Ostreopsis Ovata - Dino - How to kill them?

[Ostri]

Serious dino infection in my tank. Red, stringy. As shown herehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49SQMspNsoA

Methods tried:
- 3 day blackouts, 5 day blackouts
--- would make them disappear and after 1 week or so come back
- ammonia dosing
--- no effect
- scraping nutrients
--- get way worse
- increasing nutrients
--- controlled condition, still lots in the tank and no signs of going away
- phytoplakton dosing
--- no effect
- carbon
--- no effect
- UV
--- no effect
- water changes
--- no effect
- Carbon dosing
--- get worse
- hydrogen peroxide
--- no effect

Been battling them for 10 months now. I'm tired of doing blackouts and many corals died because of this. Burnt tips everywhere. Alk consumption near zero. Lots of corals in very bad health conditions.

No green/hair algae growing in the DT. Some in the refugium with sun light bulb.

System:
220g tank SPS only. Skimmer, socks. No other filtration except sometimes ROX carbon.

ATI 8bulbs with blue LED. 2 Coral+, 1 Purple, 1 Actinic, 4 Blue+.

At this point I have pretty much tried everything I could try to eliminate those dinos but they seem to do very well in this system. The last thing I can think of here is the light. Green algae growing in the refugium section with white light whereas heavily bluelight-lit DT has none. I may give Aquablue Special a try - switching my blue bulbs to white light.

If you have successfully dealt with Ostreopsis Ovata, please give some suggestions. Literally any suggestions at this point will be appreciated.

Thanks!

[naecO.rM]

Ostreopsis is not a photosynthetic, blackout doesn't help.
Copepods + phyto dosage for long period can help.

Some times I've read that oxydaser + UV sterilaser can help .

Хорошего рифа!

[Ostri]

Originally Posted by naecO.rM

Ostreopsis is not a photosynthetic, blackout doesn't help.
Copepods + phyto dosage for long period can help.

Some times I've read that oxydaser + UV sterilaser can help .

Хорошего рифа!

"Cells of Ostreopsis ovata are photosynthetic containing many golden chloroplasts."

http://species-identification.org/sp...gellates&id=74

[acro-ed]

This is going to be a little long, but here goes....

I feel your pain. I have been battling this for a year and I have (fingers crossed) finally won....

The unfortunate part is that I did not find an effective "treatment."

The first step is to get a microscope and confirm what you are truly dealing with. Many people have suspected Dino's or assumed a certain genus without being certain.

The Ostreopsis are mixotrophic as best as my research and experience confirms, but they are primarily photosynthetic. This means that cutting the lights will knock them WAY back, but not kill them. Doing so may be a good starting point, but is not a final solution.

After 11 months I have learned some things that may give you some direction and provoke some thought....but, there is no simple answer....

I firmly believe that the Ostreopsis are present because of lack of biodiversity in the system. I re-introduced some bacteria and micro-flora and -fauna and slowly increased my nutrients. This led to a slow decrease of the dino's over about a 3 month period. During this time I also removed about 90% of my sand. I also started dosing Kalk in my topoff water (I generally dose two part, but without any corals in there and stable parameters I didn't see the need to dose anything).

I can't say for certain that one action or the other was the "cure," but together the end result was elimination of the dino's. I also can't be certain they are "all" gone, but I cannot detect any with my loupe or with the microscope anymore. I suspect that dino's are present in most/all systems, but that they are radically suppressed and conditions are not favorable for a bloom.

A little backstory of my system/experience -

I've been keeping reef tanks for 20 years now, and have NEVER dealt with this until last year.

I setup a new 150g as an acropora only show tank. To ensure that I would have no pests (laughable at this point) I started with dry rock and dry sand. I cured the rock in fresh water and then did a light vinegar bath to dissolve any light calcification and increase porosity. I then soaked them again in freshwater and put them in the tank. After the rock and sand were in the tank with new saltwater I added Brightwell Microbacter7. The tank went through some ordinary cycles of green turf algae and cyanobacteria, and finally cleared up. At that point I added 5 green chromis (maybe at 10 weeks or so). The tank still had a little bit of algae, but things seemed good to go. I then added some snails, hermits, and several more fish. I also turned on my skimmer and ramped up the lights at this point (T5 + 400w MH, which I have since replaced with T5 plus Radion pro's). This is when the first wave of dino's hit. I lost at least half of my snails and several of the newer fish (the fish I attribute to a problem from the wholesaler; I dipped them but didn't quarantine; so I don't know if there is any relevancy to the dino's).

I believe that the massive amount of light and overkill skimming (iTech 400) depleted all of the nutrients and the dino's were able to utilize the light only and out-compete the other lower trophic level life. The dino's would come in waves/blooms and were all over the sand and would quickly dust the glass.

A 4 day dark period knocked them back about 95% but they came back. Prior to really getting into the research I did a 20% water change. As you will read elsewhere, this is a BAD idea. I dosed hydrogen peroxide (you can go WAY over recommended dosing levels and it may help temporarily, but again, does not kill them). If anything this may be further upsetting the bacteria levels we are trying to promote.

I finally thought about the sand and figured that maybe I was leeching some phosphate or something, and in an effort to eliminate other factors I sucked some some out. When I did this I siphoned into a bucket and then pumped it back through a filter sock and back into the sump. This was I only had to replace a very small amount of water. Things definitely improved but the dinoflagellates were still present.

I then got some Microbe-lift bacteria and dosed that over a period of a couple weeks. I also killed the lights and replaced the halides with Radions. I turned the T5's off and ran the Radions on low power. I also added the kalk to the top off. Things seemed to improve. I then sucked even more sand out and also took a rock from another system and shook it out in the new tank. I saw all sorts of detritus and bugs and stuff come out in a cloud. All of this together was the turning point.

About 90 days later I cannot find a single dino. The Radions have been running (total of 12 hours when you include the dawn/dusk) along with the skimmer. I have two acros in there as test frags and both are growing (rapidly).

So what did it? I can't say for sure. I removed a potential source of phosphate (maybe bad sand, maybe the phosphate to nitrate ratio was off, and that was a contributing factor?), I increased the pH via the kalk, and I added new bacteria and biodiversity of lower trophic life.

At the end of the day I don't believe the goal should be to "kill" the dino's, but rather to rectify the trophic/biological imbalance in the tank.

I can confirm that it is the "system" and not the "dino's" that are the problem. I have taken rocks/frags and transferred them back into another stable system and the dino's do NOT survive at ALL in the healthy system. The dino's proliferate because of some unknown imbalance (either N/P ratio, lack of bio-diversity, too low of nutrients, etc.).

I can also confirm that Ostreopsis DO kill snails. Some of the stronger ones may survive, but many died.

Ostreopsis DO kill acros. The strands of dino's WILL hang onto the tissue and do have some sort of effect on the zoox in the coral. It leaves pale patches and if left unchecked the acro will die. Some seem to be more susceptible than others. I tried putting some test frags in the tank several times, and when there was a negative response I moved them back to my frag tank to recover. I ran them through a freshwater dip, which definitively kills the dino's, but was also hard on some of the acros I tried. I lost several over the course of the past year trying different things.

My general thought is that the "new" sterile style of reef keeping in a contributing factor. People are generally running screaming high PAR lighting, oversized skimmers, and barebottom tanks. I think that some people are unfortunate enough to cross over some unknown nutrient/bacteria ratio and the dino's outcompete the other life, thereby replacing most other life in the system.

These are just my thoughts and experiences. I wish you the very best in figuring it out. I was very (very) close to draining the system and starting over, and there is no shame in that because you can re-start and be back in business in a few months.

Good luck!
-Ed

[Ostri]

Thank you very much Ed. I really appreciate your time and efforts in writing this lengthy reply. I also believe in your theory that it was due to lack of biodiversity and all "checkpoints" abolished. I was running an ULNS when I started this tank. Right now I'm at 0.05 PO4 and 4NO3 and I've been able to keep them there after removal of biopellets. Dino since then have been at about the same & stable scale. One thing that I noticed was that my LFS, which had a tank destroyed by Ostreopsis Ovata, was running ATI T5 as well. However other tanks at that LFS are under LED. There were transfers of corals between the tanks but under LED for some reason dinos were not showing up. Maybe its just a coincidence.

My plan now is to dose phytoplanktons and keep my nutrients high. I have lots of pods, especially amphipods ever since my nutrients went up. The good thing though is that even though dino came back since my last blackout treatment, they did not spread/propagate as widely as previous times. I would expect them to be covering everywhere on the rock and wires, but they aren't and they are only on some corals. Maybe it is an improvement? I'm hoping the situation could slowly turn around and I'll try my best to keep nutrients away from depletion.

[Ostri]

bump

[Ostri]

nobody?

[Acromaniac]

Im trying bleach at the moment. Will let you know how I go. Other have been successful with it. Google dinos a possible cure

[rhinonm]

are you removing fish or dosing with fish in system?

[Ostri]

Originally Posted by rhinonm

are you removing fish or dosing with fish in system?

I haven't removed any fish. I do have a population that keeps my NO3 from touching zero. Dinos been there not spreading not shrinking for a while now. I have not used Dino X but might give it a try. I'm just not sure if it will work on this particular strain.

[Acromaniac]

I think he was asking me about the fish in the system with bleach.

I left the fish in the system. So far at my dose the fish show no reaction at all.

[sowellj]

Ostri, I feel your pain. I am dealing with these as well. I have tried h2o2 dosing, dosing vibrant, blackouts, manual removal, dosing zeobac, mb7, prodibio, and raising nutrients. The only thing that has really worked is blackouts and manual removal. However, they return after a week or two. My next step is to start dosing phyto, and maybe even phosphate, in an effort to boost biodiversity. One other thing I am doing is putting some filter material in front of powerheads at night. Since the dinos enter the water column at night and they collect on filter, I figure this may be a good way to get some out of the system.
I suppose dino-x, uv, sandbed removal are my next options.

[naecO.rM]

Originally Posted by sowellj

Ostri, I feel your pain. I am dealing with these as well. I have tried h2o2 dosing, dosing vibrant, blackouts, manual removal, dosing zeobac, mb7, prodibio, and raising nutrients. The only thing that has really worked is blackouts and manual removal. However, they return after a week or two. My next step is to start dosing phyto, and maybe even phosphate, in an effort to boost biodiversity. One other thing I am doing is putting some filter material in front of powerheads at night. Since the dinos enter the water column at night and they collect on filter, I figure this may be a good way to get some out of the system.
I suppose dino-x, uv, sandbed removal are my next options.

Together with a Phytoplankton is great to add coppepods to the tank, they may eat dinos.
If your will use a filter for a night time better to use a filter with cells size of 1-5mn, as for RO water.

Хорошего рифа!

[Ostri]

Originally Posted by sowellj

Ostri, I feel your pain. I am dealing with these as well. I have tried h2o2 dosing, dosing vibrant, blackouts, manual removal, dosing zeobac, mb7, prodibio, and raising nutrients. The only thing that has really worked is blackouts and manual removal. However, they return after a week or two. My next step is to start dosing phyto, and maybe even phosphate, in an effort to boost biodiversity. One other thing I am doing is putting some filter material in front of powerheads at night. Since the dinos enter the water column at night and they collect on filter, I figure this may be a good way to get some out of the system.
I suppose dino-x, uv, sandbed removal are my next options.

Dino-X doesn't work. Many on clay-boa are trying Vibrant. Ive dosed phosphate and no3 and done phyto with no clear effect, though I'm still keeping a detectable amount of nutrients in my tank to boost biodiversity.

[sowellj]

I have a group of tester frags coming in on Tuesday ... keeping my fingers crossed. I have really knocked mine back ... but they eventually come back. If they didn't like to accumulate on sps tips, I could live with them.

I also have a batch of pods coming in on Tuesday. Today I am going to head up to the 'local' fish store, and see if they will sell/give me some rock rubble and sand.

[sowellj]

Ostri,

One or two other options, some people have had luck with are dosing bleach or Metronidazole. I likely will consider these options if I continue to lose the battle. At some point, when you are faced with the possibility of a system breakdown, measures such as dosing bleach may be worth a try.

[tang daddy]

I didn't have time to read through the whole post but sorry to hear about your losses and Dino, I've had it and can be a real pain. There is a product called Vibrant that claims it will remove all types of algae including cyano Dino and other types. There is a lengthy thread about the stuff on another forum.
You should definately give it a try...I've recently started using it due to a bubble algae problem and within a week it has wiped out half of it.

[acro-ed]

I'm still a firm believer that the goal should be to re-stabilize the biological diversity in the system, especially the lower trophic level life (bacteria, algae, and then micro-fauna). I agree that phyto is a good idea, and adding pods; maybe also adding some funk from rocks or sand from a known healthy system. I think that was a major factor in my tank finally turning the corner...adding some filth from my healthy system. The dino's aren't actually the problem; they die when put into a healthy system.

Also, I don't think you want to eliminate algae like Vibrant might work towards. If anything you want algae to grow, because its growth is utilizing nutrients in the system which (right now) the dino's are using to thrive, thus depriving them of available nutrient.

Just some more thoughts...

-Ed

[Ostri]

Originally Posted by acro-ed

I'm still a firm believer that the goal should be to re-stabilize the biological diversity in the system, especially the lower trophic level life (bacteria, algae, and then micro-fauna). I agree that phyto is a good idea, and adding pods; maybe also adding some funk from rocks or sand from a known healthy system. I think that was a major factor in my tank finally turning the corner...adding some filth from my healthy system. The dino's aren't actually the problem; they die when put into a healthy system.

Also, I don't think you want to eliminate algae like Vibrant might work towards. If anything you want algae to grow, because its growth is utilizing nutrients in the system which (right now) the dino's are using to thrive, thus depriving them of available nutrient.

Just some more thoughts...

-Ed

Thats what concerns me about vibrant. If it doesn't hit the dino, it will then provide dino with a less competitive environment.

[sowellj]

For what it's worth vibrant has not worked for me. I am going the dirty route, trying to increase biodiversity. I dosed some phosphate yesterday as mine is always undetectable.

[Ostri]

Originally Posted by sowellj

For what it's worth vibrant has not worked for me. I am going the dirty route, trying to increase biodiversity. I dosed some phosphate yesterday as mine is always undetectable.

Nice to know. My buddy tried vibrant too and it didn't work in his tank as well.

[beuchat]

I killed ostreopsis with ozone, two weeks with ORP around 450 mv

Before ozone:



After Ozone: only diatoms

[Tigé21v]

Originally Posted by beuchat

I killed ostreopsis with ozone, two weeks with ORP around 450 mv

Before ozone:



After Ozone: only diatoms

It says you have a 150 gallon tank?
Did you hold the tank's ORP at 450?
How large of an ozone generator do you have? What kind/ how large of a reactor?What kind of flow through the reactor?
Thanks

[beuchat]

Yes, I hold the ORP to 450 mv for several days. The ozone generator is a TMC V2 . I used the skimmer as a ozone reactor

[rog2961]

low dose of bleach since you have fish and keep nitrates higher should knock it back quite a bit.