no water changes, no nitrate?

[Reefin' Dude]

it is all about the largest phosphate sink in the system. the larger the phosphate sink the longer one can wait between water changes. a good depth DSB can bind a lot of phosphates.

not going several years without water changes does not sound that surprising if one knows what is going on in the substrate. it is all good and fine until the substrate reaches maximum capacity, then the fun starts to happen. depending on the organisms and the trophic environment one wants to emulate. if a system is a softie system, then water changes and the like are not nearly as important. the system is meant to be eutrophic. the opposite is true for SPS. as the substrate runs out of binding sites the nutrient levels go up and the greater the need for phosphates to be sunk using other methods. whether that is another DSB somewhere else, GFO, ATS, whatever. the bigger the sink the bigger the amount of phosphates that can be held onto.

Floyd R Turbo- how deep is your substrate? what corals are you keeping? from reading the boards. a substrate phosphate sink seems to last about a year for every inch of depth. i would not be surprised about your results unless you say your substrate is less than 3" deep. though the fact that you are able to grow an ATS is already showing that your substrate is reaching saturation. less and less phosphates are able to be bound within the substrate, more and more are becoming available to other organisms. if your phosphates were truly zero, than you would not be able to grow the ATS. no matter how much light you have on a screen of plastic, if the nutrients are there, than the algae will not grow. if you are keeping a eutrophic softie system, than the ATS can be used as a great biomarker for determining where you are on the trophic scale for keeping the corals happy. if you are keeping SPS, than the ATS growing algae is just a sign that the system is becoming eutrophic.

G~

 

[ReeferBatman]

Reefin' Dude - Good info.

Pistol Shrimp is a great addition to help stir up the sand-bed!

 

[brad65ford]

they are relying on the phosphate sponge in the substrate. calcium carbonate is a fantastic phosphate binder. just like GFO and aluminum oxide. the more calcium carbonate the more binding sites available for the phosphates. lucky for us, the bacteria are able to remove phosphates from calcium carbonate. unfortunately there is gravity. over time phosphates migrate slowly down through the substrate until they reach the bottom of the tank. at which point the process stops, luckily for us i stops with the calcium carbonate having the last say since it is a true chemical binding reaction. the deeper and finer the calcium carbonate substrate the longer the phosphate sponge will act like a sponge until needing to be cleaned.

water changes do little for controlling nitrates and phosphates. water is just a carrier, it is not the source of the nutrients. that is detritus. if the detritus is able to work its way down through a substrate then there will be a low level of nutrients in the water column.

here is a chart showing the various nutrient export methods we use and which nutrients they go after. take special note of the arrow directions and the number of arrows going into and out of the substrate and algae (ATS's/Chaeto). note which methods make the most use of the arrows.

ATS do not remove phosphates from the system until they are exported. until that point the system is still becoming more eutrophic from feeding the system. looking at the chart above note that the phosphates that ATS/Chaeto (even GFO for that matter) get to only become available after the bacteria have released them from their organic sources. they are after the fact phosphate removers. a day late and a dollar short to the phosphate party. they are not helping to lower nutrient levels at the source. like turning on the fan in the bathroom to remove the stink instead of just flushing the toilet.

define 0 nitrates and phosphates. hobby test kits are not able to give us the precision we need to get to the zero level for algae growth. phosphates on the reef are 0.005ppm, nitrates less than 0.1ppm. these would be zero levels for what we are talking about. unless we are reading to this accuracy, having anybody say they are reading zero is incorrect. the only indicator we have that our levels are here is if there is algae growing in the system. if non-hermatypic algae is growing in the system, then the levels are above oligotrophic level, the levels listed above.

any stirring or siphoning of a substrate allows new resources to enter the phosphate sponge and removes bacterial flock that can clog the sponge allowing the sponge to function properly. there is nothing wrong with using a substrate for what it does best bind phosphates, but in order for it to do its job it must be maintained just like any filter or sponge. it needs to be cleaned before it becomes so clogged that it can no longer bind any new phosphates.

from being on the forums for a while. the average time it seems for a substrate to start showing signs of eutrophication is one year for each inch of substrate in the display. obviously more phosphates sinks in other areas of the system can extend this, but this seems to be the formula. it is always a good idea to ask somebody who says they have zero phosphates/nitrates and does not do regular water changes how old the tank is and how deep is the substrate. it absolutely is possible and is shown all of the time, that this "works", but it will only "work" until the sponge is "full". at which point it needs to be cleaned. even in SW we need to clean up after our pets. we can not just hide it in the litter box forever.

G~

My god this is the best post ever, I haven't been on this forum in a while. G how is your new tank doing?

 

[shifty51008]

Ive had medical issues for the last 9 months so i had my tank on auto pilot, other than refilling the fish feeder and filling the ato i did nothing to the tank in that time. My skimmer was still running but i had it set to low so all it was basically doing was produceing oxygen.

Now that things are getting better i finally cleaned the glass of the coraline and everything looked great, corals, anemones and fish seemed happy as can be still. My fuge however was filled completly with cheato which helped alot though. So after i did trimming and cleaning i ran some tests:

Salifert nitrate = 0
Hanna phosphate checker = .02

However my cal, alk and mag were low which was to be expected for not dosing anything but kalk.

But even though everything did great in that time i wouldnt say to stop doing water changes as they still replenish other things other than cal, alk and mag.

Btw my fish list is: choc. Tang, 4 clowns, lawnmower blenny, banggai cardinal, 2 anthsis. So i wouldnt say it is a huge bioload.

 

[Shawn O]

A lot of this is going over my noob head but I think I'm grasping most of it. I intend to do a DSB in half my tank and SSB in the other half. Thinking of running a small bio-pellet reactor to keep nitrates and phosphates real low to prevent DSB saturation. Will the bio-pellets keep the DSB from becoming saturated for a much, much longer time or just a small percentage longer?

Also, on the RDSB, I've seen some using a 5gal bucket as a RDSB. Can this be run until saturation and then just dump the sand and refill the bucket with new sand and then be good to go?

 

[CStrickland]

A lot of this is going over my noob head but I think I'm grasping most of it. I intend to do a DSB in half my tank and SSB in the other half. Thinking of running a small bio-pellet reactor to keep nitrates and phosphates real low to prevent DSB saturation. Will the bio-pellets keep the DSB from becoming saturated for a much, much longer time or just a small percentage longer?

Also, on the RDSB, I've seen some using a 5gal bucket as a RDSB. Can this be run until saturation and then just dump the sand and refill the bucket with new sand and then be good to go?

Have you seen the "dsb in a bucket" thread? It's really long and covers the whole idea pretty well. Also google Anthony Calfo's work for more rdsb info.
If you study carbon dosing, you'll understand biopellets (tho I guess some think that the bacteria prefer to colonize the reactor over rocks and sand, idk why that would be).

Seems kinda complicated tbh, if your 1/2 dsb 1/2 carbon system works you won't really know which did the trick and if it fails you won't know which to drop. As a noob I think it's better to choose a method and give it a chance to work, picking a little from each pot can get complicated and messy. Like the good advice you hear about copying a tank you like, there's just so many variables in reefing to control that if you pick and choose you are liable to miss something.

Unless you want a jawfish or something, that'd be worth the trouble I guess

This is the dsb in a bucket thread: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=595109

 

[Nynke]

http://www.dymico.com/

they are testing it now, next year it will come out.

No water changes
DyMiCo efficiently removes waste products such as ammonia, ammonium, nitrite, nitrate and phosphate.
No additives
DyMiCo also releases calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate and trace elements to ensure vigorous coral growth and attractive coloration.

 

[shifty51008]

http://www.dymico.com/

they are testing it now, next year it will come out.

No water changes
DyMiCo efficiently removes waste products such as ammonia, ammonium, nitrite, nitrate and phosphate.
No additives
DyMiCo also releases calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate and trace elements to ensure vigorous coral growth and attractive coloration.

Intresting but then again your gonna have to dose alot of other thangs that water changes replenish.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

Intresting but then again your gonna have to dose alot of other thangs that water changes replenish.

you beat me to it.

No water changes
DyMiCo efficiently removes waste products such as ammonia, ammonium, nitrite, nitrate and phosphate.

Should read "No water changes for purposes of nutrient reduction"