Controlling dinoflagellates with Metronidazole

[Frogger]

My problem with dinoflagellates started about 5 months ago. At that time I have bryopsis that I had had for at least 10 years (tank has been running for at least 15 years). 5 months ago I treated my tank with Fluconazole to control the bryopsis. The fluconazole killed all the bryosis. After about a month I got cyno. I tried heavy skimming large water changes etc to no avail. I eventually used chemiclean to control the cyno.

Then after a month along comes dinoflagellates. They came with a vengeance and covered everything. I would remove the dinos and they would be back in 15 minutes. I was manually removing dinos at least 2 times a day and still making no progress. I tried large water changes and still no success. My corals in the tank were receding fast. Dinos release toxins in the water. I had these corals in the tank for over 10 years. I have another tank that is doing fine and I have copies of all my corals. This tank has been a bit of an experiment. I read up an article on using Metronidazole to control dinos.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/will-it-truly-ever-go-away-dinoflagellates-vs-metronidazole.254861/

Apparently it affects the ability of the dinos to multiply. I added a magnum micro filter and blow off the rocks a couple times a day. I change the filter every 3 days.

I am on day 7 of a 10 day treatment with Metroplex (Metronizide) adding about 15gms per 10 gallons of tank water daily. It is amazing the dinos are almost all gone and the polyps of the corals are opening up. It has been a month since the polyps opened up. I am hopeful that it will do the job.

[DKoKoMan]

Is this an in tank treatment? Will it kill corals and inverts? I'm fortunate my dinoflagellates took a Time out but they are still there (appear dormant). They have not flared up again covering anything quite yet but I know they are capable of destroying my Reef.

Keep me posted on your progress :smile:

[Frogger]

It is a protozoan parasite treatment and it appears to not have affected anything else in the tank. I have sps, lps, shrimp, snails and shrimp. I appear to have good success. Read the article I posted it is a good read. It is also a long read.

[Frogger]

Day 9 in the treatment. Its amazing my frogspawn is actually coming back. The dinoflagellates had caused the large frogspawn to decline to the point where there was only a bit of green left. In the past 4 days the frogspawn has started to fill in. On heads where there was no green left on them are starting to show some green. It is too early to be celebrating yet. The dinos aren't completely gone but they are not really actively growing. I will do the 10th treatment tonight and will keep you posted.

I had tried everything including blacking out the tank and could not stop the dinoflagellates. I am cautiously optimistic.

[emerald crab]

DinoX works on dinoflagelates. I had "Ostreopsis Ovata", probably the toughest dino around.
DinoX worked for me in conjunction with an UV sterilizer ( probably the most important piece of equipment when you have a dino outbreak) and with some minor blackouts (no longer than 48 hours). The UV sterilizer is actually more important than DinoX and the blackouts.
By the way, dinoflagelates love water changes.

[rsisvixen]

Out of curiosity, if a tank has been running for such a long time where would the dino have come from? Is it something that happens from spores in the air finding water like some algae's or is it something that needs to be introduced via corals or live rock?
Or is it something like cyno which is bacteria with the ability to photosynthesize?

[Frogger]

Out of curiosity, if a tank has been running for such a long time where would the dino have come from? Is it something that happens from spores in the air finding water like some algae's or is it something that needs to be introduced via corals or live rock?
Or is it something like cyno which is bacteria with the ability to photosynthesize?

How does anything we don't want get into our tanks. From the live rock, from live sand, from corals we add. Likely the dinos have been there for a long time, once conditions became ideal their population exploded.

[Frogger]

DinoX works on dinoflagelates. I had "Ostreopsis Ovata", probably the toughest dino around.
DinoX worked for me in conjunction with an UV sterilizer ( probably the most important piece of equipment when you have a dino outbreak) and with some minor blackouts (no longer than 48 hours). The UV sterilizer is actually more important than DinoX and the blackouts.
By the way, dinoflagelates love water changes.

According to what I have read the reefers trying the metronidazole had already tried the other methods including Dino-X. The great thing about the metronidazole is I did not have to black out my tank which further stresses the already stressed corals. I have read about many failures with Dino X.
I have not tried the UV Sterilizer. Might give it a try if the dino's return.

[ReefMadness]

along with this i've also been following a couple threads on dinos that promote the use of uv. interestingly, one of the more lengthy threads outright claims that metro has little to no effect on 95% of the dino strains subjected to it.
while i don't have any visible results to show just yet in my battle, the latest strategy is simply keeping nutrients consistently above zero. the thought is that untraceable nutrients are creating a perfect environment and supposedly a big reason why dinos are taking hold the first place.
uv is also mentioned as a good strategy while doing this as well so i can see myself skimming over amazon today for an entry level model to test this out with.

[emerald crab]

DinoX alone will not do the job, if you relay on DinoX only you will loose coral color and/or corals. However used together with an UV sterilizer, it works great.
I believe that the minor blackouts and DinoX make the dinos uncomfortable enough so they get in the water column trying to relocate and the UV sterilizer does the killing.

Do not overdose DinoX !!!

[Frogger]

along with this i've also been following a couple threads on dinos that promote the use of uv. interestingly, one of the more lengthy threads outright claims that metro has little to no effect on 95% of the dino strains subjected to it.
while i don't have any visible results to show just yet in my battle, the latest strategy is simply keeping nutrients consistently above zero. the thought is that untraceable nutrients are creating a perfect environment and supposedly a big reason why dinos are taking hold the first place.
uv is also mentioned as a good strategy while doing this as well so i can see myself skimming over amazon today for an entry level model to test this out with.

You are probably right from what I have read they will return. It is nice to give the corals a bit of a break for a couple weeks. I will be putting a UV sterilizer to work and am going to start adding phosphates and nitrates to see if that helps.

[DKoKoMan]

:bad-word: I absolutely hate dinoflagellates...horrible.

[Frogger]

Day 15 update: I added a hang on tank UV sterilizer, I am still running the magnum micron filter changing filter every few days. I am also adding phosphates and nitrates to keep these numbers so they register. My tank had very low phosphates and un-measureable nitrates which likely added to the problem.

So far things look good, corals are growing again, polyps extending.

Keeping fingers crossed.

[crimper]

Hey Frogger, any updates on this?

I'm battling dino again. It started when I used AF Component 1+2+3+ I should have ditch that crap. :cry:

Hope you're tank is back to it's old glory.

[Frogger]

Ok so I attacked it with a multi-pronged approach and I seem to have gotten it under control. The metronidazole as stated earlier only temporarily gives you relief. If you do not deal with the other issues it will just come back.

I added a UV sterilizer and kept my micron filter running. Believe it or not I started adding phosphates and nitrates to get my values up out of the basement. I have read that the Dynos are a low nutrient loving organism and competition is the way to go. Since adding phosphates and nitrates I have encouraged some hair algae and coralline algae to colonize the rock work. The hair algae is a lot easier to control with grazers. I am working at getting my grazing population up and everything should be fine. I still have a tiny bit of dynos but they are not actively growing.

This tank is an experimental tank and I use it primarily as a quarantine tank for new arrivals. I will be taking it apart completely trashing the rock and resetting it up as a frag tank in the future so I have nothing to loose and can gain a whole lot of knowledge from it.

Over the past 8 months I went from Byopisis to cyno to dynos and now I have some hair algae. The tank has a 6" plenum in it and has been set up for over 17 years. So nothing I do short of disassembly and removing the plenum will fix the problem.

The glory days of this tank was 12 to 15 years ago when it was stunning.

[crimper]

Ok so I attacked it with a multi-pronged approach and I seem to have gotten it under control. The metronidazole as stated earlier only temporarily gives you relief. If you do not deal with the other issues it will just come back.

I added a UV sterilizer and kept my micron filter running. Believe it or not I started adding phosphates and nitrates to get my values up out of the basement. I have read that the Dynos are a low nutrient loving organism and competition is the way to go. Since adding phosphates and nitrates I have encouraged some hair algae and coralline algae to colonize the rock work. The hair algae is a lot easier to control with grazers. I am working at getting my grazing population up and everything should be fine. I still have a tiny bit of dynos but they are not actively growing.



Thanks for the update Frogger.

That's an interesting findings. The time that dino appeared in my tank is the time when I started dosing AF Component 123 and after my tank hit 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate. I'm still struggling to raise nitrates and phosphates at this time as I continue to dose nitrate and i'm feeding heavy just to keep my nutrients above 0.

I have a UV in my display tank that I can use to help stop it from taking over.

[Frogger]

In my reef tank I was having trouble with my lack of nutrients. The colours on my sps were pale. I started adding nitrates to get my nitrates up to a readable amount on my Redsea Pro nitirate test kit and I unfortunately crashed my phosphates. I lost about half of my corals and it took me several months to get my tank turned around.

What I have found I have to add both potassium nitrate and potassium phosphate twice a day (will be setting up to a doser) at a ratio of 3 to 1. I still can't get a measureable amount of nitrates but I can keep my phosphates at a good number. To my 75 gallon tank I am adding 6mls of KNO3 daily. I am slowly increasing the dose to try to get my nitrates to a measurable amount. The colours on my corals and the growth rate are better then they ever were before.