Vodka Dosing Experiment

[Gondore]

As I think some of you know I have been considering trying out a bacteria driven system in my tank for some time. I looked at Zeovit, Neo-Zeo, Prodibio, etc. After my recent visit to Detroit to visit Sunny's tank I finally decided to take the leap. For those of you who are not familiar with Sunny or his tank here is a little info:

Recent FTS:

Thread:
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1436138&perpage=25&pagenumber=1

As you can see his colors are awesome in this picture and even look better in person.

The purpose of this thread is to track my progression while dosing Microbacter7, Vodka, Lugols, and Amino Acids. I have a few more changes I would like to make on the tank down the road but for now I am going to try and keep things as consistent as possible. I will be posting a weekly picture of my tank and what I dosed.

My skills at taking a FTS are still lacking but here is this weeks picture:

I will be dosing the following this week (it should be noted that dosages are based on a total of 100 gallons):
- 3 drops Kent Lugols weekly (starting today)
- 4 drops Brightwell MicroBacter7 daily (MB7)
- 5 ml Brightwell Potassium daily

 

[Fireworm]

Can't wait to follow this one.

David,

When i did the potassium dosing, I didn't see much difference in my corals at all with the Brightwell potassium, but I did notice a HUGE difference with the potassium from Gary at get tanked. Just a little FYI

Looks great, and I can't wait to see the results. My cousin is doing the Vodka on his 30 breeder last I talked to him, will be neat to see his results as well

 

[Gondore]

Alright, time for my weekly update. Here is my dosing for this week:

06-26-2009

- 4 Drops MP7
- 3 Drops Lugols
- Removed 9 min of Alk dosing from 7:00 am to 7:09 am to lower Alk to 8.
- 5 ml Potassium

06-27-2009

- 4 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium

06-28-2009

- 4 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium

06-29-2009

- 5 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium

06-30-2009

- 4 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium

07-01-2009

- 5 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium
- Added the 9 min back for Alk dosing to stabilize the Alk at 8.

07-02-2009

- 5 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium

07-03-2009

- 4 Drops MP7
- 5 ml Potassium
- 4 Drops of Lugols
- 0.2 ml 80 proof Vodka

And here is the picture for this week:

I decided to turn off my GFO reactor today since I started Vodka. I will be closely monitoring my phosphates to see what happens. Overall the only difference I have noticed so far is an increase in the clarity of the water.

 

[JCR's Reef]

Looks like your greens and reds are a little better.
See you got rid of the Star Polyps too...
I thought Lugols had Potassium in it. Curious to why your dosing Potassium daily?
I can tell a difference in the look of your tank. Potassium brings out alot of blue's. Maybe you could also document a specific type of coral as well?....You still scared witht the vodka method??

 

[mojo~]

The potassium from get tanked sooms to have a dirty foam around the edges in the premix I made up.

 

[Gondore]

Well from reading recently I found that potassium and potassium iodide on are not the same. Lugols contains potassium iodide while the Brightwell production contains potassium sulfate. I believe what my tank my be lacking is potassium iodide because my purples and blues are not where I want them to be. Here is an article that discusses this some:

http://www.reefbuilders.com/2008/09/03/guide-of-sps-coral-coloration-make-them-more-vivid-bright/

 

[Fireworm]

Dave,

I have used both the potassium from Brightwell and Get tanked. The stuff from brightwell was a waste of money. I got no results out of it what so ever. The potassium from get tanked gave me a huge difference in coral color. I highly recommend the Potassium from Gary at Get Tanked.

 

[Gondore]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15309290#post15309290 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Fireworm
Dave,

I have used both the potassium from Brightwell and Get tanked. The stuff from brightwell was a waste of money. I got no results out of it what so ever. The potassium from get tanked gave me a huge difference in coral color. I highly recommend the Potassium from Gary at Get Tanked.

Can you check the ingredients of the Get Tanked potassium Phil?

 

[Fireworm]

Jesse has some of it now. I used it on the 90, but have not re ordered it yet.

 

[mojo~]

I think I will buy the liquid form from now on.

 

[SeasonedReefer]

Can some one give me a quick rundown on Bacteria driven systems? Every tank has bacteria, is the dosing of these products just suping up the bacteria? I know Vodka dosing is popular with kalwasser dosing which I use on and off for calcium and alk. But i don't understand what it has to do with the color of your coral and stuff like that.

 

[Gondore]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15326373#post15326373 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by SeasonedReefer
Can some one give me a quick rundown on Bacteria driven systems? Every tank has bacteria, is the dosing of these products just suping up the bacteria? I know Vodka dosing is popular with kalwasser dosing which I use on and off for calcium and alk. But i don't understand what it has to do with the color of your coral and stuff like that.

The basic idea of a bacteria driven system is to use bacteria to control the nutrients in your tank. You are correct when you say every tank has bacteria; however, there are all types of bacteria. Dosing with something like MicroBacter7 introduces the "good" bacteria into your system on a consistent basis. These "good" bacteria consume nutrients in the system such as nitrates and phosphates. Adding Vodka (carbon source) basically feeds the bacteria and the idea is to increase their numbers to consume more of the nutrients. It's sort of a balancing act because to much carbon (i.e. Vodka) in the system can cause "bad" types of bacteria to bloom. From what I have read kalkwasser can actually be a bad idea in this type of system but I can't remember exactly why this was stated. The idea is to use these bacteria to reach a state of ultra low nutrients (ULN). Once this state is reached you can then be selective about how much and what types of nutrients you add into the system. Systems from Zeovit and Brightwell have all types of products you can add at this stage to help tweek out the colors. The main one is probably Amino Acids but there are many others. If you want to learn more about the systems I would check out the zeovit forums or read through Sunny's thread posted above.

 

[JCR's Reef]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15326461#post15326461 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Gondore
The basic idea of a bacteria driven system is to use bacteria to control the nutrients in your tank. You are correct when you say every tank has bacteria; however, there are all types of bacteria. Dosing with something like MicroBacter7 introduces the "good" bacteria into your system on a consistent basis. These "good" bacteria consume nutrients in the system such as nitrates and phosphates. Adding Vodka (carbon source) basically feeds the bacteria and the idea is to increase their numbers to consume more of the nutrients. It's sort of a balancing act because to much carbon (i.e. Vodka) in the system can cause "bad" types of bacteria to bloom. From what I have read kalkwasser can actually be a bad idea in this type of system but I can't remember exactly why this was stated. The idea is to use these bacteria to reach a state of ultra low nutrients (ULN). Once this state is reached you can then be selective about how much and what types of nutrients you add into the system. Systems from Zeovit and Brightwell have all types of products you can add at this stage to help tweek out the colors. The main one is probably Amino Acids but there are many others. If you want to learn more about the systems I would check out the zeovit forums or read through Sunny's thread posted above.

Dave said it! MB7 is a good bacteria source that competes with the bad bacteria to wipe out the nutrient levels in the tank. You will need to run a good skimmer. As the bacteria multiplies, breaks others down, oxygen is consumed. The skimmer will help with this as it pulls a little more gunk out than usual.
Here's a pretty good read if you havent read it yet
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2008-08/nftt/index.php

 

[SeasonedReefer]

Awsome concept but how do you control or monitor it? You can't really measure bacteria can you? When your adding potassium it's the potassium that tweeks the color right not the bacteria?

 

[Gondore]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15327947#post15327947 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by SeasonedReefer
Awsome concept but how do you control or monitor it? You can't really measure bacteria can you? When your adding potassium it's the potassium that tweeks the color right not the bacteria?

You basically have you to monitor your tank very closely and know what to look for. Each product has signs that will show up in your tank if you are overdosing. That is why everyone suggests starting with very low doses and moving up. It should be noted that ULN systems are more for sps corals then anything else. Some lps corals actually seem to like some nutrients in the system. High nutrients along can cause sps corals to brown out and growth to slow down so I wouldn't say that potassium is the only things that tweeks out colors. Actually in my system I don't think the potassium is having much effect because I do 10% weekly water changes but I wanted to give it a try just in case.

 

[JCR's Reef]

Have you taken another tank shot yet to compare to last weeks? Are you noticing anything different about your livestock yet?

 

[Gondore]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15328801#post15328801 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by JCR's Reef
Have you taken another tank shot yet to compare to last weeks? Are you noticing anything different about your livestock yet?

I'm taking weekly shots every Friday. I think colorwise my corals are probably looking the best they ever have right now. Growth is hard to tell because my tank usually goes in spurts, it seems to be descent but nothing is exploding with growth right now. I plan to double my Vodka dose on Friday. I will probably go at least another week before I try out the aminos.

 

[SeasonedReefer]

Jcr thanks for the link it was very helpful. I like this concept alot and might have to try it myself. Just not right away. I will do my research then go from there. Gondore thanks for the info on the subject I will continue to follow this thread for more Info and to see your progress.

 

[Gondore]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15330864#post15330864 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by SeasonedReefer
Jcr thanks for the link it was very helpful. I like this concept alot and might have to try it myself. Just not right away. I will do my research then go from there. Gondore thanks for the info on the subject I will continue to follow this thread for more Info and to see your progress.

No problem Seasoned. It should be noted that the method I am using is slightly different then the method discussed in the link that JCR provided, the main difference being the consistent addition of "good" bacteria via the MicroBacter7 (MB7). Based on the reading I have done dosing the bacteria with the Vodka helps to eliminate some of the issues people were having with dosing Vodka to their tanks.

 

[JCR's Reef]

Seasoned-I dont know how good of a reader you are but I read countless hrs, days, months, before I gave this a shot a couple of months ago. I read so much I forgot what I was reading about mostly. I just all blurred together. There are several if not hundreds of different ways people are combining additives to produce the most color, bacteria in any 1 system. Trial and error and a little know how seems to be key.
The link I provided you if I recall is pretty much just Vodka (carbon source) alone. You can dose that alone but in theory it wipes out all other bacteria and only leaves a single strain. Dosing MB7 or bio-digest along with sugar, vinegar gives more bacteria diversity in the tank and keeps it a little more stable for other good bacteria to flourish. Sorry Dave, Maybe we should start another thread. lol
I would like to see week 2 shots before you double your dose for comparison.
In your second picture I dont see any wrasse's? They staying hidden?