Ultra Clam review thread

[Aqua-Digital]

Good question and worthy of a lengthy explanation

Water changes - On any system you should be doing a minimum of 10% a week so on a 150Gallon tank you should be changing 15 gallons weekly, however a lot of people do 25% changes or some even do a lot less.

Why water changes with Low Nutrient Systems - Well as the question highlights "low Nutrient" so to help in the nutrient reduction, more so when first starting with the system, water changes are the best way of reducing free radicals (water bound nutrients), but it does not remove structural bound nutrients as will be explained below.

Why not just do large water changes instead of LNS - Simply put, all you are doing by changing the water is removing the bad nutrients that have been picked up and bound into the water. However 90% of all nutrients are soaked into the fauna and scaping of your system, such as rock, sand (biggest culprit) and even glass, pipes pumps etc etc.

So what LN systems do is build up huge levels of positive bacterias to"EAT" away the nutrients held in the systems structure, this then eliminates the bad nutrients at source.

So by adding the Ultra Bak you are putting a very powerful bacterial food into the system that will literally burn off the source of pollutions. This is where the Zeo Lite rock comes in as it creates a very large porous home for these bacteria to live in and as such you create a far great stable area for the baceria to continually thrive.

Simply put -

Water changes just remove the result of the high nutrients
LNS removes the source of the Nutrients.

Back to water changes - Depending on the system you are using with fauna depends very much so on the water changes you do. If using the balling method to stop the risk of ionic imbalance 10% water changes weekly are recommended unless you add mineral salts. In regards to Ultra Lith systems, once the system is mature, you only need to do the 10% weekly water changes that are required in any set up, this is just to "freshen up" the water as new salt puts back in a lot of goodness.

The other thing as in your case, many of fauna's foods are very powerful and as proven work extremely well, but with all foods you can produce a nutrient sink in the water IF you over feed ( ), this is what algea feeds off of, so if you over feed then your nutrients rise and by doing the water changes removes to the water bound nutrients BUT not the structural bound ones and as highlighted this is where the fauna LNS range comes into play.

And this is what is so attractive with using the fauna system, it is made up of parts that you can use as you so choose, you can use the full Lith System for optimal stability OR in your case pick and choose the parts that will help your system, in this case the Bak.

Everyone can benefit from fauna, you dont have to be an LNS nut to use it, if you want to rid your tank of structurally bound nutrients then employ a dosing regime of Ultra Bak, and then replace the bad guys with Ultra min-S

So what is Ultra Bak? - It is not a bacterial additive, but a specific VERY powerful bacterial food, Bak is so strong it will boost your tanks own bacterial count immensly all on its own and as such is best deployed gradually. If you stop using it after a period of time your system will reduce down to its pre Bak dosing levels so it is not a product you have to always use once started, however to achieve the best result in nutrients for your system a background level is very beneficial, but always remember to add MinS as well so you do not starve your system of ALL nutrients.

So What is Min-S? - Min-S is a specific amino acid nutrient, it has been developed to put into the system only positive nutrients. The product is packed full of all the food building blocks that corals and clams etc need to thrive. On regular use you will see a massive difference to your corals, in basic colour and growth, and in animals such as clams the colour will be enhanced significantly.

Remember all these products are natural so you are only putting into your system what is found naturally in the oceans

Hope that explains everything

[Skimmerking]

Thanks for the great explanation Mike, well detailed like always makes you wonder on how some of the tank survive/ Any ways back to the review.

I have been gone away for a hockey tournament since last Sunday. so i didn't dose ULTRA MIN S. OR FEED THE CLAM FOOD.
I did do a 10 gal water change on Sat before i left.

16 Jan.
- Dosed Ultra bak starting 1ml as instructed
- dosed ultra min s 1 ml to.
My alk dropped from 8.0 to 6.1 dkh so i dripped from suppertime til the next morning to get it up again.
here are the levels so far.
lost one of my big clam crocea when i got home the fish were having a great day.
CAL 495
ALK 6.1
TEMP 78.3
SALINITY 1.025
PO 4 0.01 heated test
MAG 1350
Nitrates 10-15 PPM
PH 8.2

JAN 17
dosed Ultra Bak 1ml
dosed ultra min s 1ml
fed small amount of clam food
lowered lights on the tank 3 "
took off Phosban due to running Ultra Bak since they both take out PO 4
Good new I'm seeing some pretty good PE from the new frags since they had 1 week to get used to the tnak since i was gone. today im going to snap some new pic when i get a chance to post before and after...

Jan 18
ultra Bak 1 ml
ultra Min s 1ml
fed clam with ultra min s 1ml together if that
10 gal water change

pictures to follow today i hope if i get soem time .

[Skimmerking]

not much to view here
Jan 19th
dosed ultra BAK 1ml
and Ultra Min S 1ml

Jan 20th
Ultra Bak 1ml again
Ultra Min S 1 ml
small amount of Clam Food
Added 4 large colonies of acro's
red /Purple Humilis
Deep water acro
Tri color baby blue and white.
acro Purple Acro
tested PO 4 after 5 days of dosing Ultra BAK at 1ml for my 150 gal system.
tested 15 days ago i think that was at may be 0.01-0.02 now i see is all white so i guessing tha its working maybe those salifirt tests its hard to read unless you have a digital one
all corals are doign great the clams are coloring up and the SPS are doing that too.

So Mike do I start adding 2ml per day or keep it at 1 ml per day for the tank

[Aqua-Digital]

If you can give me the heat test PO4 reading as of today i will then give you new dosing guidelines

Need photos too.

Things to watch

white film on glass - excess use of ultra bak
Dont over feed clam food or minS

Other than that all seems well.

[Skimmerking]

sounds great Mike i will get that for you after supper long day at work, jsut got home had to go for a run to burn off some neg feelings....

[Skimmerking]

ok back sooner then i thought just incase that you got my message on here.. i will post a new one tested @ 80F and the PO 4 is IMO
0.015

[Skimmerking]

BEFORE ultra bak


present after 2 weeks of dosing BAK I think so far that that colors are darken up with is nioce lots of the acro's are swoing deeper colors like the purple stag... I have just started Carbon in my phosban reactor I hope that is ok so far..