Treating with Vitamin C

[redfishsc]

I wish I had an answer for you. This never happened to me after 2 years of dosing it.

Same as Jeff states, I still dose 100ml alk to my 100g system nightly. I also started dosing 2 years ago into a very well established tank.

Most likely in your situations, your tank is consuming the alk. My tank, at the moment, doesn't have many alk consumers. I do have a few growing SPS, and the corraline is beginning to grow (the system was upgraded in July with 1 established 20g and one new 25g, so a "new" system with half the rock being established).

Right now my tank just doesn't use much alk, so I think the buffer in the VC is just building up. I am going to switch to dosing glucose for a carbon source for the moment (except when I want to treat the tank for coral health).


For what it's worth, you can add a very tiny amount of the VC powder to your alk test kit (API for me) and definitely register a strong reading. I checked my tank and got the 13 dKH reading (turned green/yellow), and on a whim I tossed in a TEENY amount of the VC powder and it nearly instantly turned :smurf: blue.


I suspect the container may actually need shaking. It's possible the buffering agent could settle out and you get more buffer than VC in some scoops.

 

[SIR PATRICK]

Thx genetics. Great recomendation.

 

[sammie]

Anyone have a coupon code for Iherb???

One that works for repeat orders.

 

[Pufferpunk]

None will work for repeat orders, just 1st time.

 

[kmacartney]

I know that when you dose vinegar, it either raises alkalinity or fools a test kit into thinking it is higher. RHF wrote that in his kalkwasser article.

 

[Genetics]

I know that when you dose vinegar, it either raises alkalinity or fools a test kit into thinking it is higher. RHF wrote that in his kalkwasser article.

Fooling the test kit is certainly possible. Someone stated that mixing a tsp of VC with a gallon of tank water and then test made their alk higher. However, at the speed at which they tested was too quick for CO2 accumulation from VC degradation. Looking at the structure and keq values of VC it has the ability to interfere with test kits. This would be my rationale for higher alk reading short term. However, if you are accumulating alk over a period of days then there may be some other factor involved.

 

[Pufferpunk]

That would be like testing the ORP only after dosing & then saying it caused the ORP to drop permanently, when it only does that for a short while.

 

[Genetics]

That would be like testing the ORP only after dosing & then saying it caused the ORP to drop permanently, when it only does that for a short while.

Yes, it would be similar.

 

[kmacartney]

Fooling the test kit is certainly possible. Someone stated that mixing a tsp of VC with a gallon of tank water and then test made their alk higher. However, at the speed at which they tested was too quick for CO2 accumulation from VC degradation. Looking at the structure and keq values of VC it has the ability to interfere with test kits. This would be my rationale for higher alk reading short term. However, if you are accumulating alk over a period of days then there may be some other factor involved.

I began dosing vinegar mixed with my kalkwasser. So every time I checked my alk it seemed out of ratio with my calcium. Then I started adding straight CaCl to improve the ratio, but that just messed things up worse. Then after some research and some questions on here I found out that tidbit about the alkalinity just seeming higher.

So, I guess if you dose VC on a regular basis it might show higher alk values consistantly. I am not a chemistry teacher so this is just speculation.

 

[triguy]

I've been dosing for about 2 months. I started out slowly as per dosing instructions. For the last 2 weeks I've been dosing 20ppm. I recently have been purchasing more zoas and I'm seeing some thrive, some doing okay but not fully open, and some that continue to remain closed.

I don't see any signs of zoa pox, nudis, sundial snails, or other predators.

Just wanted to see if yo have any suggestions on what I should do. I did see you mention fungus on zoas in an earlier post. Thinking of doing a Furan-2 dip. How long should I wait to do this?

How long should it take for zoas/palys to open after acclimating to new tank? could it be that I have less lighting, parameters are different, etc....? I'll try and get some pics, so you can see the differences I'm seeing in my zoas.

 

[Jeff]

Triguy, many times people that that dose VC and dont get the exact same improvements that others get have other problems in their tanks. Like you noted, you may have problems with water parameters, skimming, lighting or flow. We would need a lot of information about your tank to help determine what might be going on.

 

[triguy]

Like you noted, you may have problems with water parameters, skimming, lighting or flow. We would need a lot of information about your tank to help determine what might be going on.

As of last night, here are my water parameters I tested:
pH 7.8
Temp. 80
CA 440
Alk 11dKh
Mg 1400
Ammonia .25
Nitrate 0

Other tank info: 90g, with 30g sump/refugium. I also run 4x54w T5 overdriven on Icecap Ballast and skimmer is AquaC EV120. 3 Powerheads include mod. MJ1200, Koralia 3, and Mod. Tunze.

Working on getting pictures up, but I did go ahead and start a Furan2 dip on about 4 frags that haven't really opened. It didn't seem like it could hurt them.

 

[Pufferpunk]

pH in a reef tank should be around 8.2-3. I like to keep my dKH between 8-10. Ammonia should ALWAYS be 0. What's your nitrIte?

 

[triguy]

pH in a reef tank should be around 8.2-3. I like to keep my dKH between 8-10. Ammonia should ALWAYS be 0. What's your nitrIte?

I didn't check my nitrite, but I will tonight. I figured my Alk was a bit high and I'm trying to figure out why I'm getting a reading for Ammonia. As for pH, doesn't it fluctuate depending on time of day you test? It was late last night.

 

[IridescentLily]

Bump to page 1

 

[ludnix]

I'll try and post pictures this weekend but I'm going on my 6th week of vitamin c dosing and I'm currently dosing for 5ppm.

So far my zoanthids are not doing any better with this small dosage, they continue to grow at a steady rate as they did before dosing. All of my cyano however, is completely gone. Prior to dosing I could eliminate the cyano by reducing my feedings to 3 cubes every other day. Now I feed 3 cubes daily as well as phyto, and frozen mysis and brine for target feeding corals with no sign of cyano in sight.

Based on dosing in the 5ppm range my observations have been that it works excellent as a carbon source for reducing nutrients, but I have no reason to believe it is affecting my corals in any significant way other than reducing excess nutrients.

 

[Pufferpunk]

Maybe up the dosage to 10ppm?

 

[ludnix]

Would that be to accelerate zoanthid growth? I didn't mean to make it sound like any of zoanthids are doing bad, I just haven't seen any significant change in growth rate since dosing.

 

[Pufferpunk]

It should. Mine grow like crazy & are more colorful than ever. Also accelerates LPS, SPS & other softies, like my leathers.

 

[ludnix]

I'm not so sure I want any more accelerated growth with my zoos and LPS! They already are getting to the point where they are taking up some prime realestate.

Is there an easy way to remove zoos without taking your rock out?