N/P reducing pellets (solid vodka dosing)

[Runfrumu]

I started using the NP pellets yesterday, I've put 200ml in a phosban reactor while I wait for my NextReef smr1 to come in.

Ive had good results using the IO nitrate reducer on my smaller tank, but that route would be too expensive on my 125. My nitrates and phosphates are both pretty low, and just basically looking for a way to keep it that way as the tank gets older.

 

[drummereef]

...I hope my new ones work better this time. I'll keep everyone posted.

Dave, totally not knocking what you have experienced with the bio pellets but do you think your skimmer has something to do with the lack of response you've had from them? As in, do you think the skimmer just isn't powerful enough to rid your system of excess bacteria and nutrients as the pellets mature?

Don't know if you've discussed that in the past but trying to figure out what's going on with all the bacteria blooms etc I've been seeing in this thread.

Today I got a bacterial bloom in the display from my large reactor...

ari - What size system are you running the large reactor on and what skimmer do you use?

 

[daveonbass]

NOPE.

I have an oversized skimmer that works great, and I've never had a single bacteria bloom. (dont know if you thought I did?)

I'm pulling more skimmate now with the SWC BP's than I did with the NP.

 

[drummereef]

NOPE.

I have an oversized skimmer that works great, and I've never had a single bacteria bloom. (dont know if you thought I did?)

I'm pulling more skimmate now with the SWC BP's than I did with the NP.

OK great, no I didn't think you had a bacteria bloom problem just knew the pellets weren't working. Glad you are seeing more results so far with the SWC pellets. I'm running the ecoBAK pellets and it seems like they are starting to kick in. Time will tell...

How many ml's are you running on your 58g?

 

[daveonbass]

well...im not seeing any results yet. I'm just saying that the skimmer never pulled out any good nog with the NP pellets. But now it's almost back to normal. The guy at SWC sent me 250ml, it's rated for 50g. It should be fine. With all my rock and sand the tank is about 40-50g total water volume.

 

[Flems]

No bacteria bloom here but I have found that the output side of my reactor is a little slimy.

 

[mano84]

well...im not seeing any results yet. I'm just saying that the skimmer never pulled out any good nog with the NP pellets. But now it's almost back to normal. The guy at SWC sent me 250ml, it's rated for 50g. It should be fine. With all my rock and sand the tank is about 40-50g total water volume.

Sorry if I understood incorrectly but are you saying that your skimmer never worked as good as usual when you had NP-biopellets in the tank?

 

[bluereefs]

Hello,

Organic carbon is the third nutrient. It is often ignored because we as hobbyist can't measure it. Relatively new very expensive equipment is available for scientific research and has been used to gather data on organic carbon levels in the sea,surveyed reef tanks and aquariums as well as it's effects on corals. In brief, it feeds non photosynthetic bacteria, and in excess it is thought to upset the corals holibont bacteria creating pathogenic activity.

Here is one article with a good amount of detail and references in it:

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/8/aafeature3

I don't think there is a practical way to tell the levels
of organic carbon in our tanks. But certainly adding more via a carbon source will raise it without attention to export via skimming and even more so granulated activated carbon. This is why I think the pellets could be good if they do in fact keep the carbon out of the tank as opposed to direct tank dosing methods such as sugar for example.. Monitoring orp drops might give some indication that it is building up but not with any precision or reliability, in my opinion.

I can't explain why organic carbon in water would not be taken up by bacteria. Perhaps the observation was inaccurate or influenced by some unknown external variable or the actual pellets used were not biodegradeable( ie had no organic carbon in them).

Thank you for very informative article tmz.

I use/used activated carbon for long time, he was always most important filtration system for me.

I asking about organic carbon efect because, what is quite contrary whit other people bp expirience, my PE get smaller with bp usage. I have very good PE in my corals from the begining and without bp, including sps, when I get bacterial bloom or I close to him PE on my corals get very small. After so many bacterial bloom PE on my corals are sign for me for bp control. I start with very small bp amount, and check the polyps, if PE are normal I add another 100 ml, so far I come to amount of aprox 500 ml on 150 g, nitrate are droping and PE are very good. Bacterial production in reactor are very good, sponge get cloged every 24 max 48 hours as well as micron filter bag mounted on reactor outlet ( I use sponge and filter bag for visual control of bacteria production inside the reactor) . Even I think that this amount of bp and this amount of bacteria are on the wedge for PE, more bp wil probably made PE smaller and probably lead to bacterial bloom, what I wont to avoid this time.

 

[bluereefs]

Results from my 5 days old experiment with functional bp (taken from functional bp reactor) and non functional bp (taken from my non functional bp reactor), both bp are put in aquarium water from aquarium where they work or not work. Both example create bacteria in a jar with aprox 200 ml of water, non functional bp took longer to create bacteria but after few days bouth samples are equaly cloudy and there are visible bacteria strings on surface and bp as well on both samples.


One more thing I noticed, kh in those sample jump, is actually almost double higher then original sea water from those samples are taken. I just measured kh on my aquariums and for testing I decide to measure kh in those experimental jar to find does bacterial bloom cause significant kh drop, to my suprise I find double higher results in jar. Used are brand new salifert kh test. Dont know if bacterial bloom in any way influence kh testing and screw the results, that is beyond my chemistry knowledge.

 

[bluereefs]

Now the most important part of the "jar" experiment, nitrate mesaure
1 jar : bp and water sample are taken from 150 g aquarium, from functional bp reactor, 22.08.2010 when I was take the samples nitrate was 50 mg/lit, in aquarium and in the jar. Today 5 days latter nitrate in jar are 0.

This is very interesting for me because there are no bacteria removal from the experimental jar, like we have in aquarium with skimmer, bacteria completly neutralize nitrate.

Same results are from second jar, taken from non functional reactor and from my second aquarium, I did not have nitrate measure from that aquarium because I used last salifert test kit for measuring main aquarium before 5 days, yesterday get new nitrate tests. Nitrate in second jar are also 0, completly transparent water sample in salifert test kit, no changes in colour whatsoever.

Some more interesting data.
My diy reactor what I use in main aquarium and who is functional acording to bacteria production and skimming finally start to work and took nitrate from 50 mg/lit to 5-10 mg/lit in 5 days (betwen last measure).

In my second aquarium where are the non functional bp reactor, no bacteria production, no stronger skimming and loots of algae (mostly red type/no cyano/) nitrate are 2 mg/lit today, before month was 50 mg/lit. So algae drop nitrate more eficinenly then bp. When I wrote loots of algae I dont main hair algae everywhere, I do have green back glass/film, and pvc pipes, pumps, overflow have loots of red fern algae, reef keramik what I use instead of live rock as well as send are very clean.

 

[tmz]

Corals closing could be due to a rapid drop in N and P or a reaction to the by porducts and activities related to the breakdown of carbohydrates in the pellets to sugars particulary if there is excess C.
Some Lps, particularly corals like cataphyllia jardinei come from lagoons and such where P and N are higher than on high reefs, so they could have a tough time adjusting to the ultra low N and P levels. My lps ,leathers ,softies and some non photosynthetics and sps do well with PO4 around 0.04ppm and nitrate betwen0.2 and 0.5ppm For me Scolymia, Lobophylia and Entamacea quadricolr reacted badly to sugar dosing.

 

[tntneon]

...One more thing I noticed, kh in those sample jump...

Hi bleureefs ,

firstly thanks for the effort of doing this experiment , it is very intressting and writting down the results (in englisch) :thumbsup: , i know from my own experience that it ist'n easy ....

In a PM's with Jptenklooster , he somewhere told me that the pellets had some mild increassing effect on KH values , i can imagine if you contain them in a much smaller container/jar that the effect would be stronger.

If i find the time (and the mail ) i will search that mail and post it here in englisch.

greetingzz tntneon

 

[jlinzmaier]

Hi bleureefs ,



In a PM's with Jptenklooster , he somewhere told me that the pellets had some mild increassing effect on KH values , i can imagine if you contain them in a much smaller container/jar that the effect would be stronger.

I can't imagine what would cause them to increase alkalinity, but if they do, then that's another variable that I wouldn't want the pellets to have an effect on. If this is true, then the more pellets you use the larger effect it would have and there would be a continual change in the alk impact as they are "consumed" and decrease in size.

I planned on using a small amount of pellets just for an added food souce (bacterioplankton) for my corals but I'm not even going to mess with them if they're going to affect my alk levels. Alk stability is far more important than the benefit of some additional bacterioplankton for my tank.

Jeremy

 

[bluereefs]

I can't imagine what would cause them to increase alkalinity, but if they do, then that's another variable that I wouldn't want the pellets to have an effect on. If this is true, then the more pellets you use the larger effect it would have and there would be a continual change in the alk impact as they are "consumed" and decrease in size.

I planned on using a small amount of pellets just for an added food souce (bacterioplankton) for my corals but I'm not even going to mess with them if they're going to affect my alk levels. Alk stability is far more important than the benefit of some additional bacterioplankton for my tank.

Jeremy

FWIW I dont think bp will cause any sudden spike in alk in aquarium, my aquarium spent loot of kh what I need to substitute with calcium reactor or buffers, actually due to reduction of kh in my aquariums I thought that was due to bacterial bloom and bp, testing show me that, at least in experimental jar, kh drop are not due to bp or bacterial bloom.
Kh in my second 110-110 g aquarium with 1000 ml of bp and without calcium reactor are 6,4, need to get him up.

 

[trunks1622]

I just recently got some biopellets and will be trying them out on my system. Just a few months ago, my tank did a mini crash and lost quite a few corals. My tank seems to be stabilizing now but I can't get my nitrates to go down. I'm going to see if the biopellets works. Its been on my system for 3 days now and I've noticed my tank has gotten cloudy already. My skimmer is working very hard that I have to clean my 2 litre pop bottle twice a day and top off my water with RO/DI daily. I will be testing for nitrate and phosphate soon.

 

[DJREEF]

Hi bleureefs ,

firstly thanks for the effort of doing this experiment , it is very intressting and writting down the results (in englisch) :thumbsup: , i know from my own experience that it ist'n easy ....

In a PM's with Jptenklooster , he somewhere told me that the pellets had some mild increassing effect on KH values , i can imagine if you contain them in a much smaller container/jar that the effect would be stronger.

If i find the time (and the mail ) i will search that mail and post it here in englisch.

greetingzz tntneon

Funny that you mention that because I've been having a helluva time keeping my alk below 12 recently, but then my systemic alk consumption isn't all that great either. I suspect that the additional carbon is somehow ending up as disolved carbonate in the system.

DJ

 

[DJREEF]

I can't imagine what would cause them to increase alkalinity, but if they do, then that's another variable that I wouldn't want the pellets to have an effect on. If this is true, then the more pellets you use the larger effect it would have and there would be a continual change in the alk impact as they are "consumed" and decrease in size.

I planned on using a small amount of pellets just for an added food souce (bacterioplankton) for my corals but I'm not even going to mess with them if they're going to affect my alk levels. Alk stability is far more important than the benefit of some additional bacterioplankton for my tank.

Jeremy

Honestly Jeremy,

I really don't think it would be a problem in a full blown setup like yours. The consumption rate would easily outstrip the carbonate output from the pellets. It would just mean that you would have to buffer less.

DJ

 

[bluereefs]

Dont know if I get something wrong or mix the products but I think I read somewhere that new bp version (gen 2) will be without carbonate or something like that what was used as a filler.

 

[tmz]

I really don't think it would be a problem in a full blown setup like yours. The consumption rate would easily outstrip the carbonate output from the pellets. It would just mean that you would have to buffer less.

DJ


Hi,
Do we know the alkalinity increase is carbonate alikalinity?

 

[drummereef]

I just recently got some biopellets and will be trying them out on my system. Just a few months ago, my tank did a mini crash and lost quite a few corals. My tank seems to be stabilizing now but I can't get my nitrates to go down. I'm going to see if the biopellets works. Its been on my system for 3 days now and I've noticed my tank has gotten cloudy already. My skimmer is working very hard that I have to clean my 2 litre pop bottle twice a day and top off my water with RO/DI daily. I will be testing for nitrate and phosphate soon.

[welcome]


I would get an airstone in the display asap. Sounds like a bacterial bloom to me.