Biopellets for Nutrient Reduction?

[dowtish]

Thanks dowtish, any reason you use the pellets from Warner Marine's vs Bulk Reef Supply?

I dont know the origin of the brs pellets, but i do know that when the bio pellet craze happened, a lot of suppliers just bought up the cheapest bio degradeable polymers that were available. Not checking the purity or make up of them. And i do know that warner marines pellets are made from a totally different polymer than anything else on the market. They are proven to be more pure and have a different shape for more surface area for the bacteria to colonize.

Typed from my phone because I have nothing better to do.

 

[jefftse]

I just started to run bio pellets today and I have ozone and UV. Do I need to turn them off?

 

[dan-in-gr]

The nice thing about bio-pellet users is that there is a lot of fact & fiction in the use of bio-pellets and there results. From what I see, everyone seems to have different amounts depending on their tank and each tank is different in amount of live rock, sand bed, corals and type, amount of fish, water flow - circulation pumps, etc.

For my 120 I was using about 400ml of pellets but nitrates were still at 10ppm, I now have around 900 ml of pellets (BRS) and now have about 0 ppm. I run GFO and Carbon and all of my acro/SPS are doing great, and I have 5 larger fish in tank and 175lbs of rock. Feed twice a day

In my past 90 gal, I had all acro/SPS with 125 lbs of rock and only a couple of small fish, very light bio load, and the 500 ml of pellets keep my tank at 0 ppm of nitrates and everything grew excellent also. Fed once a day.

So you can see, two different tanks and bio-loads all will affect the amount of required bio-pellets. I am also a believer in that you can have much more in pellets without any negative effect. I agree a good skimer is a must.

 

[rogerwilco357]

can you use the coral snow with the pellets on line ?
So if you have the gfo and gac then add the pellets should you take one or both away?

 

[dowtish]

I just started to run bio pellets today and I have ozone and UV. Do I need to turn them off?

UV treats the waterstream and waterborne bacteria but residual ozone in the water may contact the pellets and kill the bacteria.

 

[JT3069]

UV treats the waterstream and waterborne bacteria but residual ozone in the water may contact the pellets and kill the bacteria.

uv will destroy the DNA in single celled organisims,not allowing them to reproduce.
most people will put the effluient of the reactor going into the skimmer to further help
with cyano. this will allow more bacteria to be removed from the tank.

 

[jefftse]

I'm so torn.. I have a lot of fish.. and I see ich comes and goes.. I have UV and Ozone and they make me feel better.. but I feel like I need to choose either UV or bio pellets....

 

[naterealbig]

jeff - none of the above will cure you fish of ich. There are only 2 scientifically proven methods to rid your fish of this parasite; hyposalinity and copper. This isn't the thread for this discussion, and it appears bio-pellets have their advantages - but keeping the ich off your fish is not one of them.