Amphidinium dino confirmation

[MrMatt]

I'll try to get a better image and some video tomorrow. Just wanted confirmation that this dino is an Amphidinium sp.

 

photo taken at 400x magnification

 

They've been isolated to my sand bed.

 

Tank: 12gallon AIO

~2 months old (a baby)

No filtration, only running lights a return pump, a nero 3, heater and ATO with RO/DI water.

No recent water changes (several weeks)

Nitrates have been stable at 15ppm

PO4 is currently 0.12 (fighting to maintain)**

 

I can give more details if needed

 

**I've been fighting to keep phosphates up for about 2 weeks now, I wake up to an effective 0.0ppm and dose to 0.1. I recheck and re-dose several times a day but it been a challenge keeping them at a readable level.

[MrMatt]

Here is one more picture.

[MrMatt]

I wasn't able to get a good video yesterday but here is a poor quality video of them.

 

https://youtu.be/nrJc5wPSkd0

 

Thoughts

[mcarroll]

On 3/10/2021 at 5:42 PM, MrMatt said:

I've been fighting to keep phosphates up for about 2 weeks now, I wake up to an effective 0.0ppm and dose to 0.1. I recheck and re-dose several times a day but it been a challenge keeping them at a readable level.

In the midst of a dino bloom you're effectively starting your fight back at square one each time you find the PO4 level at zero.

 

Keep in mind that 0.10 is the minimum target, not a maximum – dose PO4 up to .2 or .3 (or more....but .2 will prolly do it) if that's what it takes to prevent it from dipping down past .1 before your next check/dose.

 

The relatively good news....

On 3/10/2021 at 6:15 PM, MrMatt said:

...is that you have LOTS MORE than dino's growing.  In fact they still appear to be outnumbered, at least going by your sample.

 

Check out my dino thread (on another forum) for more info on Ampidinium....they can be a bit of a headache sometimes:  Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

 

Can you post a pic of your tank?  How are you lighting it?  Do you know what caused phosphates to zero out?  (eg Too many water changes, too many nitrates leftover from cycling, etc)

[MrMatt]

5 hours ago, mcarroll said:

Keep in mind that 0.10 is the minimum target, not a maximum – dose PO4 up to .2 or .3 (or more....but .2 will prolly do it) if that's what it takes to prevent it from dipping down past .1 before your next check/dose.

I've been shooting for 0.15-0.18 but I'll aim for slightly above 0.20.

 

5 hours ago, mcarroll said:

Do you know what caused phosphates to zero out?

I've been dosing with NeoPhos and according to the instructions to raise my tank by 0.1ppm I would need approximately 5ml of solution. I've been dosing up to 27ml divided over a single day to maintain 0.1 (most recently this has been that extreme) so it is definitely being utilized somewhere. I have confirmed this with both a Salifert and Hanna tests giving similar results. The concentration will increase shortly after adding the solution but will diminish over 6 hours or so. I did do a large number of aggressive water changes during the cycle to reduce the ammonia in order to keep as many of the hitch hikers alive as possible which in my opinion was VERY successful, so I'm sure that prevented PO4 from gaining higher concentrations initially.

 

There is a little macro algae in the tank and some diatoms and GHA but nothing I would assume would be consuming that much PO4... Is PO4 absorbed by the rock/sand to become a source later? Is it possible the PO4 is going to an abotic sink?

 

5 hours ago, mcarroll said:

Check out my dino thread (on another forum) for more info on Ampidinium....they can be a bit of a headache sometimes:  Dinoflagellates – Are You Tired Of Battling Altogether?

I have looked at that thread, I appreciate the consolidation of the one topic. My understanding is Aphidinium ssp. do not enter the water column making UV less than helpful. Treatment includes increasing Nitrates and Phosphates to encourage other algae and bacteria to out compete them for both space and resources.  Mucus can be siphoned off the sand every few days and the water filtered through a fine filter sock before being replaced, or if fresh water is added to make sure the nitrate and phosphate levels are maintained.

 

I understand silica can be added to encourage a diatom bloom to directly compete with the dinos. I've been considering this any recommendations on what to use?

 

I've also read adding bottled bacteria and phytoplankton can help but I think my bacterial diversity is really good and I'm hesitant to mess with the currently communities by adding more.

5 hours ago, mcarroll said:

..is that you have LOTS MORE than dino's growing.  In fact they still appear to be outnumbered, at least going by your sample.

I agree, there is a bunch of competition in there, I just want to make sure to give the others the upper hand now. There are also an abundance of pods in the tank, there are all over the glass and swimming in the water column, I was even seeing a bunch of them under the scope when I was looking for a good dino photo.

(Anecdotal evidence that these dinos either are less toxic or haven't released toxins yet)

 

5 hours ago, mcarroll said:

Can you post a pic of your tank?  How are you lighting it?  

 

This picture is a bout a week old. Since then the dinos had spread to the entire sand bed and even remained overnight without lights.

 

The tank has an AI Prime HD do to constraints on the tank location the light is only about 7 inches off the water surface, I can give details on the lighting schedule if that would help.

 

 

 

I siphoned the dinos off last week and replaced the 1 gallon of water with fresh mix with Phosphates added to compensate.

 

As far as coral goes, there is a small GSP colony, a small zoanthid colony a sad looking ricordea and several starlet colonies that came on the rock. CUC consists of 4 small astrea snails, a small nassarius snail, a female emerald crab and a bunch of brittle stars that came in on the rock. There is also a large "magnificent feather duster", two small pistol shrimp and a tiny mantis (will be working out that situation later) there is a multitude of other hitchhikers as well...

 

The GSP is spreading, the zoanthids are multiplying, the ricordea is still sad, I have decent coraline algae growth on the back wall and rocks, other than the dinos things seem happy from my perspective, just a nutrient issue I imagine.

 

 

***Unrelated question, is there a way to embed a video rather than just inserting a link to one? Thanks.

 

[mcarroll]

1 hour ago, MrMatt said:

I did do a large number of aggressive water changes during the cycle to reduce the ammonia in order to keep as many of the hitch hikers alive as possible which in my opinion was VERY successful, so I'm sure that prevented PO4 from gaining higher concentrations initially.

Sorry for my lack of clarity....this was the answer I meant to ask for.

 

You're fine on the other stuff.  Algae growth is good – that's at least half of the object of all this dosing, to get a bloom (or multiple of them) of anything other than dino's since that seems to be what it takes to A) make the dino's relent and go back to being epiphytic autotrophs and B) get the tank back on track toward being coral dominated.  (You'll notice, if you read into my dino thread far enough, that folks have even experimented with diatom blooms for some specific cases.)

 

Green algae like you mentioned are part and parcel of that plan.   (Mostly due to their strong settlement abilities...followed by their edibility by herbivores (including your fingers).  Same as during a regular case of The Uglies in a new tank...which is more or less what you're wishing for here.  🤩

 

It's a neutral factor here IMO, but yes Aragonite is an excellent phosphate adsorbent....up there with GFO, only healthy for your system for the same reason it's health in natural reefs (I mean the corals grow it themselves, so it's really a "duh") because it keeps PO4 from being lost to water exchanges with the open ocean, giving the corals's holobiont (thus the coral too) another consistent (if small) phosphate source beyond what's available dissolved in the water.  Reef structures in the wild are MASSIVE phosphate sinks.  👍

 

1 hour ago, MrMatt said:

This picture is a bout a week old. Since then the dinos had spread to the entire sand bed and even remained overnight without lights.

Doesn't look too bad...and even if it appears to have spread, I think the fact that it's no longer acting like a dino bloom is an important clue.

 

Unless the microscope work is a pain for some reason, I'd keep taking samples under the scope in an attempt to monitor your progress.  Once there are only a low percentage of dino's it could be time to beef up your CUC. (a little of everything from pods up to snails, including your siphoning efforts) 

 

1 hour ago, MrMatt said:

The tank has an AI Prime HD do to constraints on the tank location the light is only about 7 inches off the water surface, I can give details on the lighting schedule if that would help.

As long as you're on a 12 hour schedule, with a color something like 20,000K, you're probably fine.  

 

7" mounting height gives you (thanks to the 90º lenses) a 7" coverage radius at the water surface.....which is probably a little higher than it needs to be.  Ideally, you should not be dumping light into the room NOR should you be lighting up the filter compartment/overflow sections.

 

I'm guessing (so obviously correct me if needed) on a 12 Gallon AIO that it's about 12" cubed overall, but with a 3-4" slice off of the back for a filter section that makes the display area a bit rectangular.

 

That would mean your most narrow dimension is probably more like 9".   So you'd want your Prime to be at around 4.5".  

 

Is that possible to try?

 

2 hours ago, MrMatt said:

***Unrelated question, is there a way to embed a video rather than just inserting a link to one? Thanks.

I don't think so, or at least I'm not aware of it.  

 

I YouTube and then post the link.  

 

Nano-reef's auto-embed feature works very well with the link and does a nice embed, so all I have to do is paste and I'm done.

 

So keep doing what you're doing, just MORE OF IT.  

 

IMO: Keep those PO4 bottom-outs from happening for at least a week and see if that's enough by itself.  Then take "stronger" or additional measures.

[mcarroll]

2 hours ago, MrMatt said:

I've been shooting for 0.15-0.18 but I'll aim for slightly above 0.20.

All that text and I forgot something...LOL

 

0.2 is a fine starting point, but remember there's no penalty for going over your target to .3 or even 1.0 ppm...the only real penalty is for letting it bottom out back to zero.