Biopellets yay or nay?

[isomorphic85]

I've got some sort of algae issue going.... cyano, diatoms, hair algae... think I have a bit of it all.

Nitrates are around 15 in the tank at the moment after a 20% water change... I believe they were substantially higher before this around 25-30

My question is this... am I smart to add a biopellet reactor to combat nitrates moving forward?

Currently there are only 2 ocellaris clowns in a 150 gallon tank with some snails.

I'm trying to look long term at this though will adding a bio pellet reactor be smart to start now planning for the future when the bio load increases, corals added etc?

I've heard and read so many contradicting things about bio pellet reactors... some people have had great luck with them while others have had major issues..

it seems everyone agrees that it's beneficial to add the biopellets when your nitrates are already at a low range to prevent other blooms happening from the sudden reduction in nitrates that the reactor causes?

It also seems to me that if i'm running gfo and then I add bio pellets as well that I could potentially be taking too much of the nitrates out ? is it possible to "clean" the water too much?

so confused on biopellets and the truths behind them any clarification is appreciated.

 

[CStrickland]

bio pellets are a form of carbon dosing, they are a dissolving solid but its the same idea as nopox, vodka, sugar, vinegar etc. etc. Some of the basic info about carbon dosing applies to them too. Here's a decent article about it http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2008-08/nftt/
The idea is that there are 3 things that bacteria really needs: carbon, nitrogen and phosphate. The last two also happen to irritate coral and fertilize algae. Some times in our tanks there is plenty of N (as nitrate) and P, but not much C, so if you add it you have like bacteria steroids and they use all three up together.

Personally, I like carbon dosing for polishing out the last little bits of nutrients if you want super clean water. I'd use it for like 5ppm and lower. 15ppm of nitrates isn't an emergency but it's pretty high. I'm happy if mine stay below 10 and they are usually <5 unless I freak out and rearrange the tank or something dies. A lot of people shoot for less than 1 (too much work for me lol). If I were you I'd figure out whats going on with your nutrient export first, like fixing the problem instead of putting a bandaid over it. Nitrate issues are common and a lot of the time its a simple fix.

 

[isomorphic85]

anyone else out there running bio pellets? thoughts ?

I believe nitrates were high due to not frequent enough water changes which I will be on top of at this point.

 

[heathlindner25]

put them online and run them they will lower your nitrates,Carbon dosing is tricky at first, have to learn how to feed heavy with a low nutrient system

 

[mjl714]

Bp's reduce our 75g heavily feed fowlr tank's nitrates to undetectible with Salifert. The only noticeable downside, imo, is that they are a little messy. Do other user notice this also?

 

[whosurcaddie]

Bio pellets are harder to manage than some poeple might think. People put them online and then corals start dying when they strip the water of nitrate. Being able to manage bio pellets is extremely important.

If you become nitrate limited bio pellets will serve absolutely no purpose but to keep nitrate at zero. Once your at zero nitrates, phosphates will no longer be pulled from the water. This is where it gets tricky You need addition of nitrate to keep pulling phosphate but phosphate gets removed much slower than nitrate. One method that's used a lot is heavy feeding. I don't like this method because the nitrate gets reduced faster than the phosphate does so you end up with this build up of phosphates. Some people don't notice it at first but then algae starts to grow. Now the bio pellets don't seem to be working and the reefer reaches a tipping point where they're tank is overloaded with phosphates and corals start to recede and die. Well they are working they are bottoming out your nitrate and once your nitrate limited phosphate wont be removed <--- broken record.

I run bio pellets but I also dose nitrate. That's the key you have to keep from reaching zero nitrate. Once you achieve this balance you will continuously remove phosphate. If you think that you're just going to throw a bio pellet reactor online and think it will solve all your problems then I would start out dosing vinegar first. If you want to manage the biopellets and your not afraid to dose nitrate then I say go for it. Its one of the best ways to keep your nutrients at a low level.

I dose calcium nitrate. 1/2 a tablespoon will raise your nitrates to 2.5ppm in a 120 gallon tank. That's what I dose once a week. If nitrate gets any higher than 2ppm then I don't dose that week and let the pellets do their thing.

 

[daquan44]

I recently installed a bio-pellet reactor and cyano exploded in my tank. I don't think the pellets were necessary for my setup, because my Nitrates were zero, and my phosphates were maintained at a level below .03. I was experimenting with other options to cut costs on GFO, but I really don't spend that much on GFO anyways. I tried a ATS but I couldn't get algae to grow in it. My cheto grows like a champ though. Long story short, if your setup doesn't need it, don't add it. I believe pellets work well for the hobbyist who need to feed their system heavy.

 

[shifty51008]

If you only have 2 clowns in a 150 gal tank and you have nitrate issues i would be looking at other things like not enough rock, not enough flow, ect. As you have something not right, that size tank should handle nitrates comming from the ammonia of 2 clowns easily

 

[isomorphic85]

shifty51008 I agree with you completely... I have 120 lbs of rock in there ...

The only thing I can think of is that I hadn't done a water change in about 4-5 weeks. I will be on top of the weekly water changes at this point and see where I end up.

I would think in a properly balanced setup though that even going 4-5 weeks without a water change the nitrates should still be getting reduced and not building up.

 

[isomorphic85]

I appreciate everyone's input... I think i'm going to hold off on the bio pellet reactor for a bit longer .... and see what happens to my levels and try and figure things out a little better before making the leap into bp.

no corals yet... so it's not as critical for me to keep ultra low nitrate levels.

 

[ScienceRulez]

I'm not sure I am a bio pellet fan. When I took over the tank here, the previous caretaker had 4 reactors with bio pellets and the nitrates were still very high. I got rid of 3 reactors, set one up with carbon, the remaining reactor, I took half the bio-pellets out, and it seems to be doing better, but what really dropped the nitrates was the refugium. The bio-pellets never seemed to do that much.

 

[Reef Frog]

Is your tank new(ish)? It takes some time for the anaerobic bacteria mostly found deeper inside the LR to mature and grow in number to the point where the nitrates can be converted to nitrogen gas which will leave the aquarium entirely. This is why many new tanks have that big initial algae event - introduced nutrients are often greater than the anaerobic biota's ability to process them.

Also, phosphate is a major algae fuel and may need to be addressed.

 

[slgcmg]

Guess I know why I can't get my phosphate below .5. My nitrates have been zero forever



QUOTE=whosurcaddie;24168721]Bio pellets are harder to manage than some poeple might think. People put them online and then corals start dying when they strip the water of nitrate. Being able to manage bio pellets is extremely important.

If you become nitrate limited bio pellets will serve absolutely no purpose but to keep nitrate at zero. Once your at zero nitrates, phosphates will no longer be pulled from the water. This is where it gets tricky You need addition of nitrate to keep pulling phosphate but phosphate gets removed much slower than nitrate. One method that's used a lot is heavy feeding. I don't like this method because the nitrate gets reduced faster than the phosphate does so you end up with this build up of phosphates. Some people don't notice it at first but then algae starts to grow. Now the bio pellets don't seem to be working and the reefer reaches a tipping point where they're tank is overloaded with phosphates and corals start to recede and die. Well they are working they are bottoming out your nitrate and once your nitrate limited phosphate wont be removed <--- broken record.

I run bio pellets but I also dose nitrate. That's the key you have to keep from reaching zero nitrate. Once you achieve this balance you will continuously remove phosphate. If you think that you're just going to throw a bio pellet reactor online and think it will solve all your problems then I would start out dosing vinegar first. If you want to manage the biopellets and your not afraid to dose nitrate then I say go for it. Its one of the best ways to keep your nutrients at a low level.

I dose calcium nitrate. 1/2 a tablespoon will raise your nitrates to 2.5ppm in a 120 gallon tank. That's what I dose once a week. If nitrate gets any higher than 2ppm then I don't dose that week and let the pellets do their thing.[/QUOTE]