Vodka, vinegar,biopellets and other organic carbon dosing
- Thread starter tmz
- Start date
jordancemery65
New member
My Nitrates are down to 5 and they have been for two weeks! I am so happy! I think i am going to do one more water change, and that should bring them down to 0. Then we will see if the nitrates go back up even with the vodka/vinegar... Thank you, everyone! It really means a lot! 
Do you think having nitrates at 5 it would be too much for Coral? I was thinking about buying a couple of frags to see? Or should i wait until they are down to 0?
Do you think having nitrates at 5 it would be too much for Coral? I was thinking about buying a couple of frags to see? Or should i wait until they are down to 0?
jordancemery65
New member
Boxfish, are your nitrates staying consistently at 16? if you keep the dosing where it is, and dont do any water changes are your nitrates fluctuating at all? I am just curious?
jordancemery65
New member
I know right! Takes at least 30 seconds to load any page... sometimes longer! its annoying! I remember when 30 seconds used to seem quick with dial up! Now it seems like it is YEARS!!!!!
In my case ,I reduced them intitiually from the 80 plus range to near zero with a sulfur dentirator.. Then dosing held them at around 5ppm for several months. Then they plummetted to 0.2ppm and have remained there for seevral years. Maybe it takes a while for the anaerobic activity to settle in fully.
Well Im leaving it wheres its at Ive done a couple 10% water changes and just checked my nitrates. Checking with red sea pro kit high levels I have what looks close to 8-10ppm so that looks good. Id thought id try it with my API kits I have 2 different ones both said about 40ppm so go figure? what to believe.
Carey1465
New member
I have a question for anyone who dosed vodka before. I've been dosing for almost 190 days now and I've seen a big improvement on my NO3. A couple weeks ago I had my NO3 down to .5ppm and now my there going back up to 3ppm. I shouldnt complain about 3 NO3 but Im kinda concerned that the NO3 are going back up. Is this common to see them go back up? I'm already at 13.3ml of vodka a day now. My skimmer is kicking butt and I also have a bare bottom tank.
jordancemery65
New member
Well nitrates are still down to 5! Looks like the problem was fixed with the vodka/vinegar!! Thank you all for your help!!!! If there are any new beginners dosing the vodka and/or vinegar... i would just recommend getting the nitrates down to a very low level first and then doing the dosing... once i did this, i was pretty much golden!
Well Tom my nitrates are down to 4ppm im happy at around this level sinceim just really doing softies. What should i do at this point as far as dosage. Start backing off? Ido have a little bit of cyano going on also. Havent changed anthing in weeks been locked at 100ml per day dosage wise. Your advice is appreciated.
You re welcome Jordan.
It may be that the bacteria encouraged by soluble organic carbon dosing actually take up ammonia before nitrate forms. Thus being more effective on new decay and less so on existing NO3 levels which drop more slowly over a period of time, sometimes months. So , I agree dropping NO3 to reasonable levels first is generally more effective, ime.
This is a relatively new study which suggest the ammonia take up. It's also intersting that organic carbon dosing has made it's way into commercial shrimp[ farming:
arizona.edu/azaqua/ista/ISTA7/RecircWorkshop/Workshop PP & Misc Papers Adobe 2006/7 Biofiltration/Microbial Floc Systems/2006 Roanoke - Understanding Trophic Systems Ebeling.pdf
This is from it:
'....Removal of ammonia-nitrogen by heterotrophic bacteria is a single step process, where the ammonia-nitrogen is assimilated into bacterial biomass..."
Glad it's working for you , good luck.
It may be that the bacteria encouraged by soluble organic carbon dosing actually take up ammonia before nitrate forms. Thus being more effective on new decay and less so on existing NO3 levels which drop more slowly over a period of time, sometimes months. So , I agree dropping NO3 to reasonable levels first is generally more effective, ime.
This is a relatively new study which suggest the ammonia take up. It's also intersting that organic carbon dosing has made it's way into commercial shrimp[ farming:
arizona.edu/azaqua/ista/ISTA7/RecircWorkshop/Workshop PP & Misc Papers Adobe 2006/7 Biofiltration/Microbial Floc Systems/2006 Roanoke - Understanding Trophic Systems Ebeling.pdf
This is from it:
'....Removal of ammonia-nitrogen by heterotrophic bacteria is a single step process, where the ammonia-nitrogen is assimilated into bacterial biomass..."
Glad it's working for you , good luck.
Sounds good.
I'd take a look at PO4 as it contributes to cyanobacteria. Sometimes a PO4 remover(gfo etc) is used along side organic carbon dosing to remove the low range phosphate that the bacteia don't get.. If you keep PO4 low and clean up detritus accumulations that may occur , cyano will wane.
It may be that some cyano may take advantage of the organic carbon but remember most species of cyano in our tanks are photosynthetic, ie autotrophic and make their own sugars from CO2 and light ;they don't need organic carbon or nitrogen either but they can't make the phosphate they need. I think cyano shows up in new organic carbon systems as a start up phenomenon. Perhaps , other organisms like diatoms and other phytoplankton are reduced first leavaing less competition for the cyano until things balance out.
100ml vinegar for 150 gallons isn't terribly high .67 ml per gallon. Tanks vary but most folks settle in some where between .4 and .7ml per gallon after star rating low, amping up and tweaking for a while.
reckless1
New member
i have been dosing vinegar for several months very slowly (currently up to 105ml per day) but still having GHA problems and small amounts of cyano.. my nitrates are in the 20-25ppm range.. i used to use vodka in a previous tank (54g) and had amazing results but switched to vinegar with the new tank after reading randy's article. i would like to try dosing vodka as well as the vinegar with dosing pumps....
robin..
robin..
I use both vodka and vinegar, details are noted earlier in the thread, roughly 75% of the organic carbon I use comes from vodka and 25% from vinegar.
I bolus dose both. The vinegar is a relatively small amount so I can get away with that without a doser or drip set up for it. The vodka is ok to bolus dose as it doesn't deplete ph as precipitously as vinegar does. Both are monomer free an close to acetate( a usefull addition ) in the degradation process ,so I consider them much more coral friendly than sugar, vitamin C or bio pellets, starches etc which encourage otherlevels and types of bcterial activity that can cause some issues.. The ethanol ( vodka) oxidizes to acetic acid ( vinegar) in the water , the acetic acid moves on to acetate.
If I automated the dosing , I'd mix them together but would not dilute either one with extra water. The dilution would reduce the alcohol and/or acidity of the solution which help keep those products bacteria free before dosing.
I bolus dose both. The vinegar is a relatively small amount so I can get away with that without a doser or drip set up for it. The vodka is ok to bolus dose as it doesn't deplete ph as precipitously as vinegar does. Both are monomer free an close to acetate( a usefull addition ) in the degradation process ,so I consider them much more coral friendly than sugar, vitamin C or bio pellets, starches etc which encourage otherlevels and types of bcterial activity that can cause some issues.. The ethanol ( vodka) oxidizes to acetic acid ( vinegar) in the water , the acetic acid moves on to acetate.
If I automated the dosing , I'd mix them together but would not dilute either one with extra water. The dilution would reduce the alcohol and/or acidity of the solution which help keep those products bacteria free before dosing.
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