Recommended Phosphate and Nitrate parameters for Dino Battle?

[Ober_Reef]

Hello Everyone,

I’m finally registering nitrates when I test and I am wondering what the “elevated” nutrient levels should be to fight Dinos. I currently show 3.1 in nitrates and .02 phosphates. So far I have skipped two weekly water changes, stopped skimming, dosed Dr Tim’s, and started dosing NeoNitro and NeoPhos.

Thanks for any advice !

 

[Billldg]

Hello Everyone,

I’m finally registering nitrates when I test and I am wondering what the “elevated” nutrient levels should be to fight Dinos. I currently show 3.1 in nitrates and .02 phosphates. So far I have skipped two weekly water changes, stopped skimming, dosed Dr Tim’s, and started dosing NeoNitro and NeoPhos.

Thanks for any advice !

I would get it to 10 N03 and .08 P04. Its not because you need a specific level, its to make sure you take into account the margin of error. If you are within the margin of error of the test kits you still may be a 0. I am also battling dino's and trying to raise my N03 and P04 on a 225 gal tank...YEA...and I am having to almost dump a bottle of NeoNitro and NeoPhos into my tank daily, along with feeding extremely heavy, and cutting off all filtration short of my sump socks.

Remember, when battling Dino's, it is never a sprint, it is always a marathon.

 

[Ober_Reef]

I would get it to 10 N03 and .08 P04. Its not because you need a specific level, its to make sure you take into account the margin of error. If you are within the margin of error of the test kits you still may be a 0. I am also battling dino's and trying to raise my N03 and P04 on a 225 gal tank...YEA...and I am having almost dump a bottle of NeoNitro and NeoPhos into my tank daily, along with feeding extremely heavy, and cutting off all filtration short of my sump socks.

Remember, when battling Dino's, it is never a sprint, it is always a marathon.

Thanks for your response, yeah that’s definitely something I will have to keep in mind when I go bigger in a couple years. Any idea at what point I would start skimming and or doing water changes again? I would assume starting slow trying to maintain those nitrate and phosphate levels but when do things go back to a new normal ? After I stop seeing Dinos for a couple weeks…. months? Obviously I am always going to run a little bit of a dirtier tank from now on to prevent this from happening again but also want to avoid other nuisance algae’s too. Such a fine line we need to walk in this hobby!

 

[Billldg]

Thanks for your response, yeah that’s definitely something I will have to keep in mind when I go bigger in a couple years. Any idea at what point I would start skimming and or doing water changes again? I would assume starting slow trying to maintain those nitrate and phosphate levels but when do things go back to a new normal ? After I stop seeing Dinos for a couple weeks…. months? Obviously I am always going to run a little bit of a dirtier tank from now on to prevent this from happening again but also want to avoid other nuisance algae’s too. Such a fine line we need to walk in this hobby!

I never turned off my skimmer, I just pulled the plug and dump it back into the tank. The oxygen that the skimmer provides is a plus. Once you start to see green algae growing in your tank, then you can start to do water changes. I can't give you an answer on when things go back to normal as every tank is different. You just have to play by ear and just see what your tank is doing. It is definitely a fine line in this hobby, but I learned that once you hit that line, it is easy to maintain. ITs all about balance in a saltwater tank.

 

[paul01609]

Also dose phyto

 

[Ober_Reef]

I never turned off my skimmer, I just pulled the plug and dump it back into the tank. The oxygen that the skimmer provides is a plus. Once you start to see green algae growing in your tank, then you can start to do water changes. I can't give you an answer on when things go back to normal as every tank is different. You just have to play by ear and just see what your tank is doing. It is definitely a fine line in this hobby, but I learned that once you hit that line, it is easy to maintain. ITs all about balance in a saltwater tank.

I think I may turn my skimmer back on as well, I have a hydros XS and smart power strip that I will be getting set up. Maybe I can tune the skimming that way.

 

[Ober_Reef]

Also dose phyto

I forgot to mention I have been dosing phyto from algae barn as well.

 

[paul01609]

It’s going to take time I battled mine for a long time,I raised nitrate phosphate and added a uv.
didn’t go overnight took a few months but in the end I won

 

[Saltyanimals]

I see that folks are starting at near zero/zero and thus talking about dosing both phos and nitrate. I'm experiencing near zero nitrate (red sea pro) and about to start dosing Neonitrate. However my Phos are already on the higher end 0.15 (Hanna) so not needing to dose this manually. But I don't see many people having one or the other with dino. they seem to come around when it's near zero/zero. Strange for my tank. I do heavily feed and that may be leading to the phos, but then why isn't my nitrate going up as well.

Anyone else have this same problem?

 

[Ober_Reef]

I see that folks are starting at near zero/zero and thus talking about dosing both phos and nitrate. I'm experiencing near zero nitrate (red sea pro) and about to start dosing Neonitrate. However my Phos are already on the higher end 0.15 (Hanna) so not needing to dose this manually. But I don't see many people having one or the other with dino. they seem to come around when it's near zero/zero. Strange for my tank. I do heavily feed and that may be leading to the phos, but then why isn't my nitrate going up as well.

Anyone else have this same problem?

Unfortunately I was pretty darn close to zero on both most of the time and had a hard time bringing mine up. Hopefully someone else can chirp in for you here.

 

[BroccoliFarmer]

I see that folks are starting at near zero/zero and thus talking about dosing both phos and nitrate. I'm experiencing near zero nitrate (red sea pro) and about to start dosing Neonitrate. However my Phos are already on the higher end 0.15 (Hanna) so not needing to dose this manually. But I don't see many people having one or the other with dino. they seem to come around when it's near zero/zero. Strange for my tank. I do heavily feed and that may be leading to the phos, but then why isn't my nitrate going up as well.

Anyone else have this same problem?

Cheato consumes nitrates faster than phosphates. I had to dose nitrates to get my phosphates down.

 

[Saltyanimals]

Cheato consumes nitrates faster than phosphates. I had to dose nitrates to get my phosphates down.

I’ve heard that a few times. I just ran out and bought neonitro and dosed to a 2ppm target. Want it near the 5 range, but will continue until I get there. Let’s see if I have the same experience with that phos coming down. I haven’t done gfo in years, but loaded a little of that in as well.
Microbacter7 will prob get in these in a couple days to increase bact to hopefully help naturally consume. Thanks!

 

[Ober_Reef]

I really planned on being patient and riding it out but today has been a rough day. I’m back to work after paternity leave so I don’t have as much time for daily scrubbing. I hit my frogspawn with my brush and pulled some tentacles off and also knocked a montipora frag off my rock. Dinos seemed as bad as ever and even look like they are growing on my mp40 and wall. Just ordered a microscope off Amazon that said it would be delivered by today so I’m hoping to ID these Dinos and go at them harder.

 

[Saltyanimals]

GFO went in 3 days ago and extremely surprised how fast it works. phos from 0.19 to 0.05 which I’m leaving in place for a couple more days to see if I’ll get to 0.03. I understand GFO exhaust quickly as first bc of the count of phos it bind so probably mostly gone anyways. However nitrate barely budged. 0.25 to 0.50 which the dosing should have raised it 2ppm. Prob takes a few more times to get it in line.

 

[capt.dave]

Caveat: I am in the critical stages of a massive Dino battle in a mature tank. I have not won but I have researched. So take this for what it’s worth.

Over the last 8 months, I have oscillated between algae, cyano, and dinos and the dinos are currently winning. Badly. I’ve lost most of my coral colonies, including some that have grown in my tank for more than 5 years. Heartbreaking to say the least.

What I have learned from the experience and extensive research:

1. Everything alive wants to live and will fight to the death to do so. That seems obvious when you write it but it’s easily forgotten when you look at your beautiful coral covered with ugly dinos and wonder why nothing works. Why won’t the dinos die and stay dead? They're ugly!
2. Number 1 applies to even a single cell.
3. Every tank with animals, plants, and water from the ocean has autotrophic (denitrifying) bacteria, heterotrophic (scavenging) bacteria, cyano, diatoms, dinos, parasitic organisms, pods, etc., worms, etc., other things, etc. that all live by numbers 1 and 2.
4. Every organism has evolved to thrive within its niche.
5. None of them care what we want.

Understanding 1-5 above, we can then understand that most, if not all, pest problems in our tanks are a result of an unwanted organism outcompeting a wanted organism.

So leverage #4 and shift the niche.

Dinos are both photosynthetic and heterotrophic. They get energy from light and from other organisms they “eat.” That makes them particularly hard to eradicate. You can certainly kill all you can see but they come back. Forget starving them out. They’ll be the last to lose. The prevailing theory is to support heterotrophic organisms that don’t trash our tanks. In other words, trade good bacteria for bad and make a niche environment that sustains the good. That last part is often overlooked

Tomorrow, I am going to launch a new campaign in my tank. It will take time and more patience than I have. It’s the Elegant Corals protocol (Google it, it’s on reef2reef and Facebook). I’m confident it works in the short term because it shifts the environment to favor autotrophic and heterotrophic bacteria and fills the environment with them so they can out complete. Reading the threads it looks like a lot of people have early success only to see the dinos or algea, or cyano resurge stronger than ever. Nature abhors a vacuum, so that is to be expected. The key is once you are winning, shift the environment again to favor what you don’t hate.

I am really hoping to find that people lose because they quit when they appear to win and the dinos appear to be gone rather than recognizing that the dinos are never (never) really gone and they need to now cultivate something beneficial to take their place and keep them in check. That’s phase 2 of the Elegant Corals protocol where you are deliberately cultivating good heterotrophic and autotrophic bacteria in sufficient numbers to outcompete the dinos and hold them in check. Look it up. From the forums and the Facebook support group it seems few know about Phaes 2. I selfishly hope that’s true. If so, it gives me hope for a big win.

Remember 1-5 above and good luck to us all!

 

[Dkmoo]

Tips on how beat a heavy infestation in 1 week:

1) elevate no3/po4 alone won't work, it only works combined with HEAVY manual removal. Otherwise you are just feeding the dino. As mentioned, they are both auto and hetero trophic, so they automatically have an edge over algae when it comes to the "outcompete" model of treating it.

2) "turkey blasting" is not an effective way to manually remove, unless you have a properly sized UV to kill it in the water column. Don't count on your filter socks to "catch" them either bc they are 10 microns but most socks are 100 to 300 microns.

3) proper manual removal is either:

A) sucking it out with turkey baster. Takes a while with a large tank.
B) turn off flow when light is on, and let them collect into the snots. Without flow they should be forming everywhere in your tank that slowly raise to the surface. You can then use a cup to scoop out the ones that already reach the surface, and use a fish net to scoop up the snots thats still floating. When using the fish net, key is to scoop them gently and slowly to keep the snot inside the net. Once out the water catch it with a cup to prevent them from dripping back into the tank

4) new snot will form every few hours so repeat 3) every few hours.

5) do 3 ) and 4) during the day, use UV at night when they are more in the water columns. Make sure the UV is properly sized for wattage and flow.

6) additives like MB7 and phyto can help, but again are secondary and ineffective under the "outcompete" model if not combined with aggressive manual removal.

I did the above for 3 days and the dinos went from a heavy infestation to a light one. From day 3 to day 7, UV alone was enough to finish the job. Day 7 its completely gone.

 

[BroccoliFarmer]

I just started getting a dino outbreak last weekend..came on fast!!! I honestly cannot keep the phosphates up enough. Yesterday i accidentally overdosed phospates..put them up well over 1 - 2 PPM. This morning..nada. I guess that is good from a high side high outtake..but jeez...spend all this money and effort on a good filtration system just to say that I did TOO good of a job and that causes problems. I can see why there is a high turn over of new reefers. Just gonna keep dosing my Trisodium Phosphates and Potassium Nitrate (although may switch over to sodium nitrate on Randy's recommendation) and hope i can figure out a good equilibrium.

 

[DrMMI]

I've had success with elegant corals dino treatment in two of my tanks. I ended up having to do it 3 weeks in a row because I had such a heavy infestation.

 

[ggNoRe]

I too had success with Elegant Corals Dinoflagellates Regimen coupled with adding a UV filter.

 

[ingchr1]

....3) proper manual removal is either:

A) sucking it out with turkey baster. Takes a while with a large tank.
B) turn off flow when light is on, and let them collect into the snots. Without flow they should be forming everywhere in your tank that slowly raise to the surface. You can then use a cup to scoop out the ones that already reach the surface, and use a fish net to scoop up the snots thats still floating. When using the fish net, key is to scoop them gently and slowly to keep the snot inside the net. Once out the water catch it with a cup to prevent them from dripping back into the tank...

Another option is to use a Marineland Magnum Filter. It can also be charged with DE to make it even more effective. I have used it on Dinos and other types of algae.

What I typically do is just before lights I out get what I can into suspension and run just the Magnum filter, with my normal filtration off. This ensures I catch as much as I can in the Magnum. During this time I will also use a net to collect any forming on the surface. After some time, maybe an hour or so, I will turn my normal filtration back on. If the Magnum is not slowing down at this point, due to clogging with algae, I will let it run over night. I will then remove it before lights on. When removing the Magnum filter I ensure not to let any water from it pour back into the tank. So you will need some fresh saltwater on hand to replace what's in the Magnum. I will also change my filter floss. Thus removing as much algae as possible from the tank.

This has been effective for me with controlling algae outbreaks.