Long term success without carbon dosing

[reeferfulton]

Need some help here .

I have had my tank setup now for 2 months . I have had 5 fish in there now for about 2 weeks .

My nitrates with (elos kit) have been undetectable and still measuring .02 phosphates with the hanna checker.

I have purchased a full setup to run Biopellets , and also have a reactor and GFO on standby as well.

My questions are .

1.IF you Do carbon dose ( vodka , vinegar , biopellets ) when did you start and why ? nitrates where creeping up on you ?

2. Anyone running a lps/sps reef with fish medium stocked long term without any sort of carbon dosing . ? If so what levels of Nitrate are you happy with

feedback would be great .

Seems from the reading I do I am finding alot of people are running biopellets without really knowing why .Thus i am asking what people are doing

thanks

[kien]

I run BioPellets to reduce my nitrates because I have a fairly high bioload in my 150g. Without the pellets my nitrates would hover around 5-10. With the pellets my nitrates are undetectable. Probably not zero, but undetectable by any test kits that I have.

Also, I have always run GFO in conjunction with biopellets. GFO to reduce phosphates because BioPellets don't really handle phosphates all that well.

[Reef Pilot]

There was a recent thread about this same subject. And as was said there "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", or something like that.

I would wait until you have some measurable nitrates and see phosphate climb a bit higher, before starting bio pellets or GFO.

And this is coming from someone who is running bio pellets and GFO. But I have a very mature tank, and used to have high both. But I would not do it, until I have exhausted all other good tank husbandry efforts. Dosing some MB7 early, though, would be good, to ensure sufficient beneficial bacteria, and help your live rock to do its job.

[ScubaSteve]

I kept an SPS tank thriving for a couple of years without any carbon dosing and only a ****ty skimmer. Water changes should be your go to method for water quality. Even now as I carbon dose and run GFO I do weekly 15-20% water changes.

[reeferfulton]

Originally Posted by ScubaSteve

I kept an SPS tank thriving for a couple of years without any carbon dosing and only a ****ty skimmer. Water changes should be your go to method for water quality. Even now as I carbon dose and run GFO I do weekly 15-20% water changes.

Ok well thats good to hear . I keep being told that i should start carbon dosing now while my nitrates and phosphates are still low . With the theorey of do it now or play catch up later .

What eventually caused you to start carbon dosing ? what changed .
And did your start with the carbon dosing and then discover that you still had phosphates and then started GFO ?

thanks

Guess maybe i jumped the gun on buying a reactor and pump and pellets ..I was just under the thought of start now or regret later

[reefermadness]

start the pellets....whats the down side. You can feed more and get more fish....

[i have crabs]

All this talk about water changes, bio pellets and cleaning your skimmer cup sound like fads im gonna skip, i feed heavy And my only problem is keeping enough calcium in the water cause eveything grows to fast

[Rice Reef]

Originally Posted by reefermadness

start the pellets....whats the down side. You can feed more and get more fish....

+1

Every system is going to be different and every hobbyist is going to look at it slightly different (base on the amt of money one wishes to spend on this hobby and amt of time to look after their tank etc...), however for every action there is going to be a reaction and it will be based entirely in what you are wanting to achieve. I dont think there is a right or wrong answer ( to dose or not to dose carbon)... determine what you want to keep in the tank, how many fish you want to keep, whether you plan to feed often or not and how much you plan to do water change. If you do start to dose do so slowly and gradually build it up. If you are at an undetectable level why not keep it undetectable rather than to wait until all hell breaks loose and then do something about it? What do you want to achieve...to maintain an undetectable nitrate level or something close to that or being willing to tolerate an amt of nitrate?

If you choose not to then the advice given by others are also very valid... Feed less, have less fish, more frequent water changes or tolerate brown corals.

[ScubaSteve]

Originally Posted by reeferfulton

Ok well thats good to hear . I keep being told that i should start carbon dosing now while my nitrates and phosphates are still low . With the theorey of do it now or play catch up later .

What eventually caused you to start carbon dosing ? what changed .
And did your start with the carbon dosing and then discover that you still had phosphates and then started GFO ?

thanks

Guess maybe i jumped the gun on buying a reactor and pump and pellets ..I was just under the thought of start now or regret later

More my point was that you can successfully keep a reef quite healthy with just the fundamentals of reefing.

I went to carbon dosing (I use VSV + MB7) because:

1) I am a scientist and am constantly experimenting. I was curious. After trying a whole bunch of different things I found VSV to work the best for me.

2) Carbon dosing keeps the water on the cleaner side and gives me a bit of leeway in case I need to skip a water change. I run a business and am doing a PhD. My schedule is erratic to say the least; this lets me skip WCs if needs be.

3) I feed stupid amounts of food to my tank (like 1.5 to 2 cubes of mysis in a 50 gallon per day, plus a few krill for the mystery wrasse). I have several hungry mouths that belong to high-octane fish that need to be fed several times per day. On top of this I have a TON of coral (basically I keep the tank for the coral) and they tend to do better with higher feedings. Dosing keep water quality at top notch.

I started VSV after building a new tank a year and a half ago. I started after the transfer to keep the cycle to a minimum.

I prefer VSV (or vodka or vinegar) over biopellets, unless you add a recycle loop to your pellet reactor to control how much water you are processing. The problem with pellet reactors, especially on tanks less that ~180 gallons, is that they are essentially running at full throttle all the time. Many tanks had crashes from pellets when they first came out because no one realized this; you are basically starving the corals to death. Sure the corals looked great before they died, but you know so do human super models... and I wouldn't peg them as the epitome of health. The way to counteract this problem is to feed more. To me this seems silly as it's like driving your car with the gas pedal pinned while trying to slow down with your break pedal; not exactly efficient. The liquid carbon dosing methods let you dial in exactly how much needs to be dosed based on your tank requirements. If I feel the corals are being starved a bit, I back off; if the nitrates are climbing, I bump it up a bit. Can't do that with a pellet reactor unless you add a recycle loop to the reactor.

It's easier to start VSV when you have some nitrates so that you can watch the nitrates come down and dial in your dosing amount. You can start from the get go but you need to start with a small dose amount and then increase slightly as nitrates go up.

I'd start GFO right from the get go.

Just my two cents...

[reeferfulton]

thanks for your input .

Do you really think i should run the GFO right now . I was under the impression that for the carbon dosing methods to work you need to have phosphate and nitrate available in addition to the carbon dose to feed the bacteria .
That being said I have also read that there is usually phosphates left over even after nitrates are undetectable . which is why people run the GFO in addition .

IT seems like most mixed tanks incorporate some sort of carbon dosing so i am
likely going to have to start
I think of all the carbon dosing methods I will most likely try the pellets . People are having success with them , so why not me lol .

I think i am going to keep a real close eye on nitrates and phosphates over the next month . And will start my pellets off if i start to see any sort of rise in my indications .

thanks