Dino strategy

[Back where it all began]

Hi, in another thread, I've mentioned that I have dinos in a high nutrient tank. Sorry will post numbers soon. I've been using h202 and stirring up the sand, blowing off rocks etc and catching the material for removal. I purchased a uv sterilizer but it won't arrive for several days.
Here's the thought. Do I continue to do the above, or just let the dinos be where they are until the uv arrives.
Any other information is appreciated.
I believe I created this when I overdosed vibrant by not correctly calculating water column volume. Almost no algae equals new dinos?

 

[Big G]

bump

 

[Birddog]

Hi, in another thread, I've mentioned that I have dinos in a high nutrient tank. Sorry will post numbers soon. I've been using h202 and stirring up the sand, blowing off rocks etc and catching the material for removal. I purchased a uv sterilizer but it won't arrive for several days.
Here's the thought. Do I continue to do the above, or just let the dinos be where they are until the uv arrives.
Any other information is appreciated.
I believe I created this when I overdosed vibrant by not correctly calculating water column volume. Almost no algae equals new dinos?

My experience with dinos and personal thoughts revolve around biodiversity. Several years ago when I started my current reef I started with dry rock. Dinos took a little while to show up, but I battled them with peroxide, bleach dosing, vibrant, three day black outs... gosh you name it I tried it. What I believed solved the problem for me was introducing as much micro biodiversity that I possibly could including live phyto and various pods on a regular basis. It appeared to me as soon as I had competition in the water column and substrate the dinos disappeared quite quickly.

 

[Back where it all began]

That's a great idea. After all, the ocean is diverse to say the least. Seems like a lot of reefers use algae barn.

 

[CuzzA]

Having a bit of experience and recently setting up a new tank I anticipated various uglies popping up like they always do. I agree bio diversity is key and having more "stuff" competing for real estate keeps one particular species from taking over. This is probably a newer phenomenon since many people use dry rock.

With that said I can tell you how I have basically prevented the uglies from happening for a few different builds. First, I use GFO and GAC the moment the tank gets turned on. Every tank gets a UV sterilizer as well. I dose Bio Spira at first. I add wild seed rock and take a small coraline covered rock and scrape it all over my rock work. Within weeks I will have coralline algae popping up.

When nitrates are detectable I add a very very small amount of bio pellets to a reactor. I'm talking small, I count out the number of pellets. I usually get a very thin layer of visible bacteria on my rocks, mostly in lower flow areas. If it gets to be too much I'll cut the flow back or take it off line all together. Never close a reactor for an extended period of time.

Next I use a simple aquarium vacuum and tooth brush zip tied on to a fiberglass rod and a 1 micron filter bag. This is probably the most effective tool at removing anything from the tank.

I vacuum the sand bed fully every week with the gravity vac going into the filter bag in my skimmer section. Doing it during a water change would be ideal, but I don't like big water changes and usually the vacuuming process consumes too much water so the filter is necessary. This has two benefits. It pulls detritus and various dinos, diatoms, cyano and algaes and it also pulls the residual cloudy dust from new live sand. If I see bubble algae, I'll scrape with precision the bubble right off at the base with the vac tube and into the filter bag it goes. If rocks have unwanted growth spots I'll use the vac and the tooth brush tool and again, everything ends up in the bag.

Staying on top of this buys time for the tank to stabilize, bio diversity to spread and assuming you are keeping up with everything else and the system is designed properly I have never experienced any sort of imbalance that has allowed anything to take over, and eventually I can stop doing the uglies preventative maintenance.

Here's the vac and bag I use. I think h2o2 dosing will help with this routine as well. I've done this three times and never had any nuisance pest issues.



Here's my current tank. Just over three months old. Not a spec of any nuisance. They all got yanked quickly before they had a chance.

 

[Back where it all began]

Having a bit of experience and recently setting up a new tank I anticipated various uglies popping up like they always do. I agree bio diversity is key and having more "stuff" competing for real estate keeps one particular species from taking over. This is probably a newer phenomenon since many people use dry rock.

With that said I can tell you how I have basically prevented the uglies from happening for a few different builds. First, I use GFO and GAC the moment the tank gets turned on. Every tank gets a UV sterilizer as well. I dose Bio Spira at first. I add wild seed rock and take a small coraline covered rock and scrape it all over my rock work. Within weeks I will have coralline algae popping up.

When nitrates are detectable I add a very very small amount of bio pellets to a reactor. I'm talking small, I count out the number of pellets. I usually get a very thin layer of visible bacteria on my rocks, mostly in lower flow areas. If it gets to be too much I'll cut the flow back or take it off line all together. Never close a reactor for an extended period of time.

Next I use a simple aquarium vacuum and tooth brush zip tied on to a fiberglass rod and a 1 micron filter bag. This is probably the most effective tool at removing anything from the tank.

I vacuum the sand bed fully every week with the gravity vac going into the filter bag in my skimmer section. Doing it during a water change would be ideal, but I don't like big water changes and usually the vacuuming process consumes too much water so the filter is necessary. This has two benefits. It pulls detritus and various dinos, diatoms, cyano and algaes and it also pulls the residual cloudy dust from new live sand. If I see bubble algae, I'll scrape with precision the bubble right off at the base with the vac tube and into the filter bag it goes. If rocks have unwanted growth spots I'll use the vac and the tooth brush tool and again, everything ends up in the bag.

Staying on top of this buys time for the tank to stabilize, bio diversity to spread and assuming you are keeping up with everything else and the system is designed properly I have never experienced any sort of imbalance that has allowed anything to take over, and eventually I can stop doing the uglies preventative maintenance.

Here's the vac and bag I use. I think h2o2 dosing will help with this routine as well. I've done this three times and never had any nuisance pest issues.



Here's my current tank. Just over three months old. Not a spec of any nuisance. They all got yanked quickly before they had a chance.

That vac setup is nice! I just started using a python type of device, but it draws too much water in addition to the Dino. So I end up making a larger water change than I would like. That makes the water too clean and here we go again. I like your build, very cool.