Why do bioballs get bashed? Scientifically...

I've been around for a long while, but was curious if a larger amount of liverock (in the sump or in the display) will help to reduce nitrate levels?

I have a 375g and 470g tank with about 1100 gallons total in the system and have about 600-700 pounds of rock and often wondered if more would make a difference as I ALWAYS battle nitrate and lose. I currently have Nitrate of 26 and water changes have a tough time keeping up with it. I just restarted my sulphur denitrator, but had a tough time getting it to cycle the last time and it never performed as I wanted.
 
I was thinking of trying the Caribsea LSM sulphur to see if it is innoculated with something that makes the denitrator actually work better.

Didn't mean to thread hijack and can start another one if OP wants:)
 
Khemul said:
But the only way bioballs add more nitrates is if the person has less live rock. If the person has live rock plus bioballs, then the live rock is still doing its job either way.
Click to expand...

Not exactly. Same amount of nitrates produced, yes. But where it is produced is important. Produced in the vicinity of the anaerobic bacteria that can consume it, good. This can produce a very efficient nitrate production/nitrate consumption system that releases very little nitrate back into the water column (unless, of course, like many hobbyists the tank is overstocked or overfed ;) ).

Produced further away from said bacteria and released into the water column, not good. That nitrate might just as well be utilized by problematic algae. And there is less water circulation into the interior of the rock, meaning nitrate produced elsewhere may eventually make it to the anaerobic bacteria in the interior of the rock (or in lower levels of a sand bed), but the system is inefficient and allows more nitrate into the water column and allows it to spend more time there.

Kevin
 
Bioballs don't work for me because:

1. I've got no room for them in my sump, which is filled to capacity with the largest skimmer that fits, a return pump, baffles, a GFO/GAC reactor, and chaeto with lighting.

2. In the DT, coral looks a lot better affixed to live rock, then a mound of bio-balls.

3. The primary purpose of bioballs is and always has been to reduce ammonia and nitrite by converting them to nitrate. After cycling, I've never had a problem with ammonia or nitrite in a reef tank. Nitrate accumulation, on the other hand, is always an issue in a reef tank.

4. Whether or not you can prevent bioballs from collecting debris is beside the point. Like David said, live rock helps reduce nitrates through diffusion. Bioballs increase nitrate. That's what they are designed to do. Obviously, live rock cannot eliminate all nitrate in the tank. But when coupled with carbon dosing, growing/harvesting chaeto, regular water changes, and efficient skimming, live rock helps keep nitrates manageable.
 
disc1 said:
Diffusion is the process by which dissolved ions and molecules move from areas of high concentration to areas of low concentration. For example, if you mix a drop of saltwater into a glass of freshwater and wait for a short time, the salt is no longer just in one little spot but spreads all around to all of the water.

The driving force behind this is beyond discussion here, but it occurs even across semipermeable materials. An example is dialysis or osmosis. If you put a solution with a high concentration of some ion and separate it from a solution with a low concentration of that ion by a semipermeable membrane, the ion or molecule will diffuse across that membrane until the concentrations are equal on both sides. So the simple fact that the rock is wet and the water in the rock has a lower nitrate content than the water outside the rock (because what's inside is being consumed by bacteria) means that nitrate will move into the rock.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion

Oxygen gets used up along the way while nitrate does not. If there was nothing living there, a perfectly sterile environment, then oxygen too would slowly diffuse into the rock. However there are a number of organisms on the way in living in progressively more oxygen depleted areas that are grabbing up that oxygen for respiration.
Click to expand...

The problem I have with this explanation is that O2 is always present in the aquarium even though it's used it's replenished much faster then NO3. Also if diffusion was that slow the NO3 would overwhelm the diffusion process and also saturate the rock with nitrates creating only a small benefit. Hence, PH reading from what I understand of it, is basically a measurement of O2/CO2 in the water and in the provided explanation the pH would be nearly 0.

disc1 said:
Think of a bunch of girls walking into the club. They're going to "diffuse" all over to all different parts of the club. But the pretty single ones are going to get snatched up before they get very far from the door. So if you are waiting in the back, you might think there aren't any pretty single ladies at the club tonight. But the ugly girls and the ones with rings on their fingers don't get messed with and they might be spread all over.
Click to expand...

Well considering the O2(hot girl) deficiency the back of the club would clear out(live stock would die). You can only support a bar where people can mingle(breathe). Without hot girls guys leave. With out guys chasing women women leave and bar dies.
 
I still claim none of you guys' live rock is reducing nitrates you can measure. Its only a theory, happening at such a low level you couldn't even measure it if you took the skimmers offline. So, going forward, I'll call it that a pound of live rock can convert to gas .000000000001 gm/l of nitrate. terribly unhelpful, so its your skimmers or refug's doing all the work and the live rock/anoxic zones is still just on paper sounding good, doing nothing for you/
 
SDatl404 said:
Well considering the O2(hot girl) deficiency the back of the club would clear out(live stock would die). You can only support a bar where people can mingle(breathe). Without hot girls guys leave. With out guys chasing women women leave and bar dies.
Click to expand...
Do keep in mind that the nitrate-converting bacteria don't like oxygen and would rather have their environment devoid of it.
 
Khemul said:
Do keep in mind that the nitrate-converting bacteria don't like oxygen and would rather have their environment devoid of it.
Click to expand...

But according to the principle of diffusion all particles diffuse evenly and since there is always oxygen in the water there is always oxygen everywhere in the tank. Unless there is a sealed pocket.
 
across the bazillion tanks we've engineered online even employing deep sandbeds of 6 inches, or the new knowledge that denitrification occurs in the biofilm matrix at even depths of a half inch, all tanks had nitrate except for these lucky internet ones. if you have no nitrate, you have a machine doing it, or the correct balance of degassing and plant binding. the correct balance of fish/bioloading to reductive substrate is not found in most tanks.
 
everything I have read in this thread related to the difference between bioballs and live rock in terms of having the ability to process nitrates, is exactly what I believed prior to my carbon dosing


carbon dosing has caused me to question the above beliefs

if nitrate is processed only by bacteria in the live rock and sand bed (areas devoid of oxygen)

and if we take David's (Disc1 ) analogy of the ladies in the club

why does my vodka or vinegar only benefit those bacteria at the back of the room?
in other words, why does my vodka or vinegar avoid being used by all the bacteria present in the oxygenated areas of the tank and get utilized by the sand and rock dwelling species that convert nitrate?

and how do bio pellets help when they are remote from these areas?
bio pellets if they are having an effect on nitrate and phosphate, must be creating additional aneorobic bacteria, but they cannot be generating these bacteria in the rockwork or the sand bed , they must be generating these bacteria within the confines of the reactor on a media surface that is like plastic and that is reasonably well oxygentated?

bacterial bio films , is where I believe the answer lies
nitrate reducing bacteria can exist as part of a bio film, with the oxygen requiring bacteria
and that could explain why there are people who run tanks succesully with Bio balls
and why there are people with perfectly adequate live rock , flow and acceptable bio loads, that have nitrate issues

getting the balanced ratio of the bacteria may be the key
but that seems to be achievable irrespective of the method used

I will admit more people seem to have trate issues when using the plastic in favour of the rock
but not everyone using the plastic , does have the issue
 
SDatl404 said:
But according to the principle of diffusion all particles diffuse evenly and since there is always oxygen in the water there is always oxygen everywhere in the tank. Unless there is a sealed pocket.
Click to expand...

There is always oxygen in the water yes. But none of it makes it very deep into the rock bed past organisms that use it.

The oxygen is replenished from the surface of the tank, not all throughout. It diffuses quickly through the water but more slowly through the porous rock. So there is a pretty constant level through the water column and a gradient to near zero as you go deeper and deeper into a porous substrate like a rock. It isn't an opinion or a theory. It is simple science. You may be having a hard time understanding, but that doesn't mean it is not understood.
 
yep lol awaiting someone to disprove it

I remember a test Toonen did about 8 yrs ago where he set up multiple tanks w a dsb to measure this. I don't think anyone ever has with live rock, if so point me to em and I'll remove a few zeroes lol but it won't be helpful. I know this because my own system is designed to maximize this process as much as possible in a fishless, low bioload, high current, exceptional live rock system, with a giant dsb, I feed correctly, and still get nitrates.

There ain't no way you guys are getting live rock to do this job. Its got a buddy somewhere.
 
SDatl404 said:
The problem I have with this explanation is that O2 is always present in the aquarium even though it's used it's replenished much faster then NO3. Also if diffusion was that slow the NO3 would overwhelm the diffusion process and also saturate the rock with nitrates creating only a small benefit. Hence, PH reading from what I understand of it, is basically a measurement of O2/CO2 in the water and in the provided explanation the pH would be nearly 0.
Click to expand...

Oxygen has absolutely no effect on pH. pH is directly related to alkalinity and co2 concentration. Those two things only. Oxygen diffuses into the rock but doesn't make it very deep. CO2 diffuses out of the rock or is converted to carbonate. Again, this isn't opinion or theory. It is well understood science.

Also, you'll never get to a pH anywhere near zero on CO2 alone. You simple cannot put that much carbonic acid into solution without extremely high pressure. It fizzes out.
 
Last edited:
Steve Wright2 said:
everything I have read in this thread related to the difference between bioballs and live rock in terms of having the ability to process nitrates, is exactly what I believed prior to my carbon dosing


carbon dosing has caused me to question the above beliefs

if nitrate is processed only by bacteria in the live rock and sand bed (areas devoid of oxygen)

and if we take David's (Disc1 ) analogy of the ladies in the club

why does my vodka or vinegar only benefit those bacteria at the back of the room?
in other words, why does my vodka or vinegar avoid being used by all the bacteria present in the oxygenated areas of the tank and get utilized by the sand and rock dwelling species that convert nitrate?

and how do bio pellets help when they are remote from these areas?
bio pellets if they are having an effect on nitrate and phosphate, must be creating additional aneorobic bacteria, but they cannot be generating these bacteria in the rockwork or the sand bed , they must be generating these bacteria within the confines of the reactor on a media surface that is like plastic and that is reasonably well oxygentated?
Click to expand...


Biopellets and carbon dosing is a completely different subject. That has nothing to do with anaerobic bacteria. In those processes, you aren't reducing nitrate into nitrogen. With biopellets or carbon dosing, bacteria are using nitrate and phosphate to make protein and lipids and DNA and other biomass that will be removed by the skimmer.
 
Great technical thread. Always knew the basic reasons behind getting rid of those old 90's wet/dry's, but it's good to learn more about the science of LiveRock instead.
 
disc1 said:
Biopellets and carbon dosing is a completely different subject. That has nothing to do with anaerobic bacteria. In those processes, you aren't reducing nitrate into nitrogen. With biopellets or carbon dosing, bacteria are using nitrate and phosphate to make protein and lipids and DNA and other biomass that will be removed by the skimmer.
Click to expand...

Thank you David

then is it possible that the activity described above could also occur on the plastic surfaces of a bio ball?
could bacteria residing in oxygenated areas, perform same function in a tank that had more available free carbon

could the presence of the amount of free carbon vary from set up to set up
and could that offer an explanation as to why bio balls are effective in some set ups?
 
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