 

 

Most get their pods from algae barn but being in canada that's not possible.

 

I have limited choices apparently. I have found 2 sources so far.

 

These are what I have been able to find so far.

 

https://copepods.ca/collections/packs/products/copepods-and-rotifers-live-concentrated-zooplankton-blend-16-oz

 

Or 

https://sustainablemarinecanada.ca/products/reef-nutrition-tigger-pods

 

Would either option work?

 

 

 

If those are your choices then you want Tigger pods. Algagen Tisbe biminiiesis thru live aquaria are ideal.

 

[duderubble]

2 hours ago, jservedio said:

The easiest way is to go the nastiest, most disgusting LFS you have in your area and buy a fist sized clump of chaeto. Toss it in your DT and give it a shake every few days and remove any filter socks you have.

 

Your main lighting is probably way too powerful compared to the likely cheapo CFL bulb they had it under and it'll most likely bleach instead of growing, so it won't mess with your nutrients.

I agree with chaeto being the way to go.

[Clown79]

2 hours ago, jservedio said:

Have you considered dosing nutrients directly and getting your C, N, and P back in balance if you actually have nitrates? The only reason I was doing pretty heavy water changes is because I was able to siphon more out and was putting enough nutrients in to actually build up quickly - if I were in your boat, I 100% agree and definitely wouldn't have changed water either.

 

My tank was Nitrogen limited, so I heavily dosed Potassium Nitrate to get it back in balance. Once everything was back in balance, I had no issues keeping P and N up through just feeding - LOTS of feeding. I didn't have to deal with a Phosphate limited, but I know there are plenty Phosphate fertilizers out there you could likely safely dose if you haven't looked that route yet.

 

Also if your city water is high in phosphates, consider running just RO water - usually lots of algae-feeding ions in there.

 

Edit: I'm sure you researched basically everything, just like I did all those times, I'm just hoping unsolicited advice might bring up a prong of attack you happened to overlook or hadn't considered. I know you are awesome at this whole reefing thing, just trying to throw ideas out there. Even if it doesn't help you, maybe it'll help someone else out!

That's the problem with dino's, there are so many methods to trying to get them back to a dormant stage, finding what works is the issue.

 

I have no phos and my nitrates suddenly dropped too. They were sitting at 5-7, now 2.

 

The only thing done was a water change, purigen change, and I went away for a night and come back to everything closed with stringy crap showing up 

 

I have increased my feedings. 

 

From what I have read, chaeto doesn't really do much for this strain of dino's. 

 

Having biodiversity to out compete the dino's is what's worked for many.

Bacteria, phyto, pods. The more pods the better.

 

I have patience but I have limited options to get items and my main concern is the palytoxin that is in this strain of dino's. 

[Tamberav]

36 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

That's the problem with dino's, there are so many methods to trying to get them back to a dormant stage, finding what works is the issue.

 

I have no phos and my nitrates suddenly dropped too. They were sitting at 5-7, now 2.

 

The only thing done was a water change, purigen change, and I went away for a night and come back to everything closed with stringy crap showing up 

 

I have increased my feedings. 

 

From what I have read, chaeto doesn't really do much for this strain of dino's. 

 

Having biodiversity to out compete the dino's is what's worked for many.

Bacteria, phyto, pods. The more pods the better.

 

I have patience but I have limited options to get items and my main concern is the palytoxin that is in this strain of dino's. 

I wonder if the floss can catch it with some diy coral snow since you have no skimmer

[Clown79]

7 hours ago, Tamberav said:

I wonder if the floss can catch it with some diy coral snow since you have no skimmer

Do you have to have a skimmer with coral snow?

 

The articles I have been reading basically say lack of nutrients and biodiversity is the main cause for dino's to become an issue so adding phyto, microbacter7, and pods creates competition to the dino's.

 

 

I'm just trying to come up with a game plan before things get really bad. I also don't want to make things worse.

 

Adding pods and microbacter7 should be beneficial, I just want to get the right pods and these are apparently the only choices here. 

 

Just a lot to wrap my head around, being sick isn't helping. Lol.

 

 

 

 

[Tamberav]

I killed 90 percent in 4 days with aggressive turkey blasting....and Diy coral snow... Also one day black out from desperation to keep the coral alive since it goes into the water at night. 

 

My floss got pretty dirty but my skimmer turned black too with dino in it. I guess idk the effects of no skimmer.

 

I basically was doing manual removal this way. Nutrients did come up a bit too during this.

 

I have no pods to speak of... Wrasse eats them all.

[Clown79]

55 minutes ago, Tamberav said:

I killed 90 percent in 4 days with aggressive turkey blasting....and Diy coral snow... Also one day black out from desperation to keep the coral alive since it goes into the water at night. 

 

My floss got pretty dirty but my skimmer turned black too with dino in it. I guess idk the effects of no skimmer.

 

I basically was doing manual removal this way. Nutrients did come up a bit too during this.

 

I have no pods to speak of... Wrasse eats them all.

I've been sucking it out every day with a Turkey baster plus blasting it off the rocks.

 

Not going to do waterchanges, increase feedings to get phos up, change floss more frequently.

 

Then plan on the other items.

 

My worry about the palytoxin is for myself when removing the dino's via Turkey baster.

 

I wear gloves that cover my arms completely and clean kitchen sink after any tank water dumping/work with cleaners containing bleach. 

But there is always the worry via inhalation.

 

I read running a skimmer during dino outbreak wasn't beneficial for some and others it was.

 

Do you have a recipe for the diy coral snow?

[Tamberav]

33 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

I've been sucking it out every day with a Turkey baster plus blasting it off the rocks.

 

Not going to do waterchanges, increase feedings to get phos up, change floss more frequently.

 

Then plan on the other items.

 

My worry about the palytoxin is for myself when removing the dino's via Turkey baster.

 

I wear gloves that cover my arms completely and clean kitchen sink after any tank water dumping/work with cleaners containing bleach. 

But there is always the worry via inhalation.

 

I read running a skimmer during dino outbreak wasn't beneficial for some and others it was.

 

Do you have a recipe for the diy coral snow?

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/diy-kz-coral-snow-with-97-purity.211722/

 

 

[Tamberav]

Forgot to mention I also increased flow (in an already high flow tank).

[Aquatic Spendthrift]

Canada Copepods is good since it has a mix of diffrent types of pods.  I used it however, not to cure dio. Isnt the low nitrate/phosphate lvls due to the increase in dio. For my pico nitates are 0/less than 10(api) because algea consumes it so fast

[jservedio]

6 hours ago, Clown79 said:

I'm just trying to come up with a game plan before things get really bad. I also don't want to make things worse.

If you are lucky, your game plan will work and that'll be that. A huge problem is that there are at least 1500 species of marine dinoflagellates, and they know that's definitely not all of them - yet we as reefers just call them "dinos" and treat them the same. To make it worse, all of our water chemistries are wildly different and our biodiversities are just as varied.

 

You will almost certainly do something to make it worse at some point - don't let that stop you though. Throw every idea you have at them in order of least destructiveness to your tank and do your best to keep your chemistry balanced.

 

Coral Snow can't hurt to try, but it's basically a flocculent, so without a skimmer or a fine sock, which will clog in about 30 seconds with dinos in your tank, it's probably not going to be super effective.

[jservedio]

18 minutes ago, Aquatic Spendthrift said:

Isnt the low nitrate/phosphate lvls due to the increase in dio.

Yes it is - however, the idea is to keep tons of nutrients in the water column to allow other, easier to control, algaes, bacteria, and tiny critters to compete with it. The dinos are able to live with far fewer nutrients than other algaes can, so they are extremely good at taking over. It's generally easier to deal with in a mature tank, because there is more biodiversity there to compete with it. In a new tank with dry rock that has nothing there to compete with it....well, good luck.

 

In my previous cases, cyano was best able to out compete the species of dinos I had when nutrients got high enough. And, compared to dinos, cyano is extremely easy to control after the fact with basic husbandry.

[Clown79]

Not necessarily.

Dino's are ALWAYS in your tank, they are part of the ecosystem. They become an issue when conditions are unfavorable where biodiversity is lacking.

 

That's why getting them into a dormant stage is difficult because each system is different, therefore the line of attack is different.

 

In ulns, increasing nutrients attacks the dino's and in high nutrients system it's the opposite.

 

Balance is key.

 

My tank has seldomly had algae issues and I have never seen my phos high nor my nitrates, that's why I couldn't keep chaeto, I can barely keep dragons breath.

1 hour ago, Aquatic Spendthrift said:

Canada Copepods is good since it has a mix of diffrent types of pods.  I used it however, not to cure dio. Isnt the low nitrate/phosphate lvls due to the increase in dio. For my pico nitates are 0/less than 10(api) because algea consumes it so fast

 

[banasophia]

Sorry I don’t have time to read all the replies cuz I need to go get ready for work, but I wanted to chime in that I really like getting both Tigger Pods and Apex Pods from my LFSs from Reef Nutrition.... not sure if you can get those in Canada... I like that they seem to be pure cultures. I got a sh##ton of baby bristleworms when I got an order of chaeto with pods in it, so I would not go that route again personally. 

[Clown79]

43 minutes ago, banasophia said:

Sorry I don’t have time to read all the replies cuz I need to go get ready for work, but I wanted to chime in that I really like getting both Tigger Pods and Apex Pods from my LFSs from Reef Nutrition.... not sure if you can get those in Canada... I like that they seem to be pure cultures. I got a sh##ton of baby bristleworms when I got an order of chaeto with pods in it, so I would not go that route again personally. 

Thank you. I also prefer to go the clean method. 

 

[Aquatic Spendthrift]

Reef Nutrition Tigger-Pods Live Copepods can be orderd from canada corals this is whats in the one from canada copeodos : Tisbe copepods, Acartia, Parvocalanus, Pseudodiaptomus & Tigriopus (Tiger) L and S Type Rotifers Moina Salina 

[JBM]

Its a shame your not more local. A local guy i know cultivates tisbe all the time.

[Clown79]

2 hours ago, Aquatic Spendthrift said:

Reef Nutrition Tigger-Pods Live Copepods can be orderd from canada corals this is whats in the one from canada copeodos : Tisbe copepods, Acartia, Parvocalanus, Pseudodiaptomus & Tigriopus (Tiger) L and S Type Rotifers Moina Salina 

So the canada copepods gives more diversity! Sounds good.

 

Thank you for the info, I was going to email them to find out exactly what was in their zooplankton blend.

Much appreciated😁

 

1 hour ago, JBM said:

Its a shame your not more local. A local guy i know cultivates tisbe all the time.

I wish too. You guys have a lot more available to you.

 

I have to order from multiple places just to get the pods and then microbacter7. Shipping gets costly. Lol

 

[FLARGUE]

I had success with phosbond. I hear your phosphates can read zero, but that's just because they are being consumed. I also greatly reduced water changes to around 1x 10 days or 2 weeks.