What's Your Problem With Bio-Pellets?

[heckeng]

Isn't that the whole purpose of dosing vodka or adding bio pellets? Add carbon to the system so that you can grow enough beneficial bacteria to use up the algae causing by products of feeding? The only issues a person should have are making sure you don't add too much carbon source and have it out of balance with the excess nutrients you are trying to get the bacteria to consume AND removing the dead bacteria after they have consumed that excess nitrate and phosphate so that it doesn't simply get re-introduced to the system. Also, as far as having a top of the line skimmer, I don't think that is necessary. Most of what any skimmer removes from the water column is dead bacteria, so any skimmer will simply remove more, it doesn't have to be a super skimmer to do that. What would need to be "upgraded" is your skimmer maintenance to make sure the skimmers performance doesn't go down faster since it will be building up slum in the skimmer neck and collection cup faster.

 

[t.trezona]

The issue here is common problems and how they were prevented or solved.

 

[karsseboom]

I had bad cyano in my tank a while back. I bought some chemi clean and it wiped it all out in 2 days. Since then I have not had one single sign of any algae in my tank but maybe some diatoms. The p04 and nitrate is always zero no matter how many more fish I add. Now the tank is to the point where the cyano can't come back becuase there is nothing for it to live on. The biggest problem I see with pellets is it drives down the nutrients way to low and your tank starts having issues. I like vodka cause it seems like a middle point of the 2 methods. The best thing to do with pellets is to run like half the recommended dosage.

 

[doctorgori]

I had bad cyano in my tank a while back. I bought some chemi clean and it wiped it all out in 2 days. Since then I have not had one single sign of any algae in my tank but maybe some diatoms. The p04 and nitrate is always zero no matter how many more fish I add. Now the tank is to the point where the cyano can't come back becuase there is nothing for it to live on. The biggest problem I see with pellets is it drives down the nutrients way to low and your tank starts having issues. I like vodka cause it seems like a middle point of the 2 methods. The best thing to do with pellets is to run like half the recommended dosage.

^^^ and that brings up a good point....
looking back, I now wonder if those sps & xenia I lost was because the water was too clean...

Now I feed moderatley (I use frozen, Nano & pellets)...while my tank won't grow xenia, it does grow GSP, albeit very slowly....

I do use GFO & Carbo in conjunction

 

[t.trezona]

I had bad cyano in my tank a while back. I bought some chemi clean and it wiped it all out in 2 days. Since then I have not had one single sign of any algae in my tank but maybe some diatoms. The p04 and nitrate is always zero no matter how many more fish I add. Now the tank is to the point where the cyano can't come back becuase there is nothing for it to live on. The biggest problem I see with pellets is it drives down the nutrients way to low and your tank starts having issues. I like vodka cause it seems like a middle point of the 2 methods. The best thing to do with pellets is to run like half the recommended dosage.

This is an interesting issue. Makes most sense to me to start with a volume of pellets well below the recommendation. Then ramp up if and only if you need to. The concept the you can't OD makes some sense in theory, but in practive people seem to be having issues with that. I started very low and ramped up slowly. I have had no issues doing so. Nitrates and Phosphate undetectable.

 

[Vipete1985]

The only reason u would get a cyano outbreak from biopellets is if u do not have enough flow going threw the reactor.... Biopellets if implemented correctly well help lower phosphates and nitrates and therefore should greatly reduce your cyano problems

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

The only reason u would get a cyano outbreak from biopellets is if u do not have enough flow going threw the reactor.... Biopellets if implemented correctly well help lower phosphates and nitrates and therefore should greatly reduce your cyano problems

Do you have any evidence to support the first part of that assertion?

 

[Zedar]

A few years ago it was believed that cyano was caused from carbon dosing driving nitrates down to zero.

Under a zero nitrate (or so low its undetectable) condition. Cyano thrives because they can pull carbon from the atmosphere while the bacteria we are trying to grow starves.
In other words we remove their competition when we dose carbon and allow nitrate to go to zero.

 

[asonitez]

I've been having sporadic cyano breakouts sine using bio-pellets. I'm wondering if i should remove them and go back to seachem phosguard.

 

[96p993]

For those who have had negative experiences could you please explain your setup? I am trying to get a feel for the negative effects and improper setup, namely where you output was going....As several have said, I believe it is crucial to have the output from your reactor going directly into your skimmer. Could this be one possibility to the effects some are seeing??

 

[asonitez]

Well my setup is straight forward.

Skimz SM201 Rated for 580g
3 X Vortech Mp40
2X Koralia Evo
160lbs of Rock
100lbs lbs of Live Sand
Metal Halide Radiums 20K X 2 250w + 4x T5 54w Ati Blue Plus

I'm running my BRS biopellets in a NextReef MR1 Reactor with NextReef's Biopellet conversion Kit. I started with a full load and immediately got a big bacterial bloom which went away after 2 or 3 days. Water cleared up and then I got crazy amount of skimmate. After this it all settled down.

Tested parameters and everything zeroed out. I am however getting Cyano Algae During the day which goes away after the main lights go out... Then by half day I got cyano again. I haven't done a major water change since but I plan to do one tonight. I switched my salt to ReefCrystals and have been raising my Alk and Magnesium over the last 2 weeks. My Effluent from the bio-pellet reactor dumps right into the mouth of my skimmer so a lot of the water is pulled into the skimmer. I think that once I siphon out my sand and a lot of the cyano that my problem will go away. I've started the red-sea coral program which I've seen AMAZING results. I highly reccomend it over zeovit only because its easier to get, easier to dose, and everything you dose you can measure the level of it in your water. Its helluva lot cheaper too.

 

[lbaldrey]

I ran BP at half the recommended dose initially and then ramped it up after a month but I couldnt bring my levels down. Nitrates always hovered around the 25ppm mark.

I stopped using the pellets for a while and eventually started them again but this time I was using it at 25% more than the recommended amount and nitrates are always at 0 now. Skimmer smells foul. Im able to feed thrice a day without issues.

Im seeing a bit of cyano on the sand bed. Would it be ok to dose a bit of vinegar in addition?

 

[badonkadonk]

I've got a 120 with a 100 gal Rubbermaid sump and 60 gal (former) refugium. System is about 8 years old. Had a 5" aragonite sandbed from the beginning, but then about 2 years ago started having problems with my sps color, then began to lose colonies. Sandbed looked pretty dirty so I decided to remove based on all the talk of loading of the bed after 5 years or so. Pulled out big chunks of cemented sand (had to chip off the rock), more than half had solidified. Saw no improvement in coral growth a few months after that so decided to try vodka dosing. Followed the plan at first, but then got impatient and increased doses faster than recommendations. SPS started looking better, but got cyano, upped my GFO (I had been running off and on) - this made things worse and then I lost even more color/colonies and frags. Switched salt (grasping at straws), pulled back on the vodka and finally stopped vodka altogether.

Decided to try biopellets, orderd a few liters from BRS and put them in a TLF 550 (the bigger one) reactor with the NPX screens and an MJ1200 feed pump. Positioned the outlet of the BP reactor to the inlet of my rather large skimmer (SRO/Octopus 5000SSS) so that 100% of the effluent goes into the skimmer. Soaked a liter of pellets in tank water for a couple of days with several drops of zeobac (cultured pixie dust). Placed about 2/3's of the pellets in reactor, started pump - skimmer got a bit foamy, settled down within 10 minutes or so. Wasn't satisfied with the amount of tumble, so I lowered the reactor to be almost submerged in the sump and the tumble picked up by quite a bit, then added the rest of the pellets. Also run carbon in a TLF 150 (nearly full). Did a 20% water change (Red Sea Coral Pro, switched from DD H2O), and noticed cyano starting to pull back by the 2nd week. Now on week 7 and the cyano is gone, SPS polyps fully extended and color coming back to remaining colonies and frags.

Could have been I was running too much GFO, too much vodka (got up to about 20 ml/day - 10 ml twice daily dosing), and just generally making too many changes too quickly, throwing the system further out of balance. But I am feeling pretty good about the direction now, and have got far less gunk in the tank/sump. I've still got bryopsis growing fairly well on a rock, so I've apparently got some nutrients in the system, but no HA and no cyano, and the bubble algae is even turning light green/white. But the main thing is my SPS is looking happy again. I'm keeping an eye on the pellets to make sure they keep tumbling and that 100% of the effluent goes into the skimmer, those seem to be the major factors from what I've read. So far so good, but still too new to say mission accomplished.

 

[doctorgori]

Im seeing a bit of cyano on the sand bed. Would it be ok to dose a bit of vinegar in addition?

I asked this same question a few weeks ago, Randy didn't see any advantage... (but he didn't say you couldn't either)

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Same answer. It's fine to dose both at the same time, but I do not know if vinegar (or any carbon dosing) will defeat existing cyano. It might, but GFO might do the job faster.

 

[burnah]

ok i have to chime in.

i have been dosing vodka for over a year, and in the last 3 months vodka+vinegar, the corals were fine but the cyano took over more and more. i got myself some biopellets and moved the tank, but as a student i lack the money for a pellet reactor. started vinegar again after the move, corals look fine again but the cyano comes back again. this got me annoyed, and i saw the pellets lying around. the packaging states that one can put them in a net in a high flow area, so i tossed around 100ml of them in a nylon/perlon sock (girlie stuff, cooked), and suspended it into the skimmers sump section.

so far, they have been in there for a week. i still dose some vinegar, i still have some cyano, but i will report further. the pellets do not tumble at all, but theres high flow, emitted from my skimmer and the water is skimmed right afterwards.

tank is 50g, fuge/sump is 20g. 5 small fish, some sps

will report again

 

[badonkadonk]

No direct experience myself, but when the pellets don't tumble they start to stick together and then act as a detritus trap, probably going anaerobic in the interior as they degrade and may end up working against you.

 

[jamey1015]

I was using a Nextreef reactor MR1 with the cone mod in the bottom and a maxi-jet 1200 to run it, I was using Brightwell Kataylst which called for 1 gram per 2 gallons of water and used half the recommended dose for 3 weeks and after I got cynao which was instantly I dosed bacter7 to hopefully relive the problem, than I stepped up to the recommend about at about a month and the cynao got much worse, I had the output directly in front of the inlet for my BM-200 skimmer which defiantly getting nearly all the output, I thing I should say this was all on a fairly new set up tank with nitrate's really low to begin with and hardly no phosphates present. I sent my water parameters to Brightwell anf they told me my current conditions would not support the pellets, giving me the feeling they work much better for a tank with a high bio-load of lots of fish and heavy feeding. I had just a few tangs/clowns/gobies and a mixed reef of mostly sps in a 180.

For those who have had negative experiences could you please explain your setup? I am trying to get a feel for the negative effects and improper setup, namely where you output was going....As several have said, I believe it is crucial to have the output from your reactor going directly into your skimmer. Could this be one possibility to the effects some are seeing??

 

[t.trezona]

Ive been using bio pellets for over a year now........ when i started them it was in a tank that was a year old and had high nitrates, i dosed WM pellets according to tank size and didnt gradually add them over time. out put is in zip tied to front of the intake .In 24-48 hours i got a nice bio bloom, tank water went milky white for 48 hours. at the same time skimmer was pulling nasty sour white skim(lasted until bloom cleared). after that i noticed hair algae dieing rapidly, then cyano came.. my theory is yes there are organics released but i think its from algae decomposing. when i slack on keeping an eye on when i need to top off the pellets i notice algae blooms. then i top off and cyano returns, cyano seems to cycle through and i control it with KZ coral snow.
another problem ive noticed is trace elements seem to striped faster and i would have to dose potassium, iodine and trace element product to keep my SPS( tank is mostly SPS) from getting pale. for the last month and a half ive been using KZ sea water complex(Meerwaser) and coral still looks good. i also run a high capacity gfo to help with phosphates with no problems.

Curious how you knew your trace elements were being removed from the water faster?
im sure more water changes could help with elements but i work full time and go to school full time. so water changes are 10 gallons a month on a 85g system.

 

[t.trezona]

I had bad cyano in my tank a while back. I bought some chemi clean and it wiped it all out in 2 days. Since then I have not had one single sign of any algae in my tank but maybe some diatoms. The p04 and nitrate is always zero no matter how many more fish I add. Now the tank is to the point where the cyano can't come back becuase there is nothing for it to live on. The biggest problem I see with pellets is it drives down the nutrients way to low and your tank starts having issues. I like vodka cause it seems like a middle point of the 2 methods. The best thing to do with pellets is to run like half the recommended dosage.

Is it not possible you simply added too large a volume of pellets?