Curious about AF but had bad experience with Zeovit

cflow · 08/03/2017, 10:07 AM

I'm am ex zeovit user. I've had one successful zeovit tank which was amazing, but I moved and restarted. The second tank got dinoflagellates and cyano which made me quit zeovit. I'm starting again with just strong lighting, skimming, lots of LR, and GAC in a reactor. I believe my last zeo tank failed due to dosing bacteria and a carbon source. My PO4 never fell below 0.06, but NO3 was 0 ( by test kits ). I constantly reached out to other zeovit users who advised me just to limit my carbon source and eventually everything would balance out. I've found that some AF users are not dosing bacteria or a carbon source, but just using the supplements, zeo mix, and PO4 remover. This method I like but curious if this is really an option. I don't keep lots of fish so my bioload is usually pretty low. Any suggestions?

Anirban · 08/04/2017, 06:59 AM

Yes, you are saying that not all of AF users regularly dose the bacteria or carbon source. I am one of them. I dose twice a week and sometime just once. Generally when I do water change I dose just bacteria and next day carbon. After that anytime once in middle of the week. This is sort of maintenance dosing. If you dose too much of probiotics and carbon it creates a imbalanced nutrient level which can create a lot of issues.

cflow · 08/04/2017, 08:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anirban

Yes, you are saying that not all of AF users regularly dose the bacteria or carbon source. I am one of them. I dose twice a week and sometime just once. Generally when I do water change I dose just bacteria and next day carbon. After that anytime once in middle of the week. This is sort of maintenance dosing. If you dose too much of probiotics and carbon it creates a imbalanced nutrient level which can create a lot of issues.

Thanks for the response. Do you use the probiotic salt? I'm wondering if I can get by with just using the probiotic salt. Then I'm replenishing bacteria with every weekly water change. I might give this a try. If my nutrients climb and I don't think they will, I'll carbon dose. It's just a feag tank.

Anirban · 08/07/2017, 07:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cflow

Thanks for the response. Do you use the probiotic salt? I'm wondering if I can get by with just using the probiotic salt. Then I'm replenishing bacteria with every weekly water change. I might give this a try. If my nutrients climb and I don't think they will, I'll carbon dose. It's just a feag tank.

For a frag tank I will say you can use the probiotic salt and don't need to dose anything like amino, bacteria or vitamin as the salt itself contains all these. A simple weekly water change should be enough to maintain the balance.

cflow · 08/07/2017, 01:24 PM

I purchased some extra products just to be safe. I did not want to have to carbon dose but i will do manually and with caution. I'm more concerned about changing salt from reef crystals to AF due to the drastic alkalinity difference. It may take a few weeks to get to 100% AF salt.

120reefer · 08/07/2017, 08:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cflow

I purchased some extra products just to be safe. I did not want to have to carbon dose but i will do manually and with caution. I'm more concerned about changing salt from reef crystals to AF due to the drastic alkalinity difference. It may take a few weeks to get to 100% AF salt.

It's always wise to make this change slowly.

I've done it and all I did was 10% weekly water changes with the AF Probiotic salt . Do this until your completely switched over .

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cflow · 08/09/2017, 02:05 PM

I may switch over even more slowly. My reef crystals keeps dkh at about 9. I don't want to risk the swing. I have a few other questions. I have about 40lbs rock that i cured myself and have sitting in a low flow area of my sump. I noticed a lot of AF users use siporax. If i wanted to switch the LR to siporax would it be best to add all of the siporax at one time, then slowly start removing the LR over the course of time? Or make the siporax live in a separate tank with AF bacteria / carbon source and just switch everything over at once? Im using pukani LR and I'm afraid it might be leaching PO4. It's also harder to keep the sump clean with the LR.

120reefer · 08/09/2017, 07:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cflow

I may switch over even more slowly. My reef crystals keeps dkh at about 9. I don't want to risk the swing. I have a few other questions. I have about 40lbs rock that i cured myself and have sitting in a low flow area of my sump. I noticed a lot of AF users use siporax. If i wanted to switch the LR to siporax would it be best to add all of the siporax at one time, then slowly start removing the LR over the course of time? Or make the siporax live in a separate tank with AF bacteria / carbon source and just switch everything over at once? Im using pukani LR and I'm afraid it might be leaching PO4. It's also harder to keep the sump clean with the LR.

Can't really offer an exact best way on this. What I can tell you is what I did. I had live rock that I didn't remove. I also had Marine Pure spheres.

I added the siporax all at one time and I added Life Bio fil.

IMHO if your going to add it make sure you rinse the siporax really well in Rodi water and add it all at once. Then wait.... I'd give it quite sometime to ensure that it gets seeded properly. Then I'd pull a little live rock out..... add some Life Bio fil...... wait..... pulls some out ...... add Life Bio fil.... etc....

This is what I would do if it were my tank. Make sure you observe and make slow small moves.

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cflow · 08/09/2017, 08:38 PM

That sounds like a plan. Unfortunately I may have to put thr siporax in the tank itself. The sump is jam packed with rock. Hopefully algae doesn't grow on the siporax.

120reefer · 08/09/2017, 08:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cflow

That sounds like a plan. Unfortunately I may have to put thr siporax in the tank itself. The sump is jam packed with rock. Hopefully algae doesn't grow on the siporax.

Is it possible to do it the other way?? Move the rock to the display and put the siporax in the sump?? This way as you remove the rock if it has algae on it .... it doesn't really matter because it's being removed.

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cflow · 08/10/2017, 03:53 PM

I suppose I could. I'm sure my snails would love it. Or I could just protect the siporax from light some how.

08/03/2017, 10:07 AM	#1
cflow Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Sacramento Posts: 792	Curious about AF but had bad experience with Zeovit I'm am ex zeovit user. I've had one successful zeovit tank which was amazing, but I moved and restarted. The second tank got dinoflagellates and cyano which made me quit zeovit. I'm starting again with just strong lighting, skimming, lots of LR, and GAC in a reactor. I believe my last zeo tank failed due to dosing bacteria and a carbon source. My PO4 never fell below 0.06, but NO3 was 0 ( by test kits ). I constantly reached out to other zeovit users who advised me just to limit my carbon source and eventually everything would balance out. I've found that some AF users are not dosing bacteria or a carbon source, but just using the supplements, zeo mix, and PO4 remover. This method I like but curious if this is really an option. I don't keep lots of fish so my bioload is usually pretty low. Any suggestions?

08/04/2017, 06:59 AM	#2
Anirban Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: North Carolina Posts: 77	Yes, you are saying that not all of AF users regularly dose the bacteria or carbon source. I am one of them. I dose twice a week and sometime just once. Generally when I do water change I dose just bacteria and next day carbon. After that anytime once in middle of the week. This is sort of maintenance dosing. If you dose too much of probiotics and carbon it creates a imbalanced nutrient level which can create a lot of issues.

08/07/2017, 01:24 PM	#5
cflow Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Sacramento Posts: 792	I purchased some extra products just to be safe. I did not want to have to carbon dose but i will do manually and with caution. I'm more concerned about changing salt from reef crystals to AF due to the drastic alkalinity difference. It may take a few weeks to get to 100% AF salt.

08/09/2017, 02:05 PM	#7
cflow Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Sacramento Posts: 792	I may switch over even more slowly. My reef crystals keeps dkh at about 9. I don't want to risk the swing. I have a few other questions. I have about 40lbs rock that i cured myself and have sitting in a low flow area of my sump. I noticed a lot of AF users use siporax. If i wanted to switch the LR to siporax would it be best to add all of the siporax at one time, then slowly start removing the LR over the course of time? Or make the siporax live in a separate tank with AF bacteria / carbon source and just switch everything over at once? Im using pukani LR and I'm afraid it might be leaching PO4. It's also harder to keep the sump clean with the LR.

08/09/2017, 08:38 PM	#9
cflow Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Sacramento Posts: 792	That sounds like a plan. Unfortunately I may have to put thr siporax in the tank itself. The sump is jam packed with rock. Hopefully algae doesn't grow on the siporax.

08/10/2017, 03:53 PM	#11
cflow Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2014 Location: Sacramento Posts: 792	I suppose I could. I'm sure my snails would love it. Or I could just protect the siporax from light some how.