After Dino X treatment?

[Pwzimmermanjr]

Hey guys, I would like some assistance on steps to take after treating my 44 gal reef w/ fish aquarium with Dino X. The tank is fairly new (18months) and was doing fine before the Dino outbreak. I am beginning to see the Dino’s disappear as I have only performed 6 treatments thus far. It was a pretty nasty outbreak so I will finish the recommended full dosage of 10-15 treatments. I have assorted LPS and a few fish that have made it through the ordeal luckily, but am unsure of what to do next. Dose new bacteria? Copapods? The coralline algae has all but gone and I fear my good bacteria is as well. I’m concerned about going in the wrong direction and possibly making matters worse for my remaining livestock. Any and all suggestions will be appreciated!

 

[Daniel@R2R Verified Admin]

bump for help on this one

 

[DrMMI]

I'm not expert on this, but I'm currently on dose 9 of dino x with minimal results so far. I'm going to finish out the full 15 with hopes that the remaining doses do the trick. I was planning on dosing microbacter and getting some live rock from another tank to increase the microbial diversity afterwards. Maybe someone who's successfully completed the process can comment?

 

[Anchor]

I am looking to use Dino X myself. I am just curious as to what risks I am looking at for fish and corals..

 

[DrMMI]

I am looking to use Dino X myself. I am just curious as to what risks I am looking at for fish and corals..

My fish have been totally fine. My torch and some of my hammers aren't fully extending, but I'm not sure if that's because of the dino x or the reduced lighting schedule. I also saw one of my anemones eating my cleaner shrimp, so I'm not sure if the shrimp died near the anemone and it found itself an easy meal or if the anemone actually stung it and killed it.

 

[just4plaay]

Here's what I did after Dino X that seems to be working. Would like anyone from above to follow up with their current status and how they got there.

- Continue running short (4 hour) light schedule until Dino is no longer visible to naked eye
- Maintain phosphates at .05 but if they go higher let them come down on their own (No GFO!)
- Start a copepod culture and dose pods as often and heavy as possible (pods eat dino but it stops them from being able to reproduce)
- Dose Phyto every other day to feed the new pod tenants and hopefully get them reproducing faster than the Dino
- Turn off UV to prevent sterilizing copepods, if water gets soupy run UV as needed but no longer than needed (trying to let copepods and good bacteria build)

I'm currently 3 weeks after Dino X treatment stopped after 8 doses because tank looked clean) and just sent in an ICP test to see where everything is at. The coral is starting to extend polyps again and even my hammers that got very beat up are looking much better. Dino is completely gone to the naked eye although under a microscope I can still see free floaters here and there. Prior to treatment it would cover all of my rocks within 3 days of cleaning them so something is holding them back now. So much is talked about how to get rid of Dino and very Little seems to get talked about after treatment. My belief is that as treatment finishes it is a requirement to dose pods extremely heavy, feed them with phyto and maintain elevated nutrients.

A part of me would go one step further and say that had I been dosing copepods and phyto in the beginning the dino may never have taken hold. I can't say for sure if that would have worked though.

 

[DrMMI]

Here's what I did after Dino X that seems to be working. Would like anyone from above to follow up with their current status and how they got there.

- Continue running short (4 hour) light schedule until Dino is no longer visible to naked eye
- Maintain phosphates at .05 but if they go higher let them come down on their own (No GFO!)
- Start a copepod culture and dose pods as often and heavy as possible (pods eat dino but it stops them from being able to reproduce)
- Dose Phyto every other day to feed the new pod tenants and hopefully get them reproducing faster than the Dino
- Turn off UV to prevent sterilizing copepods, if water gets soupy run UV as needed but no longer than needed (trying to let copepods and good bacteria build)

I'm currently 3 weeks after Dino X treatment stopped after 8 doses because tank looked clean) and just sent in an ICP test to see where everything is at. The coral is starting to extend polyps again and even my hammers that got very beat up are looking much better. Dino is completely gone to the naked eye although under a microscope I can still see free floaters here and there. Prior to treatment it would cover all of my rocks within 3 days of cleaning them so something is holding them back now. So much is talked about how to get rid of Dino and very Little seems to get talked about after treatment. My belief is that as treatment finishes it is a requirement to dose pods extremely heavy, feed them with phyto and maintain elevated nutrients.

A part of me would go one step further and say that had I been dosing copepods and phyto in the beginning the dino may never have taken hold. I can't say for sure if that would have worked though.

Glad to see that dino x worked for you. Unfortunately, it didn't help me at all. In fact, I ended up losing my torch and all my SPS corals, but I think it was because I was overdosing it. The starting recommended dose didn't do anything so I kept upping the dose. Most of my other corals, including my hammers, recovered. I still have a few hammer branches that lost their polyps. In the end, what ended up working for me was elegant corals dino treatment and introducing about 40 pounds of live rock from an established reef that was covered in gha to outcompete the dinos. I also accidentally raised my nitrates to over 100 (reefbot was giving me the wrong value). So I agree that the combination of raising nutrients, introducing competition, and increasing biodiversity are the best ways to tackle this issue.

 

[just4plaay]

Glad to see that dino x worked for you. Unfortunately, it didn't help me at all. In fact, I ended up losing my torch and all my SPS corals, but I think it was because I was overdosing it. The starting recommended dose didn't do anything so I kept upping the dose. Most of my other corals, including my hammers, recovered. I still have a few hammer branches that lost their polyps. In the end, what ended up working for me was elegant corals dino treatment and introducing about 40 pounds of live rock from an established reef that was covered in gha to outcompete the dinos. I also accidentally raised my nitrates to over 100 (reefbot was giving me the wrong value). So I agree that the combination of raising nutrients, introducing competition, and increasing biodiversity are the best ways to tackle this issue.

The treatment itself is a totally separate topic. Like you I tried many different treatments before finding one that worked on my strain of Dino, which for me was Dino X. My response is more about what to do once you've found a treatment that works on your strain of Dino. Treatments I tried included H2O2, blackouts, UV, Vibrant, and manual removal. Wish I had started with the one that worked because I lost some SPS in the process of finding something that worked.