N/P reducing pellets (solid vodka dosing)

[rishma]

BRS PHA Biopellets vs TLF NPX Bioplastics

BRS PHA Biopellets vs TLF NPX Bioplastics

Any opinions on BRS PHA Biopellets vs TLF NPX Bioplastics? I guess these are two different plastics?

I need to place an order for salt fro DFS and some odds and ends at BRS. I have decided to try biopellets and the TLF is less than 50% the cost of BRS pellets. So what gives? Any reason I should use the PHA over the NPX?


Thanks in advance.

 

[thebanker]

I'd do more than pass it through a skimmer. Some precipitant will pass through a canister My understanding is it is about .5 micron from an earlier post by Boomer. Most filter socks in use are 100 micron.

The precipitant is nasty if the tank gets cloudy. I've seen ia yellow tang go down in a friend's tank where it was dosed right into the tank at 2ml of the brightwell's stuff for a 75 gallon. The healthy fish went down to the bottom within a few hours with labored breathing ; did not recover; lost it's equilibrium and died the next day. Folks have also reported problems with clams.

That being said, will activated carbon take it out? GAC is sorta like an ultra fine mechanical filter, right?

Or am I off base here?

 

[tmz]

I don't think GAC will. Gac is an organic adsorbent primarily. Sand filters are the most known effective application. Some use 5 or 10 micron socks with a slow drip and some filter floss. Personally, when I used it , I dripped it into an overflow which exits into a a can full of live rock out into a sock filled with floss and then over a bed of sand to the sump near the skimmer intake. I've only used small amounts rarely since I rely mostly on vodka and vinegar dosing .
I have also used it on live rock that was leaching PO4 in curing bins . In that case I just dumped it in and swished off the rock before placing it back in the aquarium.
I've heard some get by with the cloudiness around livestock but it's too risky for my taste.

 

[Aquarist007]

IME if you use both liquid and GFO it will knock out the PO4 faster. When the phosphates are gone change your GFO out and you will be good for a while.
Also you might not have enuff flow in your reactor, make sure the GFO on the bottom of the reactor is moveing around to. This is a mistake I made when I first started useing a reactor, I was told to have a light flow in the reactor so I just had the top of the GFO moving. I didn't see good results until I had the bottom of the GFO moving around to.

Yes, I was one of the guys that was told that too but over the last year have upgraded all of the maxijet600's to 1200 and have them going full power

That also stops the mulm from building up in the reactors.

The problem I am having in some cases is as the bryopsis dies some of it is being filtered through the reactors and plugging the small filter media in them.
Has any one run the tlf reactors without a bottom filter media?
I would think the top would be more important as the water is being pushed upward through the reactors

 

[Aquarist007]

The only thing I have that is close is my canister filter, in which I keep activated carbon, but no actual mechanical filter. My skimmer, I worry, is underpowered, and all of the LaCl would end up in the fuge. (in its precipitate forms of course)

If it is possible for you at this time I would invest in an excellent skimmer esp if using the pellets. The skimmer functions both as removing the dead excess bacteria produced in the reactors and adds oxygen to the tank which the bacteria consume.

 

[coltrref]

me the doubt arose as for the quantity of the product and every mark recommends a different dose: why?

some motive especially?

 

[coltrref]

me the doubt arose as for the quantity of the product and every mark recommends a different dose: why?

some motive especially?

I already modified it
will it be for to the size of the ?
or the used material?

 

[r0cksteady]

Bio Pellet Issues - Any advice appreciated

Bio Pellet Issues - Any advice appreciated

Hi All,

Some background\details first:

I started using NP bio pellets (in a reactor constantly tumbling) in hopes of helping with Phosphates as I have a very large tank (approx 510 gallons) and have a heavy bio load with a fully established reef (shrimp, anemones, corals, clams, inverts etc).

It's been very stable over the last few years but Phosphate was slowly creeping up and running Rowaphos in a reactor was starting to add up cost wise (I was using 1000ml a month) so instead I switched to every dosing 100ml Lanthanum Chloride diluted into 2.5gallons of RO/DI via a drip feed into my skimmer chamber that has a 10micron filter sock attached to the outlet changed daily.

I started by adding the NP Bio Pellets 1000ml the first week, another 1000ml two weeks later and a final 1000ml two weeks after that.

I am running 2 cups of GAC in a filter sock changed weekly and perform 20% water changes weekly.

Since adding the first batch of NP bio pellets I've had a massive explosion of Red Slime \ Cyno Bacteria and its only gotten worse and worse no matter what I do. I've lost countless colonies of corals so far due to this outbreak.

My phosphate hovers between 0.03 - 0.10 (on two different Hannah Checkers) and my Nitrate has been 0 (Salifert) since I've ever had my tank.

I've tried doing multiple large water changes 40% but this only seems to slightly slow the rate of slime growth.

Currently I'm trying to reduce the amount of feeding to every second day and I read that the bio pellets don't work well with an Ozonizer\Redox which was constantly at 400ppm.

Other than these two things I'm completely out of ideas as I originally thought it was due to Phosphate but even before I started focusing on phosphate I've never had Cyno even when it used to be 0.25 back in the day.

Should I reduce the amount the NP bio pellets are tumbling at the moment the top 30% tend to be bouncing around heaps whilst the rest is only slightly moving around?

Should I get rid of them totally or is it all a coincidence and I should ride it out?

Is my tank old enough to suffer from "˜Old Tank Syndrome' and need to replace some live rock?

My other ideas so far are reducing the MH lights down to 6 hours a day from 8 hours.

I looked into the new Red Sea NO3O4-X but I just think it's over complicating something I'm missing. I'm sure it's a matter of too much fish waste\food but am hoping to explore all other avenues before having to get rid of my larger fish\eel etc.

Please help!

 

[tntneon]

Hi All,

Some background\details first:

I started using NP bio pellets (in a reactor constantly tumbling) in hopes of helping with Phosphates as I have a very large tank (approx 510 gallons) and have a heavy bio load with a fully established reef (shrimp, anemones, corals, clams, inverts etc).

It’s been very stable over the last few years but Phosphate was slowly creeping up and running Rowaphos in a reactor was starting to add up cost wise (I was using 1000ml a month) so instead I switched to every dosing 100ml Lanthanum Chloride diluted into 2.5gallons of RO/DI via a drip feed into my skimmer chamber that has a 10micron filter sock attached to the outlet changed daily.

I started by adding the NP Bio Pellets 1000ml the first week, another 1000ml two weeks later and a final 1000ml two weeks after that.

I am running 2 cups of GAC in a filter sock changed weekly and perform 20% water changes weekly.

Since adding the first batch of NP bio pellets I’ve had a massive explosion of Red Slime \ Cyno Bacteria and its only gotten worse and worse no matter what I do. I’ve lost countless colonies of corals so far due to this outbreak.

My phosphate hovers between 0.03 - 0.10 (on two different Hannah Checkers) and my Nitrate has been 0 (Salifert) since I’ve ever had my tank.

I’ve tried doing multiple large water changes 40% but this only seems to slightly slow the rate of slime growth.

Currently I’m trying to reduce the amount of feeding to every second day and I read that the bio pellets don’t work well with an Ozonizer\Redox which was constantly at 400ppm.

Other than these two things I’m completely out of ideas as I originally thought it was due to Phosphate but even before I started focusing on phosphate I’ve never had Cyno even when it used to be 0.25 back in the day.

Should I reduce the amount the NP bio pellets are tumbling at the moment the top 30% tend to be bouncing around heaps whilst the rest is only slightly moving around?

Should I get rid of them totally or is it all a coincidence and I should ride it out?

Is my tank old enough to suffer from ‘Old Tank Syndrome’ and need to replace some live rock?

My other ideas so far are reducing the MH lights down to 6 hours a day from 8 hours.

I looked into the new Red Sea NO3O4-X but I just think it’s over complicating something I’m missing. I’m sure it’s a matter of too much fish waste\food but am hoping to explore all other avenues before having to get rid of my larger fish\eel etc.

Please help!

Hi rocksteady , i too had in the first month's an outbreak of cyano , that was consumining my hair algea for the last bits of N or P .
Even when the hairalgea was gonne it took my a while to get rid of it (especialy on the sand near rocks).
I did 3 things that work very well :

1) vacuum the cyano as much as possible in the display
2) rinse all deepfreeze food before feedings (+feeding in small dosages so that every thing got eaten)
3) i added vinegar in combo with the pellets ,uping it from 4 ml every 25 G a day to 10 ml every 25 g a day until it's gone , then slowly reduce the vinegar and let pellets do there work.

greetingzz tntneon

 

[rinconmike]

I am having so so success with the BRS pellets in a BR-140. I have a 150 FO tank with a wet/dry sump with bioballs. The tank was set up in March 2010. I run GAC in a BRS single reactor and GFO in a Jumbo Reactor. I really never had any hair algae issues, instead I have this red algae that is hard to clean off the overflow covers when I take them out. I also have it on dead coral skeletons but on there, there is a bit of fuzz.

I did start adding some BRS dry pukani Rock after I cured it for several months. I now have around 20 pounds of it in there. I added some on 5/1/11, then 5/25, and 6/4.

I stated running bio-pellets on 5/6 with 1 cup, I had a bloom within a week. Around 2 weeks later it went down. I added another cup on 5/29 and a few days later I got another bloom, but not as bad. It never cleared up all the way but I did add a 3rd and probably final cup of pellets on 6/12 (3 cups is the recommended amount).

My water is still cloudy. I am not sure if the cloudy water is solely due to the pellets or if I am over feeding. I feed every other day and have:

6" porc puffer
24" snow flake eel
6" red breasted wrasse
5" H. Butterly
2" blue damsel

I feed a prosalt frozen carnivore mix and sometimes do frozen prawns or silversides instead. I probably do a 1.5"x1.5" to 2"x2" chunk. I do rinse it 2 or 3 times with RO water after defrosted.

My nitrates did drop from over 50ppm to around 20 to 25ppm (maybe even less) using a salifert kit. When I started pellets, I stopped the GFO. However, my phosphates started to climb a bit and I noticed more of the red algae growing with a little of green on the rock I added on 5/25 so this past weekend I added the GFO back in and phosphates are back close to 0.

Phos readings using a hanna checker have been:

5/22/2011 - 0.15
5/29/2011 - 0.36
6/11/2011 - 0.48
6/13/2011 - 0.03 (after adding GFO back in)

I have been changing water at least 10% weekly. The first couple of weeks with pellets I did it twice a week.

One more note, the flow I have in my tank is return two pipes in each rear corner (it is a perfecto with two overflows). On the back wall, there is almost a line of where some brown algae starts on the wall. I starts around 1/3 down from the top. Above the line, the glass is clean, below the film starts.

Any comments are appreciated.

thanks,

Mike

 

[r0cksteady]

Thanks tntneon for the reply.

Rinconmike your referring to the same problem as myself with Cyno\Red Slime Algae so the same advice would apply.

 

[rinconmike]

is there a link on using the vinegar? What type of vinegar?

 

[r0cksteady]

I think ive figure out the problem after reading all over the joint, also reading up on Bio Pellets VS the new Red Sea Coral Care program.

Found this handy little post here: http://www.ultimatereef.net/forums/showthread.php?t=420101&page=6

Basically ive gotten my phosphates and nitrates down so low that its a battle of Cyno Vs Zooxanthellae to the point that my hard and soft corals are starting to fade. Im thinking because ive been manually pulling down Phosphates with the Lanthanum Chloride the NP Bio Pellets are kicking in and also reducing Nitrate and Phosphate which is basically meaning im not leaving the corals with much to work with. What do you guys think of that conclusion?

If this is the case then by me leaving the Redox off, Stopping dosing of Lanthanum Chloride, Siphoning the Red Slime Algae\Cyno, Doing regular water changes, running the skimmer wet things should become more stable BUT now ive got the issue of whether to dose trace elements etc like the Red Sea Nutrition \ Coloration Program? Mind you its not designed for larger tanks like mine and it means that 500ml would only last me 10 days. Is it worth a punt to try and get things back on track and then let nature take its course?

 

[tntneon]

nice link rocksteady :thumbsup:,
It confirms what i also was thinking and experiencing , if N / P are zero you got to feed more ( zoo -: phytoplancton and others) to keep the corals healthy.

greetingzz tntneon

 

[BuckeyeTodd]

Has anyone had starts and stops in production with pellets? I am running BRS pellets in Octopus 110 reactor. I had played around with another reactor for a month with bad results, and have been using in Octopus with proper tumble for a month. Last week for 2-3 days I got amazing production and thought the pellets had kicked in. I didn't change anything, and my production went back to normal. I am using an ATB Elegance skimmer, and so far can't even fill the cup once a week with a fairly heavy load.

I just order some microbacter 7 to try and seed the pellets, is there anything else I can do or is stopping and starting normal?

 

[Rhodes19]

Ditto, good link. I think that explains why my nitrates are 0 but my phos hangs out around 0.11 and why my fungi have turned from dark brown to pale brown. Oh, and why I'm now getting cyano. Time to get some GAC and feed my corals more.

 

[reeftivo]

any updates?

I have a BRS reactor, mag3 and pellets waiting in the wings but hesitant to start up.
I've been on zeovit for the last year and a half but dosing is problematic with my travel.
PO4 has climbed a bit because of inconsistent dosing (0.14) but trates are 3 ppm, so I'm trying to get my phosphate down below.03 before I install the reactor.

Any suggestions or advise on whether the pellets will maintain low levels if I really dont have a serious NO3 problem. I'm just looking for an easier alternative to the zeo dosing for now.

Thanks in advance

Tivo

 

[TheFishMan65]

If you only have P and not N then I don't think pellets will work for you. The bacteria need both and without both they can't grow.

I think you need to look for a food with less phosphate or try GFO.

 

[reeftivo]

Thanks,

Been running GFO overnight and just checked at lunch and PO4's coming down fine (now 0.09 hanna photo). I'll just continue zeo dosing and remove the GFO when numbers are good.

Still would like to run the BP's later on to see what they'll do but won't be trying them until numbers are better. I was hoping that as long as both PO4 and NO3 were balanced (even though low), that the BPs would still be able to maintain similar levels.

Thanks again for the reply

HAppy Reefing

Tivo

 

[Reefist]

My 210G tank (70G sump 30G ref.)is 6 month old and I have all the things I need . I have a TLF 550 reactor , 400ML TLF NPX biopellets and 10ML of Zeobac. I also have MB7 that I use once a week.
Besides the obvious(putting in screens and hookup), what is the procedure?
How much of the pellets do I use?
Do I seed the pellets with Zeobac? How?
I'd like to start slow and gradually increase pellets .I just don't know what the amount you would use to start.
Nitrates are at 10. No phos test kit since I never got a reading with any .
No cyano
I do have Mangroves growing in my sump( not sure that means anything though)
Thanks
Tom