DenverSaltyFarm
Well-Known Member
Well over a year and I finally found out what I have Dino’s!! I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy’s tank. This all started a year ago beginner reefer had a 25 gallon tank that had. I bought some coral frags from a local show and my nightmare began.
I always dip my frags in coral Rx and does a great job killing bugs it does not kill Dino’s. After about a week of placing frags into tank I got what I thought was brown algae I religiously did weekly water changes scraping the brown algae off only to have it come back a day later in full effect. I thought my tank was just a dirty tank and this is what I would live with.
My corals had the colors but did not extend very well or grow a whole lot, but they were alive and still had colors. I eventually upgraded to my current tank a 125 gallon and went all out with the equipment. I seeded the tank with a big chunk of rock “big mistake” and seeded my tank with a healthy dose of Dino’s from my old tank. I thought I was getting new tank syndrome and brown diatoms, but found a pic of Dino’s I knew this was the plague I had. I looked under microscope and sure enough this is what I have.
TREATMENT,
I tried what I feel like is everything. Dirty tank method, blackouts, manual removal, uv sterilizer, clean tank method and nothing was working. I finally switched to hydrogen peroxide 1ml to every 10 gallons and thought hell ya I’m finally killing them by knocking the outbreak down by half then a complete stall happened they slowly started to spread again so I upped my dose to 3ml every 10 gallons and nothing got better. The dosing all happened at night where they are supposedly free swimming and still not working. I also tried scraping everything in my tank trying to get it all in the water column and then heavy h2o2 dose thinking I would wipe them out but started growing all over again. This strain of Dino’s puts a nasty smell in the water that I can guarantee is toxic. I read that Dino’s when attacked can form a cyst and protect itself from treatments which I feel happened. At this point I have 5 corals and 3 fish and ready to break everything down to get out of the hobby, I read the risky treatment of using bleach. People say there is no escaping bleach for Dino’s you just have to hope you don’t lose livestock. I’m just about 4 days in and finally see an end to this nightmare. I did however lose 2 small fish but everything else seems to be doing fine. The horrible smell in the water column is gone for a first time and everything is opening up again. I will have to reseed my bacteria and pods when I’m done treating the tank but well worth it to get this cured.
I just wanted to share my story in hopes of keeping someone ready to pull the plug on everything to give the bleach method a shot if you got nothing to lose (your last resort), you will get through the battle. I think I have the worst type of Dino’s possible that nothing could kill
From now on every piece of coral I buy gets a bleach dip. This was a hard lesson learned and something I hope you all don’t have to go through
I always dip my frags in coral Rx and does a great job killing bugs it does not kill Dino’s. After about a week of placing frags into tank I got what I thought was brown algae I religiously did weekly water changes scraping the brown algae off only to have it come back a day later in full effect. I thought my tank was just a dirty tank and this is what I would live with.
My corals had the colors but did not extend very well or grow a whole lot, but they were alive and still had colors. I eventually upgraded to my current tank a 125 gallon and went all out with the equipment. I seeded the tank with a big chunk of rock “big mistake” and seeded my tank with a healthy dose of Dino’s from my old tank. I thought I was getting new tank syndrome and brown diatoms, but found a pic of Dino’s I knew this was the plague I had. I looked under microscope and sure enough this is what I have.
TREATMENT,
I tried what I feel like is everything. Dirty tank method, blackouts, manual removal, uv sterilizer, clean tank method and nothing was working. I finally switched to hydrogen peroxide 1ml to every 10 gallons and thought hell ya I’m finally killing them by knocking the outbreak down by half then a complete stall happened they slowly started to spread again so I upped my dose to 3ml every 10 gallons and nothing got better. The dosing all happened at night where they are supposedly free swimming and still not working. I also tried scraping everything in my tank trying to get it all in the water column and then heavy h2o2 dose thinking I would wipe them out but started growing all over again. This strain of Dino’s puts a nasty smell in the water that I can guarantee is toxic. I read that Dino’s when attacked can form a cyst and protect itself from treatments which I feel happened. At this point I have 5 corals and 3 fish and ready to break everything down to get out of the hobby, I read the risky treatment of using bleach. People say there is no escaping bleach for Dino’s you just have to hope you don’t lose livestock. I’m just about 4 days in and finally see an end to this nightmare. I did however lose 2 small fish but everything else seems to be doing fine. The horrible smell in the water column is gone for a first time and everything is opening up again. I will have to reseed my bacteria and pods when I’m done treating the tank but well worth it to get this cured.
I just wanted to share my story in hopes of keeping someone ready to pull the plug on everything to give the bleach method a shot if you got nothing to lose (your last resort), you will get through the battle. I think I have the worst type of Dino’s possible that nothing could kill
From now on every piece of coral I buy gets a bleach dip. This was a hard lesson learned and something I hope you all don’t have to go through
