Mass invertebrate die off after blackout

[kmanuele]

Hello,

I did a three day blackout this week to tackle a Dino outbreak.

It seems like a good portion of the microfauna of my tank have all died at once. There are literally piles of dead polychaetes, amphipods and snails. Every stomatella and limpet in my tank seems to have died. The water is cloudy.

The only populations that seem to the done well are the asterinas, which seem to have exploded in number, and ostracods, of which there are little swarms of everywhere. My corals seem to be ok, besides a mushroom and a Kenya tree which have died. My Xenia’s look rough but I think they’ll recover.

Any idea what might have happened? I’m extremely confused

 

[FishPureLuck]

The dying algae probably consumed all of the oxygen and killed everything.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

Why would you take this course of action? How old is aquriam please, did you at least use chemicals (I'm against using chemicals in my aquriam) but I would definitely use before... last resort of a blackout? How bad was your aquarium? Do you have any pictures.
Was it a controlled blackout or basically turn everything off?
Thanks

 

[kmanuele]

Why would you take this course of action? How old is aquriam please, did you at least use chemicals (I'm against using chemicals in my aquriam) but I would definitely use before... last resort of a blackout? How bad was your aquarium? Do you have any pictures.
Was it a controlled blackout or basically turn everything off?
Thanks

I’ve been pretty desperate to get rid of the dinos. I was under the impression that a three day blackout was a relatively safe and normal course of action, but maybe I was misinformed.
I turned all the lights off and covered my with a cardboard box.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

I’ve been pretty desperate to get rid of the dinos. I was under the impression that a three day blackout was a relatively safe and normal course of action, but maybe I was misinformed.
I turned all the lights off and covered my with a cardboard box.

you covered the tank with a cardboard box for 3 days? How could the tank be oxyginated? Do you have a skimmer?

 

[Rick's Reviews]

You know reef2reef community is free, full of knowledgeable people and has a large library of posts that you can read up on, especially Dino outbreaks. you should use to ask question before taking any other drastic course of action
However, as you have alot of dead in your aquarium I would start removing all as this may cause an ammonia spike also I would do alot more water changes to help avoid this.
What has actually survived in your aquarium?

 

[kmanuele]

you covered the tank with a cardboard box for 3 days? How could the tank be oxyginated? Do you have a skimmer?

I taped a bunch of carddboard sheets together to create a big enclosure. I assumed with all the cracks between the cardboard, the low bioload in my tank wouldn't be able to use all the oxygen. Clearly I was wrong.
Here's what I didn't consider and what I'm thinking happened- all the culpera in my tank was probably respirating the whole time, stripping oxygen out of the water and converting it to CO2.

You know reef2reef community is free, full of knowledgeable people and has a large library of posts that you can read up on, especially Dino outbreaks. you should use to ask question before taking any other drastic course of action
However, as you have alot of dead in your aquarium I would start removing all as this may cause an ammonia spike also I would do alot more water changes to help avoid this.
What has actually survived in your aquarium?

My decision to do a blackout was based off of reading through lots of threads about Dinos. Again, it seems like something people commonly advise on this forum. I understand that I settled on the wrong course of action, but I think you're being a little uncharitable in assuming I did zero research.
For example, this guide advocates for wrapping the tank in cardboard for a few days: https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/a-dinoflagellate-treatment-guide.841/

Still living- gsps, yellow star polyps, clove polyps, zoas/palys, most of the smaller mushrooms, xenias. Asterinas, some snails, some bristleworms, and some pods. I'm going to do several big waterchanges today and try to remove as much of the dead stuff as possible.

 

[damsels are not mean]

Sounds like oxygen to me as well, do you have fish? Fish would be the first to go in poor oxygen.

 

[kmanuele]

Sounds like oxygen to me as well, do you have fish? Fish would be the first to go in poor oxygen.

No fish, only corals

 

[damsels are not mean]

No fish, only corals

Then I have to say this is exactly what I would expect to see in an oxygen depletion situation. A lot of blackouts and chemical solutions to various problems will often say to increase flow and surface disturbance or add airstones to prevent this as any mass dieoff is going to use a lot of oxygen. It's unfortunate this happened but hopefully it's a lesson.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

I taped a bunch of carddboard sheets together to create a big enclosure. I assumed with all the cracks between the cardboard, the low bioload in my tank wouldn't be able to use all the oxygen. Clearly I was wrong.
Here's what I didn't consider and what I'm thinking happened- all the culpera in my tank was probably respirating the whole time, stripping oxygen out of the water and converting it to CO2.


My decision to do a blackout was based off of reading through lots of threads about Dinos. Again, it seems like something people commonly advise on this forum. I understand that I settled on the wrong course of action, but I think you're being a little uncharitable in assuming I did zero research.
For example, this guide advocates for wrapping the tank in cardboard for a few days: https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/a-dinoflagellate-treatment-guide.841/

Still living- gsps, yellow star polyps, clove polyps, zoas/palys, most of the smaller mushrooms, xenias. Asterinas, some snails, some bristleworms, and some pods. I'm going to do several big waterchanges today and try to remove as much of the dead stuff as possible.

I apologise if I come across that way but honestly it's not my intention. your previous posts suggest only small amount of questions in regards to Dino outbreak so I just assume you have not really asked how to manage this.

Thread 'Dinos with high phosphate?' https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/dinos-with-high-phosphate.948237/

This was a very recent post about your problem

I apologize again