30 Gallon Oceanic Cube (Not a Biocube) LED Build

It must have been awhile since i last checked your thread out,wow!What a difference!Looks great!

 

Good. I asked partially because I was curious about placement of my own torch. I can't seem to find a medium flow spot for it that isn't already occupied. Where it's been since it's introduction is a pretty breezy spot but it's doing well . Tank is coming along very fine indeed!

 

Been a while since I have posted about this tank so I thought I'd provide a quick narrative-form update:

After losing the lime green monti to BJD - it jumped shipped (the bjd) onto my stylo and a zoa rock. Another zoa colony showed signs of major distress but not signs of BJD colonization - I assume that does not mean it was unaffected by the BJD tho.

I read and read as to the possible remedies and believe it or not, 3reef did not have a ton of information on the specifics of treating a whole tank - which was my only option due to corals being part of the scape (epoxied in). On RC there is a gazillion page thread on whole-tank Vitamin C dosing. After reading through 50 or so pages of the thread - I decided to give it a try. What I observed is that the worst experiences that people had with it - it simply did not help much - but also did not seem to harm anything.

The idea, as you can guess, is to start with a low dose and increase it over the course of a week or so from 5ppm to 30ppm. It must be dosed 2x a day as it has a very short lifespan in a saltwater tank.

Keeping in mind that this was a 5 or so month old 30 gallon tank with a ton of flow, low bioload,and good filtration with a nice big skimmer - it was a pretty stable tank to begin with. I was simply careless when introducing a new frag which was stressed and caused the outbreak (wont be doing that one agian!).

By the time we got to 30ppm - about a week - two observations were made.

First and foremost - the BJD was completely gone.
Second - a TON of skimmate was produced during this time and the filter pads and overflow sponges had to be cleaned out twice a day to prevent overflow - there was that much bacterial waste from dosing. There was also a short bacterial bloom causing cloudiness in the tank.

After 4 or so days of the 30ppm, clogged filters, and cloudy water, I started to reduce the dosage again back down to 5ppm.

The filters are no longer clogging and I have not scraped the glass on that tank in almost 2 months. It has only become less covered in any kind of algae or diatoms - likely due to the bacteria consuming most if not all available nutrients.

The zoanthids all have started growing more heads in a month than I have seen them before. There is not so much as the slightest hint of hair algae or any other nuisance algae anywhere in the tank. The skimmer is still producing extra skimmate which is milky/grey in color.

All in all, I would say this has been a very effective treatment and I will continue to dose the 5ppm preventative dose to see if there are any other long-term benefits as the short term payoff has been great so far. Even the dragon-eye zoa colony that was near death is starting to come back. Polyps which were closed for weeks are finally starting to open again.

Seems like it's definately a great option for BJD when dipping individual corals is not an option and one must treat the entire tank!

 

I haven't gotten the chance to read through that RC thread yet...saved to my fav's though. What VitC product were you Dosing? Liquid,powder?

 

Really it seems the only choice is NutriBiotic - it's powder form. No additives - and MOST importantly - it's pH stabilized.

This is where I got it:
nutribiotic

There is a code for $5 off for first time buyers in there somewhere. You will not find this in your local wal mart or CVS - it's an uncommon item for them to carry. This is a pharmaceutical grade product with no binders or fillers or other additives - just pure crystallazid ascorbic acid.

You will need a scale capable of measuring partial grams accurately - so a small digital scale would be perfect - tho you have to look like a drug dealer to get one lol. Who would ever believe that you needed it to weigh out white powder for your "fish tank"? "Yeah right buddy . . . " - been there done that - but worth it to get the scale lol. I guess you could order one online too . . .

But be sure to get the Nutribiotic brand as others have all kinds of unwanted nasties.

Dosing is simple enough - i do .6 grams which is about 5ppm for my system twice a day - just drop the little bit of powder into a high flow area - for me my overflow box and that's it.

Be sure to NOT mix in RO/DI water before putting it in as this will cause it to become pH unstable and you may hurt your tank.

The other item to keep track of is the Alk. - for some reason which I have not yet come to understand - the alk shoots up during treatment - for me it was nothing harmful - but it was threatening to break 12 for a while.

All under control now.

 

Thanks for the info.

What was your Alk previous to the spike? Was it noticed more so as dosing increased or were you getting a spike even with the minuscule doses?

 

I only noticed the Alk spike while dosing 30ppm - after we got back down to 5 - it stabilized.

 

Update:

Have been dosing vitamin C in my 30 Gallon Cube for about a month now and have seen great results in terms of ridding of BJD, LPS PE, and zoa. coloration growth rate. I also have not had to scape the glass but one time in the last month. I would not be surprised I do not have to do it again until after Easter.

Finally have been getting the water parameters dialed in using BRS 2-Part solutions - so easy and cost-effective!!!

Some pics to feed that addiction!

 

Nice pics!

How do you have your torch mounted?

I have a 5+ head frag that recently came unglued from it's plug. I'm wondering if I should glue it to a larger plug. I'm having difficulty with permanent placement for both the torch's health and other inhabitants with it's sweepers.

 

I experienced the same issues when bringing this guy in . . .

Luckily I am able to wedge it deep into the rockscape while it is still high enough to not sting anyone else around it.

The reefsafe epoxies available work really well IMO and there are a number of color choices. The color we got already looks like nice corailline!