Best nutrient reduction strategy for very heavy bioload?

[Muffin87]

What would be the best way to keep nitrate and phosphate in check with this kind of bioload? (Other than water changes, obviously)

My intention is to keep an LPS & Clams 50G tank, including tubastea (yellow and black), and diffent dendrophyllias.
I already set up a mini fridge for heavy automatic feedings every 2-3 days. I figure that should be enough to keep tubastrea thriving without having to spot feed them.

So far I've been using:

• automatic fleece filter
• oversized skimmer
• middle chamber of my sump as a refugium - but I doubt that will be enough to keep nutrients in check in the long term.

I've been considering the following so far:

• Alcohol Denitrator (should also reduce phosphate, as I understand it)
• Sulphur Denitrator (would screw up the Alk-Calcium balance, as it reduces Alk substantially)
• Carbon Dosing: Tropic Marin Elimi-NP (for tanks with PO4 > 0.1)
• Lanthanum Chloride drip
• Biopellets (will they be enough by themselves tho?)

Any suggestions would be deeply appreciated

 

[burningmime]

I've never kept anything like that, so these are just some ideas; take my advice with a bucket of salt. In addition to what you listed, you might consider:

* Zeolite/zeovit method. That's basically carbon dosing plus a media that directly absorbs ammonia. They sell a vibirator so you don't need to pump the rocks every day now.
* ATS and/or Algae reactors (eg Pax Bellum) instead of/in addition to the refugium. These often have higher growth rates per watt since the light is contained within a small space with water being forced through. BRS did that segment with the dude who has the 20k gallon reef, and he has like 8 algae scrubbers going.
* Plumbing it to a larger system to distribute the bioload: https://reefbuilders.com/2015/10/29/preliminary-success-dendonephthya-carnation-corals/
* https://reefs.com/2016/01/13/outdoor-mangrove-refugium/ (maybe not, but it's a cool idea)

 

[Muffin87]

* https://reefs.com/2016/01/13/outdoor-mangrove-refugium/ (maybe not, but it's a cool idea)

This is a super cool idea, but the weather where I live would make it impossible.

* Plumbing it to a larger system to distribute the bioload:

Also great, but I live in a 2-room apartment. So it's not a viable option at the moment to have a larger tank. When I have the money to get a custom made tank, I'll certainly do something like that. Was already planning to... in the distant future.

Is Zeovit actually that effective? I wouldn't think that zeovit would be able to digest that amount of nutrients without getting cyano all over the place.

Thanks for the input!

 

[45ZoaGarden]

Not gonna lie, I think you should be fine. Is the tank already up and running?

You might not need to do anything else to keep your nitrates and phosphates under control... I strongly advise against dosing any means of nitrate reduction because tanks will become dependent on whatever you are dosing. You’d be surprised about how much a fuge can do...

If the tank is new, just wait some time and see.

If it’s over a year old, some options you could consider are:
Algae turf scrubber
Cheato reactor
Gfo and biopellet reactors
Larger external fuge

The best way at keeping them low is keeping the tank clean. Pound the tank with flow and make sure the sand bed is constantly being turned over by the cuc. Feeding the tank every other day should be no problem..

 

[45ZoaGarden]

Keep in mind a newer tank with super low nitrates and phosphates is a combination to fuel dinos. I wouldn’t keep nitrates below 5ppm for the first 6-8 months.

 

[Muffin87]

Larger external fuge

Yes, I was going to try to change my sump so I can fit a fuge about 25%-30% of the tank size, not sure thats's gonna work tho, space-wise.

Should I have to supplement algae-based filtration (ATS, fuge, cheato reactors etc), what would you go for?

It seems somehow people always discourage me from using a denitrator, but from what I can read about them, they work quite well no?

 

[Muffin87]

Not gonna lie, I think you should be fine. Is the tank already up and running?

You might not need to do anything else to keep your nitrates and phosphates under control... I strongly advise against dosing any means of nitrate reduction because tanks will become dependent on whatever you are dosing. You’d be surprised about how much a fuge can do...

Yeah, the tank is up and running, but I'm having trouble kickstarting the refugium. I'm growing all kinds of nuisance algae, which is sorta suffocating the chaeto.

 

[Silent]

If you are growing macroalgae (chaeto) then I would start growing microalgae (ATS).

 

[Muffin87]

If you are growing macroalgae (chaeto) then I would start growing microalgae (ATS).

To be honest, I'd like to move away from algae based filtration.
The Tidal Garden Sun Coral Care Tips video says when you feed the tank heavily, tubastrea will tend to develop Valonia and GHA around it potentially starving it.
So they suggest using bacteria-based filtration, in order to be able to dose Vibrant heavily.

 

[Silent]

If you carbon dose heavily then you may have to worry about cyano than. At least micro and macro algaes can be grown outside of the display whereas cyano will grow in the display and potentially irritate your tubastrea.

 

[Muffin87]

If you carbon dose heavily then you may have to worry about cyano than. At least micro and macro algaes can be grown outside of the display whereas cyano will grow in the display and potentially irritate your tubastrea.

I suppose I should have an external refugium that I can turn off-line when I need to treat the tank with Vibrant then? Or an Algae turf scrubber. Or both.

 

[45ZoaGarden]

Yes, I was going to try to change my sump so I can fit a fuge about 25%-30% of the tank size, not sure thats's gonna work tho, space-wise.

Should I have to supplement algae-based filtration (ATS, fuge, cheato reactors etc), what would you go for?

It seems somehow people always discourage me from using a denitrator, but from what I can read about them, they work quite well no?

Honestly it’s your preference. A fuge will perform just as good as the other options if it’s being run well. The main thing is how you light it. I have a Ai prime fuge over my waterbox 130’s fuge and it grows some of the cleanest, healthy cheato I’ve ever seen. That stuff grows like a weed down there. On my 45 gallon cube, I have a hob cheato reactor that gets the job done. It requires a little more maintenance than the fuge but it works. Scrubbers are also a good option but they usually take up a good amount of space unless you got a submersible one.

I personally would get a good light for your fuge and use that. It should be more than enough for your applications.

Denitrators do work. They just have their own pitfalls. You have to closely monitor your nutrients with them because they will strip your nitrates to absolutely nothing without a problem. Cheato will stop growing when the nitrates get too low. Cheato is just much safer.

And no, cheato is way more aggressive than other algae such as gha. Cheato grows faster and will outcompete gha. This is why some people set up a fuge to combat gha in their DT.

All you have to do is regularly harvest some cheato and rinse it off every so often if needed.

 

[45ZoaGarden]

I suppose I should have an external refugium that I can turn off-line when I need to treat the tank with Vibrant then? Or an Algae turf scrubber. Or both.

You should NEVER have to treat the tank with vibrant. Prevention is the best method and a fuge is just that. If you have algae in the dt, there are lots of options to get rid of algae that doesn’t involve miracle cures that act more like band aids. I can support using fluconzanole to knock down new tank algae but after that point, you should be able to control algae with much safer methods.

 

[Kal93]

I would see where your nutrients are by feeding an empty tank before employing nutrient reduction measures. A protein skimmer would help. You may also want to change your floss/can your filter sock daily/every other day. Also, you could reduce your automated feedings to 1x per a day and target feed 2x a day to reduce waste

 

[Muffin87]

You should NEVER have to treat the tank with vibrant.

I completely agree, but from what I gather, Vibrant is a very good prevention strategy against the loss of healthy tubastrea tissue suffocated by algae/leftover food between the polyps.
Even Marc Levenson had a huge chunk of healthy Tubastrea tissue die off because of all the food that gets trapped between the polyps of tubastrea, algae growing where the food accumulates, and such.

So, on one hand, my nutrient reduction strategy should be efficient enough that I will never have to dose vibrant.
On the other hand, dosing vibrant is good prevention to avoid ending up losing healthy tubastrea tissue.

It's one of those existential conondrums. To vibrant or not to vibrant. That is the question.
Sorry for the shakespearean meme, I can't help myself.

 

[45ZoaGarden]

Lol, I understand. I see vibrant more as a temporary fix opposed as a long term fix. As long as you have a good nutrient reduction method like a fuge or ats (or even biopellet and gfo) you shouldn’t have to worry about algae. A good cuc always helps too!

 

[Belgian Anthias]

What would be the best way to keep nitrate and phosphate in check with this kind of bioload? (Other than water changes, obviously)

My intention is to keep an LPS & Clams 50G tank, including tubastea (yellow and black), and diffent dendrophyllias.
I already set up a mini fridge for heavy automatic feedings every 2-3 days. I figure that should be enough to keep tubastrea thriving without having to spot feed them.

So far I've been using:

• automatic fleece filter
• oversized skimmer
• middle chamber of my sump as a refugium - but I doubt that will be enough to keep nutrients in check in the long term.

I've been considering the following so far:

• Alcohol Denitrator (should also reduce phosphate, as I understand it)
• Sulphur Denitrator (would screw up the Alk-Calcium balance, as it reduces Alk substantially)
• Carbon Dosing: Tropic Marin Elimi-NP (for tanks with PO4 > 0.1)
• Lanthanum Chloride drip
• Biopellets (will they be enough by themselves tho?)

Any suggestions would be deeply appreciated

First stage, an effective mechanicla filter, removing most organic matter. ( a skimmer removes max +- 30%)

A high nutrient import -export system, having a high bio-load, needs a high and reliable ( autotrophic) carrying capacity, need(s) effective biofilter(s).
The use of a biofilter makes it possible to manage and adjust the carrying capacity and nutrient export as desired, at any time.
Biofilters for simultanious remineraliation ( removing DOM), nitrification, denitrification, for managing the nutrient reserve , the presence of nitrate, phoshate, and other building materials . For managing the nitrogen source availability determent for growth rates of most organisms.
The use of a biofilter makes it possible to correct the nutrient reserve and nutrient balance as desired, at any time.
For active nutrient management a refuge or reactor is used as biofilter
LNS and VLNS do not need manageable biofilters but using them makes managing such a low nutrient system easy.

Keeping corals, a high DOC content must be avoided, it messes up the coral holobiont.
Some products used to battle the messengers may be a lot more harmfull as the messengers ever may cause. What is in the bottle?
By killing the messengers one does not win wars. Nitrate and phosphate are not the enemy! They do not kill. Overdosing carbohydrates does.
Why nitrate and phosphate may build up in a well lit closed aquarium system and are not used up by photo-autotrophs?



Do you consider this system to be a high nutrient system?

What is considerd to be a high bioload in a reef aquarium? With SPS? With LPS? Compared to a ZMAS, a zero emmisionmarine aquaculture system, growing sensitive larvae to a bioload of 80kg/m³?

Why heavy (automatic) feeding?

Feeding the endusers directly or indirectly?

Heavy feeding of end users ends up in a high DOM content, TOC and DOC, high heterotrophic activity, high energy needs, , high CO2, nitrogen ( ammonia) and phosphorus production. High bacterial toxins production.
In a balanced system, supporting a high bioload, 60% of the feed may come from remineralization ( be reused) and may support primary and secondary producers which means feeding the endusers is the main nutrient managment factor.
The presence of primary and secondary producers may be a guide for managing the system.

The C/N ratio of feed , the protein content, is very important for nutrient management. High protein food increases the nutrient reserve.


Denitrator: a device used to transform nitrate into nitrogen gas. In most cases kept anoxic. No, it does not export phosphate
Alcohol denitrator: must be fed daily, difficult to manage. Anoxic conditions are needed. The export rate is difficult to manage. for specialists only.

Sulphur denitrator: the BADES process uses alk, ( produces H+, accids) as does the nitrification process, and many other processes. When BADES is used correctly in combination with calcium carbonate as a substrate it does not consume alk . In a reef tank alk must be monitored and corrected anyway. A sulphur denitrator is kept anoxic which makes it difficult or impossible to manage the export rate. For making good use of BADES, annoxic conditions are NOT needed.

Carbon dosing: does not export a thing from the system. Overdosing removes installed autotrophic carrying capacity wich is not advisable in high bioload systems, needing a reliable carrying capacity. Suitable for managing the nutrient reserve, for making small corrections by managing the ammonium-nitrogen availability, making ammonia more or less available for autotrophic growth by stimulating fast heterotrophic growth.

Lanthanium Cloride: my God!

Biopellets: are pellets made of a natural organic ( bio) carbon source. The intention is to increase heterotrophic growth. As it targets the same as carbon dosing, it does not remove a thing from the system. Can also be used in anoxic conditions to support heterotrophic denitrification, wich does export nitrogen. As the nitrate content in the reactor is not manageable and organic carbon is unlimited available such a reactor will become a H2S factory due to sulphate reductiion. Are not suitable for a normal nitrifying biofilter due to the unlimited organic carbon availability.

 

[45ZoaGarden]

First stage, an effective mechanicla filter, removing most organic matter. ( a skimmer removes max +- 30%)

A high nutrient import -export system, having a high bio-load, needs a high and reliable ( autotrophic) carrying capacity, need(s) effective biofilter(s).
The use of a biofilter makes it possible to manage and adjust the carrying capacity and nutrient export as desired, at any time.
Biofilters for simultanious remineraliation ( removing DOM), nitrification, denitrification, for managing the nutrient reserve , the presence of nitrate, phoshate, and other building materials . For managing the nitrogen source availability determent for growth rates of most organisms.
The use of a biofilter makes it possible to correct the nutrient reserve and nutrient balance as desired, at any time.
For active nutrient management a refuge or reactor is used as biofilter
LNS and VLNS do not need manageable biofilters but using them makes managing such a low nutrient system easy.

Keeping corals, a high DOC content must be avoided, it messes up the coral holobiont.
Some products used to battle the messengers may be a lot more harmfull as the messengers ever may cause. What is in the bottle?
By killing the messengers one does not win wars. Nitrate and phosphate are not the enemy! They do not kill. Overdosing carbohydrates does.
Why nitrate and phosphate may build up in a well lit closed aquarium system and are not used up by photo-autotrophs?



Do you consider this system to be a high nutrient system?

What is considerd to be a high bioload in a reef aquarium? With SPS? With LPS? Compared to a ZMAS, a zero emmisionmarine aquaculture system, growing sensitive larvae to a bioload of 80kg/m³?

Why heavy (automatic) feeding?

Feeding the endusers directly or indirectly?

Heavy feeding of end users ends up in a high DOM content, TOC and DOC, high heterotrophic activity, high energy needs, , high CO2, nitrogen ( ammonia) and phosphorus production. High bacterial toxins production.
In a balanced system, supporting a high bioload, 60% of the feed may come from remineralization ( be reused) and may support primary and secondary producers which means feeding the endusers is the main nutrient managment factor.
The presence of primary and secondary producers may be a guide for managing the system.

The C/N ratio of feed , the protein content, is very important for nutrient management. High protein food increases the nutrient reserve.


Denitrator: a device used to transform nitrate into nitrogen gas. In most cases kept anoxic. No, it does not export phosphate
Alcohol denitrator: must be fed daily, difficult to manage. Anoxic conditions are needed. The export rate is difficult to manage. for specialists only.

Sulphur denitrator: the BADES process uses alk, ( produces H+, accids) as does the nitrification process, and many other processes. When BADES is used correctly in combination with calcium carbonate as a substrate it does not consume alk . In a reef tank alk must be monitored and corrected anyway. A sulphur denitrator is kept anoxic which makes it difficult or impossible to manage the export rate. For making good use of BADES, annoxic conditions are NOT needed.

Carbon dosing: does not export a thing from the system. Overdosing removes installed autotrophic carrying capacity wich is not advisable in high bioload systems, needing a reliable carrying capacity. Suitable for managing the nutrient reserve, for making small corrections by managing the ammonium-nitrogen availability, making ammonia more or less available for autotrophic growth by stimulating fast heterotrophic growth.

Lanthanium Cloride: my God!

Biopellets: are pellets made of a natural organic ( bio) carbon source. The intention is to increase heterotrophic growth. As it targets the same as carbon dosing, it does not remove a thing from the system. Can also be used in anoxic conditions to support heterotrophic denitrification, wich does export nitrogen. As the nitrate content in the reactor is not manageable and organic carbon is unlimited available such a reactor will become a H2S factory due to sulphate reductiion. Are not suitable for a normal nitrifying biofilter due to the unlimited organic carbon availability.

So the question arises, what would you use?
Sounds like you are also seconding us, saying that natural methods such as a fuge, reactor, or ats is the way to go but newer people here probably didn’t understand half of what you just said

 

[xrouter]

The problem with vibrant is that in theory it could kill your fuge as well and its not just a matter of disconnecting while you treat. I personally have not tried using vibrant with a fuge but I have heard of people unable to grow chaeto after using it so I myself have avoided trying it and also I'm inclined to agree its a band aid although taking onboard your points about prevention.....the problem is that prevention could kill your fuge and then your really in trouble.

If you are convinced you want to use vibrant then maybe avoid the fuge but I'd be interesting to see if anyone else can comment on its safety with for example chaeto.

 

[45ZoaGarden]

The problem with vibrant is that in theory it could kill your fuge as well and its not just a matter of disconnecting while you treat. I personally have not tried using vibrant with a fuge but I have heard of people unable to grow chaeto after using it so I myself have avoided trying it and also I'm inclined to agree its a band aid although taking onboard your points about prevention.....the problem is that prevention could kill your fuge and then your really in trouble.

If you are convinced you want to use vibrant then maybe avoid the fuge but I'd be interesting to see if anyone else can comment on its safety with for example chaeto.

As long as you do a wc after treatment and run poly filter, carbon, and skim heavily you should be gtg. Ive treated with fluconzanole which is a bit different but I shut the reactor down during treatment and did the wc etc after the treatment and the cheato was fine.