N/P reducing pellets (solid vodka dosing)

[jason2459]

Originally Posted by sirreal63

The whole RUGF thing is just a fad, no one will be using them in 40 years. LOL

Paul, I wondered how long it would be before you noticed this thread and the RUGF ideas being presented.

I think he does a forum search daily for anyone mentioning RUGF. I think the thread count is up to three now.

[tmz]

anen, Why do you wan't to dose organic carbon ( via pellets, vodka ,vinegar etc.) if your nitrates are at 0?

Add more fish if you wish.

I'd then wait and see if your current system supports them while keeping low nitrates low without carbon dosing. High total organic carbon as can occur with dosing can be harmful.
BTW Chaetomorpha takes up nitrogen and phosphate . It also helps reduce CO2 and raise O2 levels.

Varied sources of organic carbon such as polysacharrides( pellets),vodka( ethanol) monosacharrides( glucose/etc) advantage various strains of bacteria. The variety may be of some benefit or the opposite in that certain strains may be more harmful than others. For example, acidogenic bacteria that breakdown sugars seem to have an adverse effect on certain corals based on several anecdotal accounts and some studies demonstrating adverse effects in corals related to high total dissoved organic carbon and particularly glucose.

[izzy123]

Originally Posted by Paul B

Wow, what a totally new concept on the cutting edge of technology. Who would have thought?

[anen]

My nitrates have always tested 0, I started the tank with very established live rock. May this be the cause if there is no bacteria on the pellets?

My phosphates were around 1.25 before I added the gfo and chaeto. After the addition which was a few months ago I have always gotten 0 on a elos test kit. I purchased my first acro frags a couple weeks ago and they're all browning, if not already brown. I got a hanna meter and it gives me readings between like .03 and .06. I then took a water sample to someone with a $200 meter not sure the make, where I was getting a .09.

Originally Posted by HighlandReefer

anen,

What is your nitrate and phosphate level currently at? Is your phosphate level stabilized or does it rise at all? Was your nitrate level high before using the pellets or did it read zero?

[DJREEF]

Originally Posted by Paul B

Wow, what a totally new concept on the cutting edge of technology. Who would have thought?

I was wondering when you were gonna catch wind of this. Welcome aboard Paul.

DJ

[anen]

I want to dose do reduce my phosphates. My acro frags turned brown when introduced to the tank, and from my understanding it is more than likely due to phosphates?

Originally Posted by tmz

anen, Why do you wan't to dose organic carbon ( via pellets, vodka ,vinegar etc.) if your nitrates are at 0?

Add more fish if you wish.

I'd then wait and see if your current system supports them while keeping low nitrates low without carbon dosing. High total organic carbon as can occur with dosing can be harmful.
BTW Chaetomorpha takes up nitrogen and phosphate . It also helps reduce CO2 and raise O2 levels.

Varied sources of organic carbon such as polysacharrides( pellets),vodka( ethanol) monosacharrides( glucose/etc) advantage various strains of bacteria. The variety may be of some benefit or the opposite in that certain strains may be more harmful than others. For example, acidogenic bacteria that breakdown sugars seem to have an adverse effect on certain corals based on several anecdotal accounts and some studies demonstrating adverse effects in corals related to high total dissoved organic carbon and particularly glucose.

[HighlandReefer]

anen,

Simply put, you don't need to use these biopellets, your nitrate is at a zero reading without them. You need to use a product like GFO to reduce your phosphate to a zero reading. After that you can stop and see if your phosphate remains at a zero reading. If not use GFO for maintenance.

You only use these pellets for nitrate reduction when you can't keep the nitrate levels down. They won't work for phosphate reduction for any serious amount. They may cause more problems than any possible good in your situation.

[tmz]

Originally Posted by anen

My nitrates have always tested 0, I started the tank with very established live rock. May this be the cause if there is no bacteria on the pellets?

My phosphates were around 1.25 before I added the gfo and chaeto. After the addition which was a few months ago I have always gotten 0 on a elos test kit. I purchased my first acro frags a couple weeks ago and they're all browning, if not already brown. I got a hanna meter and it gives me readings between like .03 and .06. I then took a water sample to someone with a $200 meter not sure the make, where I was getting a .09.

PO4 at .09ppm won't interfere with calcifiction by sps or lps enough to notice,ime, provided your alkalinity is constantly at a level with the acceptable range (7 to 11 dkh) and other water quality/parameters are in good order. Salifert notes .15ppm aa critical level with .25 as inhibiting calcification. I'd still try to lower it to under .05ppm but doubt .09 accounts for the browning. I ran my sytem at .1 or so for a long time without any browning.
Carbon dosing will reduce some PO4 if sufficient nitrogen is available. As Cliff noted it takes a lot of nitrogen to enable bacteria to use a little PO4 . Thus as a primary strategy for reducing PO4 ,carbon dosing it is quite limited. Gfo will do better particularly in a tank with 0 nitrates. Perhaps you need to use more gfo or change it more frequently. If cost is an issue you could check out the thread on regenerating gfo which is a relatively easy process and allows resuse multiple times.

[bluereefs]

duh, is me again , lol
Anen, if you do not see any bacteria, stronger and stinkies skimmate/skimming, if your pelets are same size in 6 months, then IMO they do not work.

Bp can work on aquarium with 0 nitrates/phosphates, and can create bacterial bloom as well on those aquarium. In this thread are already few expirience from people who come from zeovit system with so called ULNS system and they also get bacterial bloom what is proof that bio pellets can produce big amount of bacteria in those enviroment.

Locally I know for few people who start bp in almost brand new aquarium with undetectable nitrates and phoshates on test kit (salifert) no algae or any sign of elevated nutrients in aquarium (white clean sand, clean rocks (reef ceramic) ) and they get bacterial bloom as well, actually extreme example of bp usage in my posts are one of that aquarium who use only 200 ml of bp in 200 g capacity aquarium, everything more then 200 ml create bacterial bloom.

There is always food and nutrients in aquarium, if we have working live bacteria in aquarium (and we must have them otherwise our aquarium will not work at all) then we can use bp. We must have bacteria on rocks, sand, glass, equipment ... in aquarium to work properly, so bp must work and must create bacteria even when we measure 0 nitrates, 0 phosphates. If bacteria can not be present in bio pellets when nitrate/phosphates are 0 then we will not have bacteria at all in our aquariums under those condition.

[Paul B]

I hope it never catches on, I like having the oldest tank on here and I don't have to worry about calcification, bio pellets, Vodka dosing, DSBs, Chaetomorpha (I don't even know what that is) Carbonite hardness and all of these other things many people worry about

If I had to think about all of that stuff I would get a stroke.
My test kit came in a wooden box and the directions say to keep in a cool chariott.
I throw some food in the tank, wave hello to the fish and go out with my wife and have a nice glass of merlot with dinner.
Have a great day but most of all, have fun.

[Toadally]

your browning may be due to lighting...

[wilba777]

Hi All,

Been following this thread and others simular to it for ages and finally decided to take the plunge.
My system is aprox 500l, 5x2x2 with 3x1.5x1.5 sump. Its been running for 18months and I had been dosing vodka for 10 months. My reason for changing over is that although the vodka kept my nitrates down, (5-10) I developed a horrible light brown stringy covering on my rocks, when touched it turned into dust. I tried VSV for 2 months but the covering still persisted.
I stopped dosing altogether 6 weeks ago, the covering is now covered with cyno and my nitrates have risen to 25, phosphate is 0-0.03 (using GFO in DIY reactor).
My story so far with BPs
I added 1l of the BP to the system on Tuesday night after soaking them for 24hrs, they are in a deltec reactor running at a slow boil with the output right in front of my FM ultraskim 2 skimmer inlet.
Wednesday morning woke up to find both my skimmers overflowing, cleaned the cups and turned them right down (almost on lowest settings). By the evening had to empty them both again, never seen that amount of gunk come out of them!
Woke up this morning to find the tank in bloom, its not as bad as some of the pics I have seen, I can still see from end to end. The Orp has dropped to 270 from its normal 320-350. I have added activated carbon to help clear it up and will turn the ozone on tomorrow if its not clearing up. Combined my skimmers are rated for 1600l (heavy stocked) so should be able to handle the excess dead bac.

Cheers

Grant

[anen]

Toadally,
I have a 40 breeder, sps placed towards the top. I'm running an ATI sunpower with 3 month old ATI bulbs. The guy I bought the frags from was running LEDs. Doesn't seem like it would be too much or too little to me?

I can't remember if the browning occured during the dip or after, but I would say the browning took place the same night so I would rule lighting out.

Originally Posted by Toadally

your browning may be due to lighting...

[bluereefs]

one picture from the left side of aquarium to show water clarity, aquarium are 130 cm long, water clarity are excellent

[tntneon]

nice picture bleureefs !
How often do you have to clean your glass ?

greetingzz tntneon

[bluereefs]

thank you tntneon, I clean glass aprox once a week, glass never get comletly covered with algae, biggest problem are coraline algae as you can see per picture. And in the bottom I get brown algae, is hard to clean them because the corals are close to glass so I clean them once or two per months.

[ryanuuy]

Hi guys,

Im a total noob in biopellets. My tank is a 120g 4x2x2ft display with a 50g sump. My total water volume is about 110 gallons(i have a lot of live rock in my display). I asked around locally and what the other reefers suggested is that i use 500ml of biopellets for 100g of water. Is that right?

And also where i am from, the only reactors that we have here are the Phr 70 from reef octo(for phosphates) and zf-1000 from reef octo(zeo reactor). Would either of those be okay to run the biopellets?

Heres a link to the zeo reactor pic. Its the zf 1000 model.
http://www.reefphilippines.com/forum...p?f=41&t=10673

Heres a link to the phosphate reactor:
http://aquariatech.multiply.com/phot...A_NO3#photo=16


Thanks for the help!

[bluereefs]

ryanuuy, I use reef octopus reactors, both bigger and smaller, my diy reactor is octopus calcium reactor. I would advise starting with small amount of bp, 100 ml and ading each week another 100 ml until you come to 500 ml mark, slowly adition of bp is more safe way to avoid bacterial bloom.

I do not used new ZF100 reactor so I can not speak from expirience but IMO that can be optimal reactor for bio pellets, first he have small holes on platforms what prevent bp to escape and there is no need for sponges or modification, second he have posibility to shake the pellets what is great advantage, and he have the valve to control the flow inside reactor, just everything what is needed for bp.

[tntneon]

hi ryanuuy ,

-Yes that would be the recomended amout for your system , however you could begin with less ( say 1/3) and upping it gradualy over a couple month's.
Because in serveral cases blooming has occured , this you could expect when having high nitrates (don't know if that's the case ? )

-The zeo reactor is a nice but expensive piece of equipment , just be sure that there ain't no filter pads in there , these clog up very fast reducing flow and possibly creating dangerous conditions (H2S).
I do like the stirring rod in those reactors this is a good practice with BP too.

greetingzz tntneon

[ryanuuy]

thanks bluereefs and tntneon for replying so quickly! im actually really excited to give this a try and i think ill go with the zeo reactor since its only a little bit more expensive compared to the phosphate one!

[tntneon]

We where probably posting at the same time bleureefs , but as you see i share your opinion

Once a week cleaning your glass , thats something i can dream about , now i'm back to 2 daily glass cleaning .
I think my BP's are now really worn out , and that it is realy time to replace them again .
I also see that my Chaeto (in fuge) is growing like before the BP's (=really fast ) and that coloration of my acro is less .

This week i'm gonna buy me the new formula Bp's at my LFS , they look a bit darker and have a different shape .


greetingzz tntneon

[bluereefs]

tntneon, please post a picture of new formula bio pellets when you can. Well you use them more then a year, is sure time for more of them, keep us updated with the results from new formula

[tntneon]

hi bleureef ,
i already changed them about 5 to 6 month's ago , so it isn't a year that i use them
but it is sure time to change them , will post pics of the new ones this week

greetingzz tntneon

[Aquarist007]

I have two client tanks that have plagued me for over a year with bryopsis and brown algae I do weekly water changes
One is a 65 gal and the other a 40 gal--both mixed reefs and both do not have refugiums or sumps.
Last Wednesday i installed a reactor with np pellets on the 65 gal and yesterday on the 40 gal.
Both have adequate skimmers.

Today I checked the 65 gal and was amazed at the water quality already, A further bonus was that all the lps corals had there polyps extended
No nuisance algae had accumulated on the glass.

On my particular system I am running two 40 gal refugiums with deep sand beds and chaeto algae. I cranked up the flow through the refugiums last wed when I installed the first np pellets on the 65 gal.
To day I noticed little difference in my corals

Question
Do refugiums introduce bacteria back to the tank like carbon dosing or the np pellets do?

[tmz]

Not in the same way and probably not in the same voume but algae exudates do add dissolved and particulate organics which are fair game for microbes.