N/P reducing pellets (solid vodka dosing)

[DJREEF]

Originally Posted by thebanker

What I'm saying is that the skimmer takes out proteins and oily organic molecules that will degrade, via biological processes, to PO4, NO3, and other things while sitting in the skimmer cup. Of course you would find PO4 and NO3 in the skimmer sludge, but when the skimmer pulled them out of the water, they were part of something else.

I.e. what I'm saying is this, if you ran a skimmer on a bucket of water with a high concentration of PO4 and NO3, it wouldn't make a dent in either.

Exactly. That's what I was saying, too .

DJ

[tmz]

I agree with both of you.
Perhaps a bit more on removing PO4 and N03 will be helpful to some readers.
Neither NO3 nor PO4 or are amphipathic and are not attracted to the air/water interface ;thus , not skimmable. The bacteria bind them up as organics and make some of them more skimmable. The smell from the skimmer cup is decaying organic matter.

These inorganics PO4 and NO3 do not have an affinity for adsorbtion by granulated organic carbon ,either. When they are part of an organic compound, gac is very effective at removing some of them . Some note gac is significantly more effective at reducing total organic carbon including dissolved organics than skimming. Though it seems lots of particulate organics flow out of the skimmer when carbon dosing and the aeration gained from skimming is also very important particularly with more bacteria consuming more O2.

[thebanker]

Does that mean DJ and I both win a prize?

[tntneon]

yes , you have won the pelletzer price ...

[staggeringwade]

Okay, so i ran my aquarium with out light for the last 2 days to try and kill off the GHA. Well it is working, but I turned the DT lights on to feed the fish and to my surprise I have either a bacterial bloom from the pellets or the GHA dying back has caused the water to cloud up?
I am running a 6"+ sugar fine DSB that kept my no3 at zero, but the sand beds surface is turning splotchy black-kinda like if you dig down into the substrate.
I was planning on allowing the DSB to just kinda dissolve down and not make it a dsb anymore as long as the ecobak pellets are handling the no3 in the future.
So here is another oddity.
My phosphates are at zero with the hanna checker, and my no3 is at zero too.
I'm not so sure I feel excited that the biopellets are working yet.
I thought I needed some no3 in my system to keep the pellets bacteria flourishing?
I plumbed my biopellet reactor output directly into the front of the euro reef skimmer pump using a tee. Is that okay?
How long does the bacterial bloom usually last-if it is from the bio pellets?
Is it wise to run with lights off for another day or two to keep killing of GHA or am I trying to do too much too fast?

[staggeringwade]

Who else is having their hanna phosphate checker go thru AAA batteries like dirty socks? I get about 2 uses out of a battery a week.
I purchased a pin point ORP probe to kinda guage things while I start using ecobak pellets and the thing goofs up my ph readings on the digital aquatics RKE.
Wade

[borcu]

Originally Posted by migas_01

can some of these pellets be removed and dried and reused latter?

any ideas?

[jason2459]

Originally Posted by borcu

any ideas?

Yes, I just went through doing just that. Started up again just like it was the first time.

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk

[borcu]

thank you.

[thebanker]

Originally Posted by thebanker

Here's an odd question. Is it bad to tilt your pellet reactor? When mine is tilted at a slight angle, the pellets fluidize on the upward facing side the most, and it will move the entire mass of pellets in a slow vertical gyre... Whereas if the reactor is level the pellets will clump and form channels under their own weight.

Originally Posted by Scej12

If you can get good motion that eliminates the clumping effect - then I say go for it. tweak yours toward your best individual performance. SJ

Originally Posted by SimonSKL

Excellent idea! I am using an Eheim 1250 pump (317gph) that hardly moved my 600ml pellets in a NextReef MR1 reactor. By tilting the reactor a slight angle, most of my pellets are now moving with the pellets facing the upside the most. Thank you Banker!

What I've been doing is tilting my reactor every other day to keep the pellets moving around - and tilting it in opposite directions. SimonSKL, I'm glad that this is working for you. I'm running about 250 ml in a Phosban reactor with ~290gph flow from a MJ1200. I'm wondering if it's really beneficial, or it just appears to be moving more of the pellets. Time will tell I guess!

Originally Posted by thebanker

Does that mean DJ and I both win a prize?

Originally Posted by tntneon

yes , you have won the pelletzer price ...

That's funny tnt.

[tmz]

Originally Posted by capn_hylinur

tom, I am directing this to you as you have a superb background in bacteria

The main aim is to 'remove' as much bacterial mulm as possible, leaving only traces to make it through to the system as coral food (a poor one at that compared to real zoo-plankton it must be said)..."

In my particular system I added the np pellets to increase bacteria for the corals. The system took care of phosphates and nitrates by the use of two 40gal refugiums and dsb's.
If this is the case I maybe should remove the pellets and return to the phosban reactor although I am enjoying the crystal clear water.
My tank is totall lps corals and softies also.

Sorry
I missed this earlier.

The benefit of the bacteria grown from carbon dosing as beneficial food vs any pathogenic effects from organic carbon buildup or the bacteria themselves is largely unknown and I suspect variable from tank to tank and coral to coral. If I didn't need carbon dosing to control NO3 in a high bioload system , I personally wouldn't use it.I do run refugia ,gac,gfo,etc in an effort to minimize the amount of organic carbon I use.

[tmz]

Originally Posted by thebanker

Does that mean DJ and I both win a prize?

Well I can't beat the "pelletzer prize", great pun, but I can thankyou both for taking the time and making the effort to share information and offer a wish that we all grow beautiful and healthy aquariums.

[bertoni]

Originally Posted by staggeringwade

...I have either a bacterial bloom from the pellets or the GHA dying back has caused the water to cloud up?
I am running a 6"+ sugar fine DSB that kept my no3 at zero, but the sand beds surface is turning splotchy black-kinda like if you dig down into the substrate.

I would do some water changes and make sure the skimmer is in good shape. Bacterial blooms can be a serious problem.

The black areas in the sandbed are anoxic zones. There might be a fair amount of hydrogen sulfide in them:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-12/rhf/index.php

[tmz]

Staggering Wade,

I agree sounds like sulfides left from hydrogen sulfide gas .

Yes the bacteria need some nitrogen and phosphate to flourish and consume the organic carbon from the pellets. You may be inadvertantly supplying organic carbon to the bacteria in the sand bed and without oxygen or nitrate the sand bed will become anoxic and sulfate reducing bacteria will flourish creating toxic hydrogen sulfide as a by product.

In addition to the water changes and heavy skimming noted by bertoni, I'd stop using the pellets for now and run some gac . Enhnaced flow in the tank may help as well.

[staggeringwade]

Thanks, for the info.
Wade

[tmz]

You are welcome. Good luck.

[Aquarist007]

Originally Posted by tmz

Sorry
I missed this earlier.

The benefit of the bacteria grown from carbon dosing as beneficial food vs any pathogenic effects from organic carbon buildup or the bacteria themselves is largely unknown and I suspect variable from tank to tank and coral to coral. If I didn't need carbon dosing to control NO3 in a high bioload system , I personally wouldn't use it.I do run refugia ,gac,gfo,etc in an effort to minimize the amount of organic carbon I use.

thank you for taking the time to re back into the thread Tom

I started a thread here to see if there is more input on the benefit of bacteria from carbon dosing

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...7#post17940717

[DJREEF]

Originally Posted by tntneon

yes , you have won the pelletzer price ...

Cripe, I just threw up in my mouth.
You know Tnt, I think I know you well enough now, that you probably didn't even need to spend that much time thinking that one up.
DJ

[DJREEF]

Originally Posted by staggeringwade

Who else is having their hanna phosphate checker go thru AAA batteries like dirty socks? I get about 2 uses out of a battery a week.
I purchased a pin point ORP probe to kinda guage things while I start using ecobak pellets and the thing goofs up my ph readings on the digital aquatics RKE.
Wade

I have the phosphorous checker and haven't needed to change the batteries once in 15 uses. I think the one u got is bunk.

DJ

[Aquarist007]

Originally Posted by DJREEF

Cripe, I just threw up in my mouth.

DJ

yeah, those pellets are nasty when you get them in your mouth
You might want to turn off the power head before you clean out the reactor next time DJ

[Aquarist007]

Is there any problems with continuing to run a uv sterilzer while using the pellets?

[staggeringwade]

I just performed a good size water change and took out 75% of my biopellets, rinsed them off and put them aside to dry well.
I'm also running fresh GAC. Reduced my GFO too.
I just read the article on hydrogen sulfide Bertoni recommended i look over and it almost made sense.
I have a birdsnest acro that has started to RTN because of this ordeal. Maybe the fast reduction in phosphates (.007 to.000 in two days)
I was using biopellets as a way to keep phosphates down to stop the constant battle with GHA.
Obviously the bacterial bloom has made my skimmer foam up like crazy today.
If the tank looks bad tomorrow, I just may scrap the whole biopellet thing, and just keep researching.
I also noticed that my coraline algae has quit growing- it started bleaching when I added my LED array-however the corals loved it.
Now I have coraline algae peeling off of the back of my DT in sheets.
The biopellets are obviously doing more damage than good. I can't really blame the biopellets, because I'm not a scientist so I don't fully understand what the reactions are here.
I think the overall lesson here may be don't use biopellets with a dsb and zero no3 even if you have high phosphates.
Any more insight would be helpful-I sure enjoy reading this thread.
Wade

[DJREEF]

Originally Posted by capn_hylinur

Is there any problems with continuing to run a uv sterilzer while using the pellets?

I wouldn't. You want the excess bacteria to remain alive long enough to either become food, or get skimmed out. Dead critters release their energy back into the system. Kinda counter productive.

DJ

[staggeringwade]

Update & Summary of events:
After the two days of lights out and my sand bed started bringing black splotches to the surface, after running the lights for two days on, the blackness has mostly disappeared.
My DT still has cloudy water after 4 days (lost count) from the bacterial bloom.
Other than the one birdsnest that is dyingback, everything appears to be doing great. All of my parameters are in check, all animals are looking good.
I did another test on a 40 gallon breeder that has a 6" sugar fine sand bed and live rock with a couple fish. No equipment other than a little aquac remora.
I ran the lights off for two days and the sand bed start leaving black splotchy spots at the surface too?
So I'm kinda thinking maybe I'm stumped. I'm running a very small amount of ecobak now, maybe 250 ml on my 120 gallon DT with 60 gallon sump.
I don' have but 4 fish and quite a few corals.
I don't mind adding some more fish to the system, I just don't have fish readily available where I live. Petco just carries clowns and fish that are not reef safe. (or the tangs are all sick with ick.)
Plus I hate to add fish to a tank with a bacterial bloom because I don't fully understand the science here.
I feel like I should have just left the bio pellets alone at 1000 ml and seen what happened because I still a bacterial bloom.
Am I now prolonging the bacterial bloom by reducing the pellets?
Nitrates and phosphates still at zero, refuguim plants looking bad (which was to be expected) and GHA still hanging on, but looking like it is about to die off.
I was planning on running my DT with lights off again to help kill off the GHA but the black stuff on the sand bed was frightening. I scooped up a little sample and it didn't smell like hydrogen sulphide, and my tank water smells clean (for seawater).
Wade

[tmz]

Originally Posted by capn_hylinur View Post
Is there any problems with continuing to run a uv sterilzer while using the pellets?

Hi. I don't run the sterlizers with carbon dosing. It's counterintuitive but it could be argued that it may be useful in limiting any pathogenic effects excess bacteria may bring. Dead or alive the bacteria are still organic and can be exported before they break down.Perhaps someone who is using them in this situation could share some experience.
Similarly some use ozone along side carbon dosing even though it kills some bacteria but it also helps breakdown organics and seems to raise the efficiency of granulated organic carbon in exporting them.