Silica dosing

[AltitudeAquarium]

I have a question? I don't think I have diatoms or dinoflagellates. However, I do have a few sponges. Particularly, I have some larger colorful sponges that I want to keep healthy. Do I need to supplement my weekly water changes to dose for silicates? Thanks Brandy in advance.

 

[AltitudeAquarium]

Randy, I don't know why my phone auto corrected to Brandy.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I do not know if your tank has enough silicate without dosing, but it is certainly fine and, IMO, appropriate to dose, to encourage sponge growth.

I also think organic carbon dosing feeds them, either directly or by the bacteria that they filter from the water (or both).

 

[Enigma84]

Hey guys. Has enough time passed to see whether this is more than a temporary band aid yet?

I am looking to use liquid glass (sodium silicate 40%) on a 165 gal. I have ostreopsis which I know is treatable by UV, but all this seems to do is prevent it the display being overrun. I have a reverse period chaeto fuge that seems to be the epicentre of every reoccurrence and makes it difficult to target when the lights are "off".

I have it reverse to stabilise pH. I don't want to black out the fuge as my phos is 0.27 and nitrate is 10-15 but holding. I don't wish to let this run away as I'm dealing with a few small patches of GHA.

...I digress. I'm after a good starting place of dosage amounts per day to try and outcome these sods. I've been dealing with this for nine months now and have too many sps casualties to count.

Any input greatly appreciated on dosage.

 

[taricha]

for ostreopsis, nothing else (like Si) will make as big a dent as UV.
tweaking your usage of UV and working on forcing ostreopsis into the water will be far more effective at reducing dino numbers.

 

[Enigma84]

for ostreopsis, nothing else (like Si) will make as big a dent as UV.
tweaking your usage of UV and working on forcing ostreopsis into the water will be far more effective at reducing dino numbers.

You seem to speak from experience. What's the ideal flow rate then if you don't mind me asking, as there is conflicting information. I have a reefer 625 with about 590 litre of water. I have a jebao 55w steriliser approximately 3 weeks old. I currently calculated 340 litres per hour running through it. I haven't had much luck at 800 litres per hour, but then this isn't helping much. Your help is appreciated.

 

[taricha]

What's the ideal flow rate then if you don't mind me asking, as there is conflicting information. I have a reefer 625 with about 590 litre of water. I have a jebao 55w steriliser approximately 3 weeks old. I currently calculated 340 litres per hour running through it. I haven't had much luck at 800 litres per hour, but then this isn't helping much. Your help is appreciated.

people have gravitated towards 200-300 gph as a slow-flow target for UV plumbed directly in/out of the display. So 800-1200 L per hour.
Higher than that is recommended by manufacturers for greenwater phyto or cloudy water bacterial blooms, but our dinos are many times larger, and people find the higher flow rates less effective.

BTW, if the chaeto is getting covered by dinos, then pulling the chaeto out (might want gloves, dino toxins can irritate skin) and giving it a rinse can be a good way to manually export large amounts.

 

[Acros]

I am on day 5 of diatom bloom. I do not see any diatoms on the rocks (only see dinos on rocks under microscope).

Is it a good idea to siphon the rock surface every other day?

This is a pic from the sand bed: prorocentrum dino + Pennate diatoms.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I'm not a dino expert as I never had them, but with any pest, manual removal is a typically good idea along with any other method else you use.

 

[taricha]

Is it a good idea to siphon the rock surface every other day?

yep. manual removal is a great conservative approach that should be part of any treatment.

 

[echopiece]

I know I'm reviving an old thread, but should I keep my normal light cycle while dosing spongexcel to defeat dinos? I've already completed a 3-4 day blackout period and am afraid to keep that up for too long. Thanks in advance

 

[taricha]

I know I'm reviving an old thread, but should I keep my normal light cycle while dosing spongexcel to defeat dinos? I've already completed a 3-4 day blackout period and am afraid to keep that up for too long. Thanks in advance

Do whatever light makes corals happy. The Silica will help the diatoms compete for resources with the dinos that would grow. Diatoms are photosynthetic too, so they wouldn't do much if you kept a blackout going.

 

[aggrofish]

How often should you be dosing silicate? I’ve been told with sponge excel to do a 3x dosage because it’s on 15%

 

[Acros]

How often should you be dosing silicate? I’ve been told with sponge excel to do a 3x dosage because it’s on 15%

When I had dinos, I was dosing daily. At some point I started free hand dosing. Dinos are that frustrating.

Edit: Btw, I do not suggest free hand dosing. You will have to dose at least once every 3 days.

 

[aggrofish]

When I had dinos, I was dosing daily. At some point I started free hand dosing. Dinos are that frustrating.

Edit: Btw, I do not suggest free hand dosing. You will have to dose at least once every 3 days.

Man I’ve had dinos for what seems like forever, dosed neophos/neonitro, installed uv, raised temp, siphoned daily, changed socks daily, DIY coral snow. If the silicate dosing doesn’t work imma nuke it with dino-x.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

How often should you be dosing silicate? I’ve been told with sponge excel to do a 3x dosage because it’s on 15%

I'm not sure how often is best in a dino strategy, but I'd say at least every 2-3 days. I dosed once a week or so for boosting diatoms/sponges/etc.

 

[Acros]

Man I’ve had dinos for what seems like forever, dosed neophos/neonitro, installed uv, raised temp, siphoned daily, changed socks daily, DIY coral snow. If the silicate dosing doesn’t work imma nuke it with dino-x.

Do you have an id on the dinos and how bad is it?

 

[aggrofish]

Do you have an id on the dinos and how bad is it?

My phone is dead so I cant attach a picture but I was told it's prorocentrum. It's only on the sand bed now. It started on the sand and rocks. It killed all my SPS pretty fast, then moved on to hammers / torches / acans. It's less than when it started but I still have to siphon the sand bed into filter socks daily.

I increased the flow as much as I could without blasting the remaining corals. The mp40s are moving the sand in the middle of the tank so it doesnt grow there lol.

I've also been maintaining PO4 in the .03 - .05 range by dosing daily and NO3 in the 6-10 range. It's fueling GHA but dinos are still there.

 

[aggrofish]

I'm not sure how often is best in a dino strategy, but I'd say at least every 2-3 days. I dosed once a week or so for boosting diatoms/sponges/etc.

I'll give that a shot. There are a couple things my tank does well: breeding mini brittle stars, growing sponges, and growing unwanted algae

 

[Acros]

Prorocentrum is the worst. I battled them twice. First time, I was successful with silica dosing. Second time it hung around even after silica dosing. I siphoned out all the sand over the course of couple of day. Did not put any of the water back in. Essentially a mini tank reset. Dinos were gone in about 10 days.