After chemiclean Dino or more cyano

[JsLevine]

Is your sand brownish color? If so that means to back off the zeobak I’ve noticed that’s one side effect with it if you dose to much.. I add about 20 drops a week in 300 gallons

Might have hit the nail on the head with that one I used zeobak a day before it took off

 

[Troylee]

Nope they stay there all night I have a uv sterilizer directly plumbed into the return already

Hmmmm… gonna need to get a I’d under a microscope then.. really hard to say without it because both diatoms and dinos normally fade away at night.

 

[slingfox]

Hmmmm… gonna need to get a I’d under a microscope then.. really hard to say without it because both diatoms and dinos normally fade away at night.

@Troylee Not sure if you missed my post above but could you let us know what kind of sand you use in your tank? Beautiful setup!

 

[Readywriter]

"I decided to try..." should be on a reefing shirt.

 

[Mikeltee]

With a 2.5year battle with coolia and a 3 month battle with LCA, I have learned a little about dinos. I don't see any bubbles, so I'm going to take a guess that it is cyano, but being a low nutrient tank and only 6 months uoung, you are very lucky that it's only cyano. You need to start testing weekly with Hanna checkers and get yout nutrients up. I'd wager that the main cause of the cyano is not enough flow on the sand bed. Adjust your flow accordingly and don't use chemiclean. What I do and suggest you do the same is a weekly dose of Coral Snow (Calcium carbonate) mixed with the recommended dose of Microbacter7. This has been shown to be a better cure for cyano. I mix it up real good, blow off all of my rock with the return off, and after 5 minutes of shaking, dose. Let it circulate for a couple hours and then turn your return on. On the day that you do this, use a 5u filter sock. It should be full within 24 hours. Change back to your 200u filter sock at this point. Using this method keeps my cyano at a reasonable level and helps to outcompete the dinos. Once your rock is covered in coralline and nutrients in check, you are safe to use chemiclean although if you fix your flow and get nutrients in check, you shouldn't get cyano.

 

[Troylee]

@Troylee Not sure if you missed my post above but could you let us know what kind of sand you use in your tank? Beautiful setup!

It’s caribsea reef grade sand.. and thank you!

 

[JsLevine]

@Troylee Not sure if you missed my post above but could you let us know what kind of sand you use in your tank? Beautiful setup!

With a 2.5year battle with coolia and a 3 month battle with LCA, I have learned a little about dinos. I don't see any bubbles, so I'm going to take a guess that it is cyano, but being a low nutrient tank and only 6 months uoung, you are very lucky that it's only cyano. You need to start testing weekly with Hanna checkers and get yout nutrients up. I'd wager that the main cause of the cyano is not enough flow on the sand bed. Adjust your flow accordingly and don't use chemiclean. What I do and suggest you do the same is a weekly dose of Coral Snow (Calcium carbonate) mixed with the recommended dose of Microbacter7. This has been shown to be a better cure for cyano. I mix it up real good, blow off all of my rock with the return off, and after 5 minutes of shaking, dose. Let it circulate for a couple hours and then turn your return on. On the day that you do this, use a 5u filter sock. It should be full within 24 hours. Change back to your 200u filter sock at this point. Using this method keeps my cyano at a reasonable level and helps to outcompete the dinos. Once your rock is covered in coralline and nutrients in check, you are safe to use chemiclean although if you fix your flow and get nutrients in check, you shouldn't get cyano.

Okay so no more chemiclean I have coral snow and have been using it once a week and I have microbactor 7 as well. The flow is a tricky bit given that I think I did a big rock pattern for such a small tank I think for that I will have to get a 3rd pump my reef wave is set high already and if I turn it up anymore it will just move sand like crazy to the one side of the tank

 

[Macbalacano]

I had the reverse. My nutrients bottomed out and I got Dinos. I did a few things and ended up getting rid of the Dinos. But then I got hit with really bad cyano. I ended up using Chemiclean. It worked great.

If it were me, I would try to keep phosphates around 0.05 - 0.10, especially if you are trying to keep nitrates that high. I think that will help you to keep the dinos and cyano at bay.

 

[JsLevine]

I had the reverse. My nutrients bottomed out and I got Dinos. I did a few things and ended up getting rid of the Dinos. But then I got hit with really bad cyano. I ended up using Chemiclean. It worked great.

If it were me, I would try to keep phosphates around 0.05 - 0.10, especially if you are trying to keep nitrates that high. I think that will help you to keep the dinos and cyano at bay.

Well I’m going to try and lower the nitrates but I was going to try and target that phosphate range I got some neo phos because I’m assuming the 0.01 I tested for is really just 0 because the Hannah tester has a range of accuracy so im going to try to raise it to at least 0.05 and get the nitrates down closer to 10ppm

 

[Macbalacano]

Well I’m going to try and lower the nitrates but I was going to try and target that phosphate range I got some neo phos because I’m assuming the 0.01 I tested for is really just 0 because the Hannah tester has a range of accuracy so im going to try to raise it to at least 0.05 and get the nitrates down closer to 10ppm

Yes, I use Hannah tester as well and part of the challenge if you are getting less that 0.05 is that I believe that is within the margin of error. So if you are testing between 0.05-0.10, then I think it is safe to say you actually have a low detectable level of phosphates. I do think it is possible that sometimes we get a test result below 0.05 and that we may actually be pretty close or at 0.00.

 

[JsLevine]

Just to close this one out. Raised po4 to 0.10 nitrates to 15ppm and let the sand sifting cuc do all the work and I stoped doing water changes for a few weeks and bam all gone.