Reef Discussion

[daveH]

I'm needing a bit of advice about my nitrates being up a bit and the use of the additives/medium I'm using.
The tank is 240L
I'm currently running a reactor with 100g of All-In-One Biopellets - (50g 3 weeks ago and another 50g last week).
I have a 1" x 8" x8" block of Marine Pure.
I dose 10ml of NoPox daily.
My Nitrates have recently crept up to around 10, which isn't alarming and the tank still looks fine.
So, what I'm wondering is should I:
1. Wait and let the biopellets kick in a bit further and gradually back off the NoPoX. Because I'm not sure if both work together OK, or against each other, or it should be one or the other.
2. Cut off the NoPoX and let the biopellets do their thing.
3. Leave it alone, because if the Nitrates don't go higher there isn't a real problem. (my previous tank ran well without having zero nitrates.)
4. Go and have a beer.
Phos is at .03, which I can live with also. But would like to have it running lower.
Calc, Mag, Alk all bang on the money.

Suggestions?

 

[Sam Parker]

Personally, I'd have a beer. My tank thrived with nitrates over 20 for quite some time, I eventually got them down to around 1 and was hoping for an improvement in coral colour but cant say I've seen any difference.

What sort of water changes are you doing at present? I'd probably double the frequency of those, reduce feeding a little and take the bio pellets offline. But just my thoughts :)

 

[daveH]

Personally, I'd have a beer. My tank thrived with nitrates over 20 for quite some time, I eventually got them down to around 1 and was hoping for an improvement in coral colour but cant say I've seen any difference.

What sort of water changes are you doing at present? I'd probably double the frequency of those, reduce feeding a little and take the bio pellets offline. But just my thoughts :)

You reckon I should remove the biopellets? and keep the NoPox going?
I'm doing 10% water changers per week at the moment.

 

[potatocouch]

I opt for option 4, @daveH but what do I know .. I have my own separate thread for Nitrate reduction :p

 

[Sam Parker]

You reckon I should remove the biopellets? and keep the NoPox going?
I'm doing 10% water changers per week at the moment.

I only say that as I'm not a fan of bio pellets. With a tank that size, it would be fairly easy to raise water changes to 25l twice a week and if you can cut back a little on food, it should probably be all you need. Also, have you cleaned out your skimmer and have it working at its best?

 

[daveH]

I'll try doubling the water changes and see what happens.

 

[MagicJ]

I haven't used the All-in-One pellets, although I have some and was planning to use them on the new tank. I have read in the past that it can take a while for the pellets to become colonised with the required bacteria and , in some cases, they never work properly as the required bacteria are not present. You can improve the likelihood of success by getting some used pellets from an existing system.

I also haven't used Red Sea NO3: PO4-X either (so what would I know :rolleyes) but this is just another carbon source - using this together with the pellets would appear to be counter productive - maybe choose one or the other :confused:

 

[Franklin Dattein]

So, what I'm wondering is should I:
1. Wait and let the biopellets kick in a bit further and gradually back off the NoPoX. Because I'm not sure if both work together OK, or against each other, or it should be one or the other.
2. Cut off the NoPoX and let the biopellets do their thing.
3. Leave it alone, because if the Nitrates don't go higher there isn't a real problem. (my previous tank ran well without having zero nitrates.)
4. Go and have a beer.
Phos is at .03, which I can live with also. But would like to have it running lower.
Calc, Mag, Alk all bang on the money.

Suggestions?

I would also just have a beer if things are going well.

Answering question 1:
They do work together. Mixing multiple sources of organic carbon is allegedly a good wayt to reduce the risk of bacteria mono-culture. No practical evidence, as far as I know.
However, I tend to not mix, because in the long term you want to determine what quantity works for your tank, so it can be repeated. Mixing multiple sources adds more variables to the formula and makes it harder to determine the real consumption.

Other things your could try:
- Add more carbon. That is almost always the fix and people tend to give up or carbon, afraid that higher doses could kill the tank.
My unit of measure is fairly simple: If you don't need to remove bacterial biofilm from glass, every 2-3 days, it means you can dose more.

If you are afraid of higher doses, increase it very slowly, like 15%/day or increase faster on a day you will be near the tank for most of the day, so you can react if water gets cloudy.


- Dose bacteria strains to make sure the tank has it. MB 7 or zeobak, for example. This is just for piece of mind.

 

[gtrxu1]

Top advice above, don't be scared to up the dose, When I was using it I followed the vodka dosing chart/calendar you can find on google.
Took a while but when I got to 9ml per day the magic started happening.

edit - http://wateralchemy.blogspot.com.au/

His latest post is all about Nitrate removal but he also has an excellent article on Carbon Dosing from a few years ago.

 

[Susan Bates]

I have been reading about carbon and getting mixed feelings on dosing or not and should you use it 24/7??

 

[Susan Bates]

I'm needing a bit of advice about my nitrates being up a bit and the use of the additives/medium I'm using.
The tank is 240L
I'm currently running a reactor with 100g of All-In-One Biopellets - (50g 3 weeks ago and another 50g last week).
I have a 1" x 8" x8" block of Marine Pure.
I dose 10ml of NoPox daily.
My Nitrates have recently crept up to around 10, which isn't alarming and the tank still looks fine.
So, what I'm wondering is should I:
1. Wait and let the biopellets kick in a bit further and gradually back off the NoPoX. Because I'm not sure if both work together OK, or against each other, or it should be one or the other.
2. Cut off the NoPoX and let the biopellets do their thing.
3. Leave it alone, because if the Nitrates don't go higher there isn't a real problem. (my previous tank ran well without having zero nitrates.)
4. Go and have a beer.
Phos is at .03, which I can live with also. But would like to have it running lower.
Calc, Mag, Alk all bang on the money.

Suggestions?

I use NoPox but have only been using 10ml for 400lt tank, am i not using enough?

 

[Sam Parker]

I use NoPox but have only been using 10ml for 400lt tank, am i not using enough?

With all forms of carbon dosing, you keep slowly raising the amount until you see results. But by slowly, I mean slowly. You should find some good dosing schedules online to follow :)

 

[daveH]

I've took the AIO pellet reactor out a couple of weeks ago and things have certainly improved.
No more white sludge - the tank/sump looks cleaner.
Phosphates and nitrates are still zero - which kind of means the reactor wasn't doing all that much.
I feel the corals aren't doing all that great at zero/zero so I'm going to back off the NoPoX gradually until I get a low reading for both.