Is Carbon, Nitrate, and Phosphate Dosing Bad For the Hobby?

[TheGreatWave]

Are you sure that is true? the Feldman article I just linked researched this and concluded 35% of TOC was the maximum a skimmer could remove which is the complete opposite of your claim? Could you please explain how a skimmer can behave as you suggest or provide links to support your claim, thx Paul

It's an accurate statement in practice. I find my skimmer slurps up whole mysis shrimp within minutes of it crossing the overflow.

If the shrimp was left to rot then maybe the skimmer only gets 30% of the oils, but if the shrimp is sucked up whole I figure that is good enough for 100% of some of the shrimp.

About 15 minutes to a half hour after feeding, over 95% of the shrimp is either in a belly or in my skimmer. I assume this is what @Montiman means when he says the skimmer can respond quickly to large inputs.

Same with the reef roids. When I first add it the foam stops, but then the next day or so you can see the coating of reef roids on there. I have to clean it off right away because it stalls the bubbles going up the neck. I can still get algae from over doing the roids, but that is neither here nor there, the pollution would be worse without the skimmer.

Something about having a seafoam generator going 24/7 feels right. It adds effective motion and surface area to our systems.

 

[Ike]

Isn’t the most TOC most skimmers can remove about 30%? So is bigger better?

They were measuring what percentage it was removing, and not necessarily how quickly it was removing it. I just skimmed (haha!) the article though... I also didn't see anything that conclusively showed that 35% was max, just that that's the best they got out of that group of skimmers. If your goal is to remove ammonia and other organic content as quickly as possible before it breaks down into nitrite and nitrate, then yes, big is absolutely better. However, you're going to need to avoid a big that a skimmer can't maintain a foam head because it's stripping the tank too quickly.

 

[Ike]

I let mine fluctuate by 1.5’C but no greater than that. I think the temperature swing of that range is healthy.

Yeah, I used to have a nice swing of more than that which I encouraged. My move away from MH and more reliance on my controller has made things way more stable than I would like. Ideally I'd have a swing of 2-3c as long as it stayed at or below 30c.

 

[jda]

If so inclined, you need to cruise to the chemistry forum and search on the Feldman article. Dr. Holmes-Farley had some very strong comments and research. I am forgetting most of it, but basically that analyzing the skim mate is not effective and that over time, a skimmer can get most of the organics. Worth a search and read if you care, but I took from it that the 35% was not accurate in practice.

People get gas exchange for skimming, but most forget that it is the best way to rid your tank of metals. Metals get added in food, supplements and other places. They bind to organics and can get skimmed out. Because of this, I would never cut back or run without a skimmer.

 

[Ike]

Two of the big enemies mentioned- Feeding (overfeeding) and chasing numbers. These will haunt a system every time.
Filtration plays an important role in keeping certain levels in check and allowing nutrients to generate while removing necessary waste.
Each persons' system will be different and have its' own requirements. There are too many eager hobbyists that try to duplicate/imitate ones' success forgetting their water volume, type of water and age of tank may differ drastically.
Although a bit of reefing will be based on trial and error, we need to as hobbyists focus on enjoying our systems and not stress out about a low level such as sainity or PH as an example.

Agreed, though I think underfeeding is a far bigger problem than overfeeding in the hobby. I also think that you can feed quite heavily and not be overfeeding. I would imagine that overfeeding means a lot of different things to different people...

 

[road_runner]

..

 

[Ike]

I wonder how differently this poll would have turned out if the question had been...

"Is carbon dosing potentially harmful for inexperienced hobbyists to be using in their newer SPS tanks?"

People are afraid I'm trying to force my anti-carbon dosing agenda on them

 

[road_runner]

..

 

[TheGreatWave]

I would imaging overfeeding means a lot of different things to different people...

Agreed, lots of numbers quoted but never the amount of stock.

Example: If a large established healthy tank runs at 10 ppm nitrates, are we to assume this is also suitable for a new tank with one pinky size frag?

Or do we scale the nutrient and light back and base the numbers on the size of coral instead?

A good example would be Richard Ross's tanks which are pretty high nutrient compared to common practice. His tanks are loaded with stock.
Would you dare to start a tank with his parameters? lol.

 

[Ike]

Bingo,
I also think feeding definition vary between reefers.
To me there is 2 types of feeding
Coral feeding like AA, phytos..etc
Fish feeding, pellets or frozen.
I think overfeeding fish food can cause issues, while overfeeding coral is less problematic....what do you think?

Well practically there is bacterial feeding like carbon and such as well...

I look at amino acids and phytoplankton as "feeding" corals indirectly due to nitrogen content, neither add much pollution by comparison to other liquid or small particle foods that are seafood and protein based, unless of course the phytoplankton isn't done properly or is dying in the system. I feel like amino acids do little other than provide some nitrogen to nitrogen starved systems. They're about as superfluous as supplements come IMO, but we'll save that for a future thread

Overfeeding fish food is probably more of an issue simply due to the level it can pollute and because people tend to feed their fish a lot more by weight. Feeding of corals can be a problem just like feeding fish too much, but I think people are more likely to hold back, and there aren't many popular or commonly coral foods for that work well with most SPS.

 

[Ike]

Agreed, lots of numbers quoted but never the amount of stock.

Example: If a large established healthy tank runs at 10 ppm nitrates, are we to assume this is also suitable for a new tank with one pinky size frag?

Or do we scale the nutrient and light back and base the numbers on the size of coral instead?

A good example would be Richard Ross's tanks which are pretty high nutrient compared to common practice. His tanks are loaded with stock.
Would you dare to start a tank with his parameters? lol.

There's what what parameters can you have and still have healthy and very colorful livestock, and then there's "holy crap that's impossibly beautiful" kind of colors. The latter isn't typically happening in the tanks of those of us that have decided to explore the world of ignoring N and P and not doing water changes...

 

[road_runner]

...

 

[Ike]

There's what what parameters can you have and still have healthy and very colorful livestock, and then there's "holy crap that's impossibly beautiful" kind of colors. The latter isn't typically happening in the tanks of those of us that have decided to explore the world of ignoring N and P and not doing water changes...

Whoops, thought I'd edited this to make sense... See below!

There's the kind of parameters you have where you can still have very healthy and very colorful livestock, and then there's "holy crap that's impossibly beautiful" kind of colors that are only achieved with a great deal of luck (shortlived), or some careful balancing and adjusting. The latter isn't typically happening in the tanks of those of us that have decided to explore the world of ignoring N and P and not doing water changes... I can get kinda close to my old colors, but I can't quite match the colors I used to get. I know I would be able to if I wanted to play the PO4 reduction game again. I look at my tank now as more of an Audi or BMW (we'll see which model). My old tank was a Ferrari F50 at Monza, and it took a lot of maintenance and pushing limits to keep it going.

Maybe some day I'll post my thoughts on what it's like to have a fully mature SPS where suddenly every coral in the tank is trying to invade and kill all the others. For those that looked at that tank of the month article, you should have seen that tank nearly a year later. Some of those colonies were monsters and a hammer and chisel was something I broke out several times a week...

 

[Sandyego reeyfur]

i voted yes but now that i think about it dosing can be necessary in tanks whose inhabitants draw a lot of nutrients. However in smaller tanks with less corals dosing is not necessary and many people use it as a method of speeding up the growth rate of their corals, which i think is a waste of recources. LEt them doo their thang!

 

[maksim serebro]

What size tank and which skimmer are you using?

I have octo 152-s skimmer in a aprox 100 gal tank. Skimmer should be rated to 140-200 gal.

 

[Ike]

i voted yes but now that i think about it dosing can be necessary in tanks whose inhabitants draw a lot of nutrients. However in smaller tanks with less corals dosing is not necessary and many people use it as a method of speeding up the growth rate of their corals, which i think is a waste of recources. LEt them doo their thang!

It's funny to me that some people are taking voting yes as you're somehow advocating against its existence or banning its use or something. It can still be bad for the hobby and widely misused and still have it's good uses that aren't harmful.

 

[Montiman]

About 15 minutes to a half hour after feeding, over 95% of the shrimp is either in a belly or in my skimmer. I assume this is what @Montiman means when he says the skimmer can respond quickly to large inputs.

This is exactly what I mean. I posted my initial post to respond to a comment questioning why anyone would oversize their skimmer. Essentially an oversized skimmer allows a skimmer to quickly respond to a sudden large inflow of nutrients while a smaller skimmer that is capable of keeping up normally might not be able to respond.

 

[Mortie31]

This is exactly what I mean. I posted my initial post to respond to a comment questioning why anyone would oversize their skimmer. Essentially an oversized skimmer allows a skimmer to quickly respond to a sudden large inflow of nutrients while a smaller skimmer that is capable of keeping up normally might not be able to respond.

Yes a large skimmer can possibly do that, but if it’s too oversize it will not be working efficiently all of the times and indeed may not work at all for hours.. so is it best to not have the correctly sized skimmer? Tbh I don’t know

 

[Mortie31]

If so inclined, you need to cruise to the chemistry forum and search on the Feldman article. Dr. Holmes-Farley had some very strong comments and research. I am forgetting most of it, but basically that analyzing the skim mate is not effective and that over time, a skimmer can get most of the organics. Worth a search and read if you care, but I took from it that the 35% was not accurate in practice.

People get gas exchange for skimming, but most forget that it is the best way to rid your tank of metals. Metals get added in food, supplements and other places. They bind to organics and can get skimmed out. Because of this, I would never cut back or run without a skimmer.

I've tried searching and cannot find anything, that overly criticises his findings and no comments from Randy, do you have a link at all, I’m actually really surprised that no one (that I can find) has done any more research into skimmer performance at all..

 

[Montiman]

Yes a large skimmer can possibly do that, but if it’s too oversize it will not be working efficiently all of the times and indeed may not work at all for hours.. so is it best to not have the correctly sized skimmer? Tbh I don’t know

I don't think anyone would argue that you can't oversize a skimmer but I do think that some system are best served with a larger skimmer not because of the Bioload but because of the sudden changes in Bioload. The only thing that will stop a skimmer from being able to remove DOCs is if there are not enough proteins for the skimmer to form a proper foam head. In this case if two skimmers have the same neck diameter but one has a larger reaction chamber and more air input the larger skimmer is undoubtedly better. I also believe that the amount of waste required to form a foam head on most hobbyist sized skimmers is not as significant as people believe it to be as a foam head immediately forms after even light feeding. Because of this going with a larger skimmer with a neck diameter only 20% bigger will not result in any significant performance loss but will serve as a buffer against larger and sudden nutrient inflows.