Carbon dosing - method testing started

thanks Sacul
yes, it is often the case that nitrates become the limiting factor for the removal of phosphate
when Nitrates are at zero, any residual phosphate often require the additional use of GFO to remove

I am not 100 % certain on this aspect
maybe Curtis (Inwall 75) or Matt ( m2434) will have a much greater understanding of this
but the Retfield ratio may come into play
basically from my research it seems that
if you have a nitrate and phosphate level that is in equilibrium then you can have both N and P, but minimal algae issues
if you have either nitrate or phospate out of whack with each other (no equilibrium) then you can get either green or red/ brown type algaes depending on if its the nitrate or the phosphate that is high in relation to the other 1

thus in an set up with a balance of nitrate and phosphate - then it is possible for the bacteria to keep up with both nutrients

I do not have the hannah checker yet - store was out of stock, but will hang on to my order until new delivery arrives
will be interesting to see, if there is a difference

welcome Will
your probably correct regarding nutrient inputs, once I started the testing, I rarely added anything ( only had snails in the tanks for a while, thus nothing to feed)

Steve

 

The redfield ratio is a rough guide, it's basically the C:N: P ratio found in phytoplankton tissue. It's 106:16:1. However this can vary greatly from organism to organism and dosn't account for metabolism, just biomass. So, for example, C is used for energy, so the C side of the equation is much higher when you account for energy. Hence carbon dosing. The food input contains C from biomass, but this is in a lower ratio than needed for metabolism.

Also, foods tend to have preservatives rich in P, which will shift the ratio more towards P, on the input side.

I don't know what is in TLF biopellets. BRSs bio-pellets use polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHS), these are compounds produced by bacteria as natural energy reserves. I think likely they will contain P, as they are a natural product and possibly other limitation regarding food input and such, will make it less effective towards P than N reduction. Actually, BRS advertises them for N reduction, but not P reduction, so, this seems to corroborate that brief.


We don't know what is in TLF biopellets, as they do not advertise this. Some believe it is poly-epsilon-caprolactone (PCL), which is a synthetic biopolymer used for internal sticking during surgery. I am not that familiar with it, but other products, known to use it, such as Instant Oceans nitrate reducer product, also do not advertise P reduction.



Also, many BP users report N, but not P reduction, although, this could just be because N is used faster than P, due to the Redfield "like" ratios of the various bacteria. However, the input should be similar to these ratios, so, even though N is being reduced faster than P, it may be just the ratio. In theory the ratio should be similar with regards to food input, so they should reduce in a similar ratio. That dosn't account for preservatives though, but once levels get low, test kits just don't work well; so, no one really knows which is reduced first in practice due to testing limitations.

Likely in this experiment N is reduced before P with the Pellets, as the GFO tank and other tanks showed coral bleaching and the Biopellet tank didn't. Bleaching is known to occur with P limitation. So, that could be likely. However, it could also be a result of reduced N (although probably not in the GFO tank) and the pellets are producing more appropriate bacterioplankton. Light energy from zoox is known to be deficient in N, and corals are believed to get significant N, from food. So, if the other carbon sources are reducing N, but not transferring it back to the coral via bacterioplankton and the BPs are, then it would be reasonable that the other tanks would be starving. The vodka or BF also could, but the vodka for example, seems to instead be resulting in benthic bacteria, at least based on Steve's scraping experience. So benthic, i.e. surface dwelling bacteria is not really available as food for the corals. In the BPs, it's also benthic, but sloshes off, into the water column. Food is also know to inhibit bleaching, so this would also make sense.

That's my .02 anyways, hopefully inwall75 will chime in though.

 

As M2434 said the redfield ratio is for phytoplankton not bacteria. The 'general' ratio for bacteria is 1:10:50 (P:N:C). but things get complex because most the phosphate in your tank is in the organic form which test kits do not measure. I have read posts where people say their beads have stopped working and their phosphate is '0' while others say they stop and the nitrate is '0'. Not sure what the difference are as there is not enough data to make a solid conclusion.

Also the ratio will effect what grows in your tank. When N is low but there is a relative high amount of P you can get cyanobacteria because cyanobacteria can fix nitrogen from the air. When N is high and P is low you tend to get algae (versus cyano) but this a just a general trend.

Because no one has really looked at organic nitrogen and organic phosphate in aquaria one has to be careful about drawing conclusions.

 

wow, well Steve, this research is PhD right there! My vote is Vodka! this is only 1 addictive you can dose into your own system too ;D

 

Thank you Matt
once again you have delivered great input into this thread and given me and a number of other people a lot to consider/ research

Appreciate your input to Dr Tim
you must have forgotten more about bacteria then I have ever or will ever learn, so if you cannot draw a conclusion, then I certainly cannot

the only conclusions drawn by myself for my own benefit thus far are
Bio Pellets is about as easy as it possible to get in terms of maintaining a LNS , set up costs are naturally more expensive than Vodka but other than that its very much a hands free system and during experiment 1 , seems to do exactly what its supposed to do ( my 1st experience with this method and an eye opener for sure)

Thank you Maksimsf
the Steve Wright ratio has been in play 0.3- 2.0 and 50
thats 0.3 into this set up, 2 mils into the 70 and 50 mils with orange juice for me.

 

Ugh, you and your pesky organic nutrients again ;D I remeber from Ken Feldman's research, the evidence seems to suggest that TOC, in a well filtered aquarium can be lower or similar to a natural reef. However, this can vary a quite a bit IIRC. Hopefully other organic nutrients are similar, but I certainly couldn't guess.

I suppose for my purposes I mostly just think of the organic nutrients, sort of, as a sink for inorganic nutrients. They are there, waiting to show up as inorganic nutrients, but we have no idea how much is actually in our systems. If the inorganic nutrients are low though, I tend to be less worried as they are unavailable to algae (well most algae). And therefore less problematic (assuming the tanks inhabitants are thriving). Also, there just isn't much I can do, other than removal via water changes, GAC, skimming etc... and hope that they remain in check...

We do know organic carbon can destabilize symbiosis, with mucus associated bacteria in corals. So, this seems like the biggest issue with accumulation of organics. Watching the corals may help guestimate if organic nutrients are high though. If adding GAC, helps for example, that could indicate there is problematic levels of organics. Although, admittedly this is very wishy-washy as it could also be a number of other things. Also, yellowing of the water, detritus buildup, algae on the rocks, with no detectable inorganic nutrients, are all useful hints of high organic levels. Would definitely be nice if someone would come out with a reliable organic test though, but I probably won't hold my breath for that one LOL.

 

From Vodka to Biopellets

I ordered 500 mils of BRS biopellets and a MJ1200. I have a TLF Phosban 150 reactor running GFO right now, which I plan to modify to run biopellets.

My plan as of right now is to continue my current vodka dosage of 4.8 mils daily, while adding 200 mils of biopellets and letting them run for about 2-3 weeks. After that I will assess the situation. If the biopellets have seemed to kick in and the reactor looks to be able to handle another 100 mils, I will continue to add on a 2-3 week basis, while slowly dropping the vodka dosage. I'm still on the fence about pulling the GFO completely. It's hard to take the jump.

I think by montoring the overall health of the tank, the pellets themselves in the reactor, and the skimmate pulled, the switch should be relatively smooth.

Steve, one question:

Did the pellets appear clumpy or mushy at any time, or all the time? I've read people report clumping together, but these always seemed to be from high-nutrient tanks. I'm more or less wondering if I will be experiencing clumping/tumbling issues, as my tank already has an established nutrient level that is undetectable by liquid test kits.

I will start a seperate thread documenting my progress, as I do not want to hijack or change the intent of this thread. Thanks for everything you've done so far Steve, and for the input of our other "resident experts".

 

Sounds like a good plan Sacul

they never appeared mushy , but after about 2 or 3 weeks I did experience some clumping
the pellets that clumped together formed such a large surface area they got pushed up the reactor by the water flow
a quick side to side shake of the reactor a few times, broke them up and they descended back to the base again

 

what bio pellet reactor did you use for this? i can't seem to find that :-[ I am debating on reactors atm. you have me convinced of the biopellets!!!

 

That's strange, because my tank seems to follow the opposite logic; I have zero detectable nitrates, but detectable phosphates, and can't get rid of algae...