Declaring WAR on my Aquarium

[reeferaddict]

Wow! That's quite the regiment! Just one thing...

I'm sure this didn't happen overnight - so when it comes to chemical paramaters I hope you don't attempt to change it overnight, especially with SPS - even though I know how much urgency I feel myself when things aren't right....

[i have crabs]

sounds like a good plan to me the only thing i might also do is suck out the sand since the manderin is gone,but that depends on how you feel about people looking at your bare bottom.

[albert_dao]

Personally, I like the look of my bare bottom. It's what I get the most comments on when girls are over to see my... tank.

[Delphinus]

Dinoflagellates are perhaps the most nightmarish thing that can happen to your tank. In essence, it's a "red tide". Unfortunately it can be deadly to inhabitants who happen to ingest it, usually snails will drop dead. And it is worse than any cyano bloom because you can remove every last visible piece of it and within 2-3 hours it can look like you removed nothing, due to the fact that dinoflagellates reproduce so fast, a population can double within half an hour or something insane like that.

Save yourself a lot of trouble right now and go immediately to the step of turning your lights off. It is the only method to combat dinoflagellates. If this is indeed what you have, first off my sympathies (many people have suffered this, myself at least twice, others more so). It will hound you and hound you and hound you. Trust me on this one, your only first step to success in battling this is starving them of light. Your big challenge will be to find out how to do this without impacting your light-needing animals such as your corals and clams. As far as I'm concerned, corals can stomach the lack of light for a few days just fine, but clams maybe not. You'll have to figure it out for yourself what's going to work for you, but I cannot overemphasize this enough: you can *only* fight a dinoflagellate bloom by starving them of light. If you have actinics you can try maybe running just actinics for a week, but don't be surprised if this fails - even stray light from an adjacent window may be enough to invalidate your efforts - the only way to fight a bad dinoflagellate bloom is through starving them of what they are looking for.

You can try limiting your nutrient load by reduced feedings and increased skimming and rowaphos and so on, but don't be surprised if it doesn't work. An excess of nutrients may lead to the conditions favourable to a dinoflagellate infestation, but realistically the problem is that they are there, and there is no real mechanism to remove them. Your only hope is through starvation. I'm sorry -- I know you said you only want to tackle a reduced photoperiod as a last resort, but I'm trying to save you a lot of futile effort - they will persist. Your only hope is by removing what they are looking for which in this case is light.

Best of luck. Frankly, your aiptasia and crab problems may seem to add to your headaches, but if you indeed have dinoflagellates they are the least of your worries right now. Get that dinos bloom dealt with, if in the process you can deal with the others, great, but if not -- focus on the dinos first. It can be a hobby killer. I count my two experiences with fighting dinos in my systems as the lowest points of all time with respect to my reef tanks, and believe you me, in ten years in the hobby now I have seen it all, I've seen some nasty things, but very few compare to a bad dinoflagellate infestation.

I wish you the best of luck. Chin up - it can be beat, but you will be severely tested in the meantime.

[Clown]

Does This Algae Grow Realy Fast And Long Like a hair algae?
and If You Clean It Grows Back In A Few Hours?
If So Try Useing Filtered Water(if your useing tap water), And Problem Will Go Away
...
Or At Least it did for me

[Psyire]

Thanks for the encouragement and tips.

I noticed today that the brown plague was worse on the two sides of my tank compared to the middle. (the middle is a newer bulb, only a month old) So what I did is change all three bulbs to new Reeflux 12K bulbs that I just recieved. We'll see what kind of change that makes tomorrow.

I also plan to post pictures of what this infestation looks like. It's not near as bad as some of the pictures I've seen posted on the 'net, but it's bad enough that it needs some serious attention.

Today I ordered some necessary firepower and commando tools. (filter media & test kits)

I've also started with increasing my skimming and upping my ozone (a hair)

Tomorrow I'll be doing a full test on my water and a full filter change on my RO/DI. (then I will start making new water for a water change)

I'm attempting to make 'slow' changes to the system, however I've lost nearly all my SPS so I'm not that worried anymore... fish are fairly tolerant, as are softies and LPS.

I'm going to go to bed tonight praying that a battle between the dino's and the aptasia breaks out, with both sides eradicating each other... however unlikely that is.

Ruth: Thanks for the offers, I'll be in touch. (PM)

Delph: I'm definately re-thinking my lighting schedule as we speak, but I'm curious as to what dino change will happen due to my bulb changes)

Clown: Definately not Hair Algae... I've seen a lot of that stuff before. (not so much in my tank, but others)

[christyf5]

Good luck, I used your battle plan in my Dino Battle of 2004-05 (also included increased alkalinity, increased flow, increased water changes, turkey basting, siphoning, replacement of aragonite sand with oolitic, addition of chemipure, you name it I tried it). Damned things stuck around for a year. At the height of the evilness I was putting the tank in complete darkness with a blanket overtop for 2 days. They still came back. Eventually I ripped out the sandbed and went barebottom, powerwashed all the rock and restarted the tank. Pretty drastic move but I've been dinoflagellate free for over a year now and am glad I did it