Who's dosing vodka? And why?

[tipmoff]

Hello folks, Ive been tagging along reading the thread for a little while now and here's my story.
I have 52 gal cube tank 7 months old. I have a large bio-load which includes 4 chromis, 2 clowns, 1 coral beauty, 2 four stripe damsels, and a fire goby. All doing well.
Inverts are 2 Sand sifting stars, 6 Nassaurius Snails, 2 Peppermint shrimp, 8 astrea snails, 8 red leg hermits
For corals I have 1 baseball size frogspawn, 1 six head sun coral, 14 heads of candy cane, 1 softball size rock covered in Galaxia, 12 various size frags of pays and zoas, 1 baseball size pulsating xenia, 1 baseball size pocilloporidae. 2 half dollar size ricordea's. All are doing ok.
I have been battling phosphate/nitrates for the past few months (no surprise there). I have no room for a sump/refrugium either hang on or under the tank. I use an AquaC Remora skimmer, Fluval 405 cannister filter with LR, Carbon, and sometimes Phos remover or Kent's Nitrate Sponge. Have RO/DI unit for Salt and topoff water (new past 2 weeks). Just purchased a Via-Aqua Poly-Reactor (just received not set up). I won't list everything so I will stop there. All other parameters are within reef specs although I don't test for magnesium (yet).
I noticed about 2 weeks ago white algae on my glass instead of the normal green algae I was ise to wiping off. This Monday I started dosing .1 -.15ml of 80proof Vodka in hopes of controlling my Nitrates which were running around 15-20. Phosphate was sort of under control at .015 but down from .04. 3 days into the start of dosing .1-.15ml I had a diatom bloom. White/Clear snotty sort of algae on the powerheads and light green what I believ is hair algae lightly on the rocks.
Should I stop dosing the Vodka? Keep the regiment up and ride it out and it will go away? Grit my teeth and be ready for a long siege and lots of work? I have read about algae blooms when dosing vodka but with that little going in the tank I didn't figure it would happen so fast and so much. of course your comments are welcomed and appreciated.

BTW... here's a link to closeup pics I took on Wednesday of the bloom... http://s679.photobucket.com/albums/vv156/Tipmoff/

 

[melev]

JCR's Reef - the lighting is on all that long. How close are the T5s to the water's surface? I know some people have experienced pale corals, and a theory floated around that if the bulbs were about 7" from the water, they'd color up more. Another person simply stopped using T5s after months of trying everything, switch back to MH & VHOs, and got the colors back that he was used to.

tipmoff - that isn't much of a bloom in those images. I'd just clean it off. The Remora skimmer really isn't a good candidate for vodka dosing, even though it is rated for a 65g aquarium.

 

[kmckay]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15181590#post15181590 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by JCR's Reef
When did I say I fed the flameback once a week?

Here:

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15174152#post15174152 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by JCR's Reef
Is it possible to dose Vodka just to bring out the color of the coral? I dont have high No3=0, P04= .04
Phospates use to always be 0 but I have started feeding more aggressively throughout the week instead of just once a week.

It wasn't apparent to me when you said feeding once a week that you meant feeding the corals once a week. I hope this clears up your confusion.

 

[JCR's Reef]

Tipmoff- What type of bacteria you dosing? There was someone else that had a bloom and just changed up the dosing a bit. I cant remember whether it was to get rid of cyano or the white bloom though.

Marc- my lights are roughly 16" above the waters surface being such a shallow tank. Before I switched to the reefflux 12k bulb I was using phoenix bulbs. I had great color with the Phoenix bulbs, but didnt like the blue all the time throughout the tank since I didnt use supplement lighting. I'm thinking of going to radiums since they are the same color spectrum of the phoenix bulbs. I wonder if my coral would bounce back just being under the same color?

Kmckay- No harm done and sorry for the confusion. Yeah, I was only talking about the coral in general in that quote. I wouldnt blame the angel for picking if I wasnt feeding him. I actually fed my fish till they wouldnt eat anymore on the nights I fed my coral. After I fed the fish I would spot fed my coral. They would still go around and just pick the food out of the corals mouth and just spit it out without eating any of it. I tried to comprimise.

 

[trueblackpercula]

I have been thinking about dosing Vodka and have been reading for days but can't find my answer so here it is. What happen when you decide to stop adding the vodka or go on vacation or just plain forget one day does the tank get over run with Algea?
thanks

Michael

 

[tipmoff]

melev - I agree but I will say that the skim is much darker now even in the few days I have started dosing. The pic I took was a closeup of the slime for id purposes. I will admit it isn't anywhere near as bad as most I've seen but I wanted to nip it in the butt as soon as possible.

JCR's Reef - I was dosing to get the nitrates down so I could feed more often since I have quite a community in there. It appears as though it is a diatom outbreak which is whitish.

My plan is to keep dosing and run extra carbon in the filter. I'll be hooking up the Poly-Reactor tomorrow am and filling it with probably nitrate sponge and check on how levels are. I checked nitrite this morning with Salifert and it was 0.

 

[melev]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15185705#post15185705 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by trueblackpercula
I have been thinking about dosing Vodka and have been reading for days but can't find my answer so here it is. What happen when you decide to stop adding the vodka or go on vacation or just plain forget one day does the tank get over run with Algea?
thanks

Michael

If you miss a day (skip a day), that's fine. Don't double dose the next day. Just dose the next day at the same amount as usual.

I've not stopped dosing, so I don't have personal knowledge what may occur.

 

[Genetics]

I agree with Marc. If you miss a day don't sweat it. However, if you miss two weeks or more just start off a little lower (maybe half) and then quickly increase back over the course of a few days.

 

[trueblackpercula]

ok now all I need is a po4 and nitrate test kit and it's off to the liqure store. I have high calciume around 640 and my alk/dkg us 71/2 this ok to get started ?
Thanks
Michael

 

[melev]

Why is your calcium so high, Michael? I would let that burn off for a few days and then resume dosing whatever it is you use for Calcium. Alk is a bit low at 7.5 dKH, if that is the measurement you were sharing. 8 to 11 dKH is the common goal.

 

[kmckay]

Melev- Since I started dosing vodka, I have been trying diligently to keep my Alk closer to 7-8 dKH. Have I been doing this wrong?

 

[melev]

No, not wrong. 7 - 8 is the level that Zeovit dosers use. His just seemed a bit down compared to the Ca level in his tank. It would be good to know his Magnesium as well.

 

[tmz]

I know zeo systems at ultra low nutrient values go for the lower dkh. There is no reason given for this practice though. I prefer it higher and have good growth and color at 11.5dkh. Higher alkalinity makes it easier for a coral to calcify and encourages growth. I wouldn't argue with any dkh level kept between 7 and 12dkh,personally. Be aware that some test kits have variations of a point or two and 7 could be 5 or 6.

 

[trueblackpercula]

My mag is 1300
Temp 80
Salinaty 1.026
Dkh 7.5
Calcium this morning 630 (around)
I use randys two part with arm n hammer baked and I add after the use of 1 gallon a bag of dead seasalt to replenish magnisium. So what do you think is a good clcium level before starting? 450 ok
I am going to take a few pictures for a detailed before after
Michael

 

[trueblackpercula]

Almost forgot
P04 reading is 0.02
Nitrate can't get a reading says zero but will have to check on it when the new kits come in.
Michael

 

[melev]

For some reason, I thought dosing "1 gallon of dead seasalt" I figured salinity would go up rather than calcium.

Anyway, seems like a simple fix. Just don't dose the Calcium part of your two part for a few days, but continue dosing the alkalinity. Testing daily or every other day will give you the information you need to know when to resume dosing calcium.

With Phosphate that low, and possibly nitrate at or near zero, I don't see the reason to dose Vodka. However, if you start feeding a lot and those two parameters rise, vodka would help get them back where they belong.

 

[trueblackpercula]

Yhea my salinity drives me crazy it always a battle to keep it in check. The reason i was thinking about the vodka method is because i have load and loads of Bubble algea and was hopping that this would be a way to get it out of the tank for good. Maybe that's why my PO4 reading are so low because the algea uses it up?
any thought on that?
Michael

 

[Genetics]

I don't think that it will necessarily rid your bubble algae problem permanently but would definitely stave off growth while dosing.

 

[melev]

I would add some new emerald crabs if I were you. They really do work for Valonia. My angled tank was full of valonia. It really didn't bother me, nor did I care, but people would actually talk about 'em when they visited. So I dropped in three, and not only did they get rid of the valonia, they apparently got rid of the stupid caulerpa I've been dealing with for the past year. I still can't believe it, but nothing else explains why it went away a little bit more each day. The tank is currently 99.6% caulerpa free. There's the tiniest bit in a couple of spots, but I think it'll be gone soon.

 

[trueblackpercula]

well thanks for the great advice, I do use po4 remover24/7 and gac. I guess I was getting board and was looking for a magic bullet again. Lmao
I also forgot to mention I am getting red cotton algea build up on the sand bed and it looks ugly. So I have bubble algea red cotton algea and a little patch of red slim algea in the tank. But for all reason test kits are reading just a out zero. Ahhhhh don't want to high jack the thread so I will post a picture or two and maybe someone can tell me if it's worth it to dose vodka or get a better clean up crew.
Thanks everyone for all the help