my rice experiment

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genetics, if you see a few posts up, you will notice that I did the phosphate leaching test on RO water.
This was just a bottle of water with rice in it for a little over 24hrs.
it leached 0.1ppm phosphate in 300ml of water, so this is a very small amount going even into a nano.
if you see the pic of the test for po4 in tank water, its undetectable. which means that the bacteria consumed whatever was leached from the rice and the po4 that was in my tank.
and if organic phosphate is broken down into inorganic phosphate, the bacteria will consume it as soon as it is broken down, so again nothing to worry about

the only thing is, I think you should start with 1/4 cup for every 100g water volume and work your way up so that you dont shock your inhabitants.
 
well I haven't written my daily update yet as I havent tested my water params but everything looks good otherwise and I have no algae growing on my glass today none! still haven't tested for oxygen yet, it's been a busy day
 
icycoral said:
well I haven't written my daily update yet as I havent tested my water params but everything looks good otherwise and I have no algae growing on my glass today none! still haven't tested for oxygen yet, it's been a busy day
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sounds good icycoral
do you have no3 and po4 params before the rice?
looks like its just a few days for the rice to kick in, I wonder if I can patent this and call it "reef rice", $50 for 500ml in a zip-lock bag
lol
 
Very cool experiment. Reminds of me science projects in school. But doesn't the rapid decay of the rice requires you to refill the reactor often? So wouldn't the cost increase over time? How often had you refill your reactor already?
 
kkil4life said:
genetics, if you see a few posts up, you will notice that I did the phosphate leaching test on RO water.
This was just a bottle of water with rice in it for a little over 24hrs.
it leached 0.1ppm phosphate in 300ml of water, so this is a very small amount going even into a nano.
if you see the pic of the test for po4 in tank water, its undetectable. which means that the bacteria consumed whatever was leached from the rice and the po4 that was in my tank.
and if organic phosphate is broken down into inorganic phosphate, the bacteria will consume it as soon as it is broken down, so again nothing to worry about

the only thing is, I think you should start with 1/4 cup for every 100g water volume and work your way up so that you dont shock your inhabitants.
Click to expand...


I am not sure the fact that the rice leached little phosphate in r/o water means that the rice is still not adding substantial phosphate to the system as it is consumed by the bacteria in saltwater. First, the bacteria in a marine environment which break down the rice is probably not present in substantial quantities in r/o water, and therefore, the small amount phosphate which leached out in the r/o water from the rice imo does not mean much because it is still probably bound up in the rice and not broken down much by bacteria. Second, the fact that you did not test any phosphate in the tank water with the rice being dissolved therein does not mean that substantial phosphate is not leaching from the rice which is not being consumed by bacteria. The algae in your system could be simply taking up all the phosphate leaching from the rice and therefore is undectable in your test kits. Since the pictures of your system show you have substantial algae, I would be more convinced that the rice is not leaching any phosphate into the system not consumed by bacteria if rice was used on a system with little algae and still showed no increase in phosphate readings and/or increased algae growth.
 
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jjsan said:
Very cool experiment. Reminds of me science projects in school. But doesn't the rapid decay of the rice requires you to refill the reactor often? So wouldn't the cost increase over time? How often had you refill your reactor already?
Click to expand...

surprisingly the rice is holding up pretty well. I haven't had to replace or top off the rice even once so far.
infact even if you need to replace the rice in one or two months, its still cheaper than GFO and the bio-pellets and is readily available
 
Stuart60611 said:
I am not sure the fact that the rice leached little phosphate in r/o water means that the rice is still not adding substantial phosphate to the system as it is consumed by the bacteria in saltwater. First, the bacteria in a marine environment which break down the rice is probably not present in substantial quantities in r/o water, and therefore, the small amount phosphate which leached out in the r/o water from the rice imo does not mean much because it is still probably bound up in the rice and not broken down much by bacteria. Second, the fact that you did not test any phosphate in the tank water with the rice being dissolved therein does not mean that substantial phosphate is not leaching from the rice which is not being consumed by bacteria. The algae in your system could be simply taking up all the phosphate leaching from the rice and therefore is undectable in your test kits. Since the pictures of your system show you have substantial algae, I would be more convinced that the rice is not leaching any phosphate into the system not consumed by bacteria if rice was used on a system with little algae and still showed no increase in phosphate readings and/or increased algae growth.
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OR if you look at it this way, my system has algae growing due to po4 being present. correct?
now with the rice the algae is dieing.
algae is dieing, and po4 tests out zero po4.
doesnt this mean that the bacteria is consuming the po4?

ALSO, this is why I have decided to trim back the algae rather than let it die on its own. I've clean up parts of the glass and powerhead. I haven't cleaned the rocks yet. if the algae grows again, this means that either I need more rice or more bacteria.
lets see how this goes......but ur input is valuable and I will definitely see how I can improve my testing methods. and since this is just day 4, we still have some time to prove that rice is a viable method of reducing N and P.

I really hope I can prove you wrong. :)
 
kkil4life said:
. if the algae grows again, this means that either I need more rice or more bacteria.
lets see how this goes......but ur input is valuable and I will definitely see how I can improve my testing methods. and since this is just day 4, we still have some time to prove that rice is a viable method of reducing N and P.

I really hope I can prove you wrong. :)
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Or if the algae grows again, it may mean that the rice is contributing more phosphate to the system then the total bacterial mass potential of the system can consume in a timely fashion. I wish you the best of luck with your experiment, but I too am extremely cautious about this approach because I have a hard time accepting that by adding so much additional phosphate to your system with the rice that you are doing anything but increasing phosphate levels despite what bacterial mass gains may occur from the addition of the carbon in the rice. It is important to note that bacteria take up many times more nitrate for each unit of phosphate. Therefore, when you add phosphate to your system, it requires much more bacterial mass to remove the phosphate than it would to remove the same amount of nitrate. As such, you would need to gain a vast amount of bacterial mass from the carbon in the rice for each unit of phosphate added to your system from the rice, or you will otherwise have residual phosphate. I just very much doubt that this is the case.
 
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Stuart60611 said:
Or if the algae grows again, it may mean that the rice is contributing more phosphate to the system then the total bacterial mass potential of the system can consume in a timely fashion. I wish you the best of luck with your experiment, but I too am extremely cautious about this approach because I have a hard time accepting that by adding so much additional phosphate to your system with the rice that you are doing anything but increasing phosphate levels despite what bacterial mass gains may occur from the addition of the carbon in the rice. It is important to note that bacteria take up many times more nitrate for each unit of phosphate. Therefore, when you add phosphate to your system, it requires much more bacterial mass to remove the phosphate than it would to remove the nitrate. As such, you would need to gain a vast amount of bacterial mass from the carbon in the rice for each unit of phosphate added to your system from the rice. I just very much doubt that this is the case.
Click to expand...

even if the phosphate is added into the system, there is very very little po4 in rice. approx 115mg per 100g. so that means 0.115g. this is much less that what you add with some foods
 
ok, I've been reading up on rice for a bit, and I think we might have a minor problem.

FIRSTLY before I believe what I read, does anyone know if rice contains COPPER or SILICA?


icycoral, can you test for SILICA as well?
 
"Minerals Nutrition in White Rice (Cooked)
Calcium (Ca) content (mg per 100g) 19
Iron (Fe) content (mg per 100g) 1.13
Magnesium (Mg) content (mg per 100g) 12
Phosphorus (P) content (mg per 100g) 42
Potassium (K) content (mg per 100g) 37
Sodium (Na) content (mg per 100g) 3
Zinc (Zn) content (mg per 100g) 0.31
Copper (Cu) content (mg per 100g) 0.094
Manganese (Mn) content (mg per 100g) 0.26
Selenium (Se) content (µ per 100g) 8.2"

http://www.calorie-counter.net/calories-potatoes-rice/white-rice-cooked.htm
 
highland what does this mean?
is it a cause for concern?
copper was the obvious thing I checked for before trying this experiment, but somehow it slipped me
should I stop the rice? or do you think the carbon will pull it out?
 
The addition of the copper may be why the algae is dying, and the rice could still be adding phosphate to the system. Similar to why Kent's Tech M is effective at killing algae. The raised magnesium levels from adding Tech M do not kill the algae, but rather it is the metal impurities in the Tech M.
 
kkil4life said:
I'm currently not worried about the po4, but rather the copper.
do you think that those levels are even a little dangerous?
Click to expand...


I have no idea, but my prior comment was directed at showing that the fact that your algae is dying does not mean that the rice is not adding phosphate to your system but may instead be the result of the copper addition contained in rice. Someone with more knowlege about copper needs to advise on whether this is a dangerous amount of copper to add. I will chime in and state that I do know natural sea water contains a small amount of copper as well as many other things found in the ocean. As such, the fact that the rice has some copper may not be a problem. The amount of copper I think is what is critical.
 
I am aware that natural sea water has copper. but I dont know if the copper in rice would effect anything since its less than 0.1g per 100g of rice. and I would think that I must have used 50g of rice. so that means the copper amount is also half?
WILL DEFINITELY RUN MORE CARBON IN THE MORNING!!!!
 
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