You have one of if not the most well kept reef tanks I have came across on RU-vid. I love the amount of depth you go into for your videos and the variety of livestock in your tank. Please keep the videos coming! Also, what does your cleanup crew consist of??
Thank you very much William! I'll upload a new video soon! I have two sand sifting starfish, a bunch of snails and a large abalone snail. Sand is being maintained by a Valiencienna Sexguttata
My tank went nuts when I tried carbon pellets and NoPox at the same time - huge bacterial blooms, so will be interested to see how this works for you. Remember that bio pellets are basically just another form of carbon dosing, so you're sort of doubling up.
I am a big fan of carbon dosing as well. I have been doing it for many years. If you want to make your own DIY nopox it's 375ml vodka, 500ml vinegar and 125ml ro/di. I also found nopox expensive so I switched to this DIY method over 2 years ago. If you want to lower your levels further I suggest you just slowly increase your carbon dosing. As you increase protein skimmer will also increase production of skimmate.
Thanks for the formula! Can I ask why the RO/DI water? I'm slightly worried that dosing too much carbon will upset the system, do you have any experience with that? I'm already dosing 40ml a day on this 500L reef tank
That is to get you as close to red sea's nopox as possible. If you google "DIY nopox" or "nopox recipe" you can read chemists explanations. It ends up even smelling the same as red sea's nopox. Part of the reason these products don't list the ingredients is it's so simple to make them yourself. Of course you can dose vinegar or vodka on their own, the reason I went with the diy recipe was it was a seamless transition from store bought to diy. As for overdosing, you will get cloudy water or a film all over everything. The biggest danger outside of a bacteria bloom is stripping the water of nitrate and phosphate. I have approximately 425L in my tank and dose 10ml. I don't have a ton of fish but I do target feed corals twice a week in addition to the fish and I run with just a trace of nitrate maybe 2.5 which one day will get a little higher if I add some more fish and phosphate varies but 0.10 0.07 are my last couple of results of course the photometer has an accuracy of 0.04 so both results could be the same. My system is pretty dialed in now, but initially I ran into imbalance issues where p04 would be absorbed faster then no3 but now it's somewhat reversed but I also run GFO in addition to the carbon dosing that way I don't have to strip out the nitrate to keep phosphate in check.
Thanks for the further explanation, I will definitely make my own carbon using this recipe then when I run out of DSR EZ Carbon! I will also closely monitor the po4/no3 values and balance, next test this weekend :)
Thanks! Well since they eat veryyyyy slow, you either need a healthy amount of living copepods in your tank (a refugium helps) or feed a lot, or feed multiple times a day.
Just be careful with biopellets. You want to step it up slowly, use like 1/4 or 1/2 recommended dosage at start and increase slowly over a few weeks to full dosage. If you use too much at once you might shock your system. Same thing if you decide to stop using biopellets in the future, don't cut it off cold turkey. Slowly remove it little by little over the span of a few weeks. Also with biopellets I don't think you have to dose carbon. The biopellets are a carbon source.
It's going okay for now to be hones, but I'm keeping a close eye on how the tank is responding to the pellets. I will reduce carbon as the pellets kick in, that's the plan :)
having run bio balls on one of my tanks previously, can I suggest you move the outflow of you media reactor close to the input of your protein skimmer. you'll find they work just as well but with significantly fewer negative side effects in the long run :-)
How much ati do you dose a day? I'm trying to figure the cost out. 1000ml don't cost that much here but it's quite diluted meaning it don't last to to long. And I'm a running 250 gal tank. Right now I'm running a calcium reactor. But I like the no water change aspect of ati and not wasting water every 2 weeks.
The bubble gun chalice I just saw ur last video it’s an lps type chalice?? It’s red and blue with the bubbles on it...? It’s gorgeous I want it in my 90gal lol
Hey Dutch i have the opposite i have zero nitrates and phosphates i try to feed alot to raise them, but not working any suggestions. My tank is mainly softies and lps.
beautiful tank Dutch Reefer....awesome mixed reef predominantly more leaning towards softy....i saw you are using np biopellets and carbon dosing from DSR to reduce your nitrates.. imo thats an agressive approach and may shock your corals..i would take one approach and see how the system does and than IF NEED BE think abt using another method in combination...also a little less feeding might help as well and may eliminate the use of either of those approaches...Take care I subbed....
Thanks Ash! It's quite an aggressive approach indeed but I'm watching it closely. For now it's working out just great, and yeah I know I overfeed but since I have a lot of slow/picky eaters I have to, to keep them healthy...
Hey man , amazing tank.. Have you ever had problem with copperband or foxface eating zoas? I added both to my tank about a week or two ago and something has been eating some of my zoas now.. Let me know, thank you!
How do you not have any algae really growing anywhere and no macro algae or refugium? I get algae anything over .03 po4. With a algae turf scrubber. Do you dose iron or potassium? Whatever you're doing or not doing its working.
wow! you have to dose 40ml a day just for a 525xl? I'm currently dosing 2ml a day in my 525xl albeit I don't have as much of a bioload in my system as you yet. Do you think maybe you should look into more biological filtration in order to get your carbon dosing down? I have a large reactor full of matrix and two bio-bricks a long with the usual LR.
Hi i have high nitrate 10 ppm to 25 ppm between but fosfate zero and must ad fosfate plus. But i want also to try dsr ez carbon. Do you recomend it as a reducer
I am mixing them 50/50, white vinegar and 80proof vodka. I am dosing 20ml a day on a 500L tank. Be sure to start slow (1ml a day for example) and raise it slowly as well. If you see a white film in your tank then you are dosing too much too fast.
You should! It's a simple but beautiful coral when it starts covering large areas! You could try some montipora, stylophora as they are the most easy ones to keep in an LPS tank :)
ik heb sinds kort mijn tweede zeebak draaien ben van 300 liter naar 800 gegaan echter ik blijf altijd problemen houden met fosfaat en nitraat heb al vanalles geprobeerd nopox carbon fe+ waterwissels etc etc echter ik vraag me af waardoor het zo hoog blijft en gewoon amper tot niet zakt en ja ik heb deze behandelingen echt lang en correct uitgevoerd. is er iets wat ik mis waardoor het zo blijft oplopen altijd want meeste koralen doen het wel goed hoor echter sps houden met een fosfaat van 1.0 tot 2.0 is niet te doen nitraat is ook nog eens 15 ofzo dus echt ver van optimaal ? alvast bedankt.
rowaphos e.d. heb ik ook allemaal geprobeert maar er moet iets zijn waardoor dit bij mij continue een probleem is heb ook ruim voldoende skim capaciteit geen dikke bodem meer en geen steen met fosfaat erin opvoer is ruim voldoende en circulatie ook
Hi Kevin, ik kan je helaas geen antwoord geven omdat dat per bak verschilt, en zoals je zelf ook al aangeeft heb je al veel geprobeerd. Bij mij weet ik dat het komt omdat ik (te) veel voer. Ik doe dit bewust omdat ik ook de langzame eters genoeg wil voeren. Het enige dat écht werkt is elke week 20% van je water wisselen om het relatief snel te laten dalen. Ik krijg het naar beneden met een combi van een zware afschuimer, biopellets, rowaphos en NoPoX.
Gebruik nu nog NOPOX maar zie dat DSR EZ-Carbon bizar veel goedkoper is. Koop 10 liter en deel het met mede hobbyisten....TOP. Hou ons op de hoogte hoe de DSR bevalt ten opzichte van NOPOX aub.....
Jep klopt, scheelt zo veel geld! Ik gebruik het nu zo'n 1,5 maand, tot nu toe geen verschil met NoPoX dus zeker een aanrader! Wel de EZ versie, die doet meer met PO4 dan de standaard versie
50:50 ongeveer en ik doseer 15ml per dag op 500 liter. En nee zeker niet zomaar erin gooien, altijd doseren gedurende een periode en langzaam op- en afbouwen om bacteriebloei te voorkomen!
I cant afford to do the ridiculous amounts of water changes that is needed to lower my 160+ nitrate level that was left in my tank after the cycle. So i moght just use carbon dosing or else my wife will kill me for the huge waste of water that is used on RO/DI.
