Phosphate Absorption Rates in Aragonite

[mcarroll]

A little Shel Silverstein says it better:

 

[mcarroll]

When you look deeper and see the death and species of coral that have died in these tanks, then my curiosity wanes.

Real reefs are also selective about which corals they will support. This should be where curiosity is piqued. When you see a parallel, understanding might be just around the corner.

Copps are not significantly more (or less) frequent or valid or dangerous than Ricks or PaulB's if that helps.

Nor is his method any more transparent so that it would make learning or emulating easier.

What I hear you say is that you interpreted Copps and adapted yourself to your understanding of his methods, but that you don't understand the others. Which is fine you only need one working method.

 

[mcarroll]

(Sorry, I know I'm quoting out of order a little..)

I have seen the roulette table land on Green, but I do not bet on that, even though it happens. I bet on the widespread cases of people who have the same goals as me - Copps would be a better example for what I want than Richard Ross.

So even as a non-weather man you can bet on rain but not tornadoes when you see clouds – that's pattern recognition. But that doesn't mean that you disbelieve or underestimate the tornado, does it? Nope – life is not like a game of roulette.

As long as you find an example that is functional and that can work for you, then it's good.

We can see that Paul, Copps and Rick all have functional examples, and that you can make one of them work for you as a model. There's only a problem if you were to ignore the reality and of things and use one of the other two as your model.

There is certainly a level of understanding that's required for interpreting anyone's tank as a model, or even selecting whose tank to use as a model. This is why it all hinges on the "Nothing good happens fast..." rule....everyone needs time to "learn up" to the model they hope to emulate. Most folks don't allow that time or progress to happen due to any number of other motivations.

BTW, I don't think any of the three names we've been dropping got their success overnight, and I think all have experienced meaningful failures along the way that are forgotten in conversations like this. Perhaps never known in some cases....Copps used to come into the store where I worked, but I never knew much about him or his tank. Has he posted a lot about his system's setup, history, ups and downs, etc? Or just TOTM articles kind of stuff? (Ironically I didn't learn "who he was" until I left RC and got on here. )

There is no "Copps > Paul + Rick" Rule, after all.

If anything I see it more like Copps ≈ Paul ≈ Rick ≈ [more folks I could name].

Really anyone with a healthy, longstanding example reef could be on that list and their "method" could be looked at with equal validity. Longer-standing examples should make better examples as the pro's and con's of the example may be better understood. But there aren't so many of that kind of tank that you really need to worry about being choosy. It's certainly not outside the scope of reason to read all of Paul's Copp's and Rick's posts and make the best of all of them.

Speaking generally, BTW, "making the best of all" has more or less been my strategy. I think I'm a (very weird) blend of [Every Aquarium-related Book and Periodical I've Ever Read] + Wilkins + Bingman + Shimek + Holmes-Farley(Recipe #2)...probably with a significant dose of Tullock, Riddle and a few others. There will be a "+ PaulB" addition with the next tank iteration, whenever that happens. Mainly meaning fish- and live foods-related additions, along with some DIY projects he uses in support.

Phosphate adsorption. (On topic.)

(It's getting deep, which can't be a bad thing in the end. But you better send some notes to Randy to get the first post updated with the experiment details and results. LOL)

 

[jda]

What you are hearing me say is that I have to make actual choices that impact a myriad of life in my own house. I do get a big disgusted when people seem to think that the best reefers somehow luck into a system that works and they do not spend hours and hours reading, researching and most importantly talking and interacting with other people do develop their own methods. Don't think for a second that I do not understand Ross's tank and many more like it. Also, do not think for a second that other people have not done the same thing. Perhaps the disconnect is in experience.

Do you have a tank? All of these posts reek of armchair/sideline idealist-academia. While all of this is fine on some level, people have to ultimately make decisions. What decisions have you made? I would rather hear about your path to illumination on how to keep a reef, where it came from, what hard choices that you had to make and what successes you have had. I could learn something from this. Telling me that Copps and Ross are different is not helpful, especially in light how I just explained that I did study both in great detail, why I choose what I chose and the success that I have had with that choice. What choices have you made? Why did you make them? What did you learn? What would you do differently?

I use the word "reek" very carefully. These type of posts can be dangerous to many people who lack the breath and depth of knowledge to know the difference between what you are saying and then actually applying them to reefing. While some part of you probably does not care under the umbrella of turning up your nose at minutia in the name of academia and philosophy, there is still the part of even the most bright academics that knows that what they are doing is unhelpful to the very people who they are turning their nose up to.

If you want to help somebody, enough with playing both sides from the Monday morning armchair. How have you done this? How would you do this?

 

[mcarroll]

All of these posts reek of armchair/sideline idealist-academia.

Time to get back on topic.

 

[ZaneTer]

@jda

That is an entirely inappropriate response. Your accusations were not required and none were pointed in your direction.

@chipmunkofdoom2

I am not trying to get people to run their tanks like Richard. It is incredibly interesting that he manages to be successful in what he does. Why? Why is his tank successful? Where is the point in a standard reef tank that PO4 concentration becomes potentially limiting or even damaging?

Nobody knows!!

We should be exploring this instead of arguing about it. I mean on the one hand we have some academic papers that say phosphate can substantially inhibit coral growth, on the other we have some papers that show increased growth rates AND a few fantastic tanks that show high PO4 levels coupled with great success.

We are brainwashed into so many things in life, it can be good to step back and question things once in a while. Not that long ago nitrates were thought to be terrible. Now many, many people dose. Why? Because they questioned what they were told and found that they were mislead. They are enjoying the fruits of their labour.

This is a platform for discussion and to share our experiences and ideas. I will do my part in trying to keep it that way.

 

[ZaneTer]

For those that say excess (whatever that is???) PO4 slows their coral growth:
Please show us what you did to test this theory, what data can you provide to back up this claim? I want to see and learn what your testing procedures were, how controlled your testing was and how frequently you tested. I don’t want to see academic papers, I can review those at my leisure any time. I want to see YOUR data.

 

[taricha]

The idea behind my proposed experiment is to show just how aggressive chaetomorpha is at removing phosphates in a system.

I will be trying to measure the PO4 at 6hr intervals during my testing. I am trying to see whether the heavy lifting to remove PO4 is carried out by my corals or my chaetomorpha.

If the goal is to max out PO4 consumption by Chaeto, then this might be interesting: Plant Fuel by Florida Aqua Farms.
It seems to be basically an F/2-like growth medium for plants but without N & P. So you can add everything else to support plant growth independent of the P & N levels.
my only reservation would be that their F/2-based "micro algae grow" has vitamin C so this might also, while some other F/2-based mixes don't and they grow nutritious phyto just fine, so I don't know if my phyto consumed the Vit C at all, or if I was just dosing Vit C into the tank along with my phyto feedings.

 

[ZaneTer]

Thank you Taricha, I will have a read of that today.

 

[ZaneTer]

That’s an interesting product. I wonder how useful it would be in a full reef or whether the nutrients it contains is more likely to be utilised by the other inhabitants before your macro algae gets a chance at it.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Could even be undesirably high levels of some elements when applied in a mixed reef.

 

[ZaneTer]

Good point.

 

[KimG]

Raising a topic from the death
I find this type of topics super interesting, as I believe they are part of the explanation for a lot of what we see in today's reefing. Thanks for a brilliant experiment #jda

I do have a question.
If aragonite is so good at binding phosphate, isn't there a risk that it will also bind other nutrients and trace elements?
Also, according to your experiment, even after binding 57 ppm, it still brought it down to 0.174ppm. And I believe at some point you were down to 21ppb (0.021ppm). This is a lot of phosphate bound. Is the binding mechanism the same as GFO? (sorry, not a chemist).

Thanks

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Raising a topic from the death
I find this type of topics super interesting, as I believe they are part of the explanation for a lot of what we see in today's reefing. Thanks for a brilliant experiment #jda

I do have a question.
If aragonite is so good at binding phosphate, isn't there a risk that it will also bind other nutrients and trace elements?
Also, according to your experiment, even after binding 57 ppm, it still brought it down to 0.174ppm. And I believe at some point you were down to 21ppb (0.021ppm). This is a lot of phosphate bound. Is the binding mechanism the same as GFO? (sorry, not a chemist).

Thanks

it binds lots of things, yes. Some you may want and some you don’t. Iron, lead, etc., etc,

 

[jda]

GFO, Aluminum Oxide, Aragonite, Calcite and Dolomite all bind/unbind based on the surrounding environment - all of them appear to bind exponentially more as the outside environment gets higher and will unbind when the outside concentration drops.

I have only really focused on harsh metals, which aragonite does bind pretty well... copper being among the most unwanted in reef aquaria.

 

[KimG]

Hi Randy and jda

Thank you both for the answer.
I get that they will bind compounds until equilibrium is reached, but as far as I'm aware you can strip most phosphate out of a reef tank with gfo. I never used it myself, but always saw being advised to go very slowly or the levels can drop to much. So, assuming aragonite as the same capacity for storage of phosphate (probably less), would it no be possible for it to bind all, or at least most of the phosphate?

However, that was actually a detour. I'm actually thinking more in terms of the other elements, the ones we can barely read, even with an ICP test and that then to be present in extremely small amounts in a reef tank. Isn't there a risk that a lot of them become limited in our systems until the aragonite is in equilibrium with the rock?

In both cases this would only be a problem at the start of a new tank or if new rock or sand where added to a running tank.

Thank you both again for the wealth of information provided to the hobby

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Hi Randy and jda

Thank you both for the answer.
I get that they will bind compounds until equilibrium is reached, but as far as I'm aware you can strip most phosphate out of a reef tank with gfo. I never used it myself, but always saw being advised to go very slowly or the levels can drop to much. So, assuming aragonite as the same capacity for storage of phosphate (probably less), would it no be possible for it to bind all, or at least most of the phosphate?

never happened to me either, but when it happens, I interpret it to mean the reefer used too much, almost by definition.

That said, I'm not sure I understand your aragonite concern. No one here is suggesting it as a treatment, but rather as an effect that a reef tank gets from the live rock and sand already present.

 

[jda]

The issue with GFO is that you can strip the tank water too low too quickly, then when the aragonite unbinds, the level goes back up again - most people do not know that aragonite binds phosphate and think that they only have to deal with the tank water (one of the reasons why I did some of this). It is the large up/down spike that is the issue - the use, not the product. The best idea is to use small quantities and change it out often so that your removal from the water is about the same as the rock/sand release... so a slow and stead descent and not sharp and large spikes and valleys.

Like most tools and treatments, there are some right ways, some wrong ways and some ways in the middle...

 

[KimG]

Hi Randy and jda

Thank you both again for your replies.

I'm not thinking in terms of treatment, but more in relation to a lot of problems I see this days.
I will try to explain (sorry long post). Also, sorry, you probably have heard all of this before. Don’t be to annoyed.
I moved the final questions to the top. You can read or skip the rant

Isn’t it possible that what we are mostly seeing with new tanks is caused by lack of nutrients and trace elements, rather than stability itself?
Or in other words, systems only become stable once the rock (directly through binding and indirectly through the growth of bacteria) stops striping all elements from the water and reaches a balance?

Now the rant:
Since coming back to the hobby after being away for over 8 years, a lot as change.
Probably nothing more than the fact that most new reef tanks are started up with dry rock, instead of live rock.
On top of that, the other big change I see is that we went from running around trying to reduce nutrients to having to dose them. Report of people having, especially phosphate, reaching 0 (may or may not be accurate in home test kits is another question) is an almost daily occurrence (nuisance algae section is a good place to see this).
While part of this comes from overzealous use of things like carbon dosing and GFO, plenty of people don't run this (some don't even run skimmers), and still nutrients bottom out.
This thread probably explains quite a big part of it, while bacterial communities developing on the death dry rock probably also account for a large part of the consumption.
This brings the first issue. Algae outbreaks, specifically dinos, are a much more common occurrence these days than they were 10 years ago. Mostly seems to be caused by nutrients bottoming out.
Next we have the sps issue. In the past keeping high-end acros was difficult, but keeping simple stuff like plating montis or birds nest wasn't a big problem. This days, plenty of people (I will include myself in this group) seem to be unable to keep them thriving. I’m not talking about RTN events, but the slow demise of a new frag or colony, that looks great on arrival and does for some time, but then slowly stops extending its polips, starts fading and then eventually losses all of its skin over the course of weeks. Normally the answer is either instability, the system is too new to handle SPS's or it’s the reefer that is too inexperience. While I agree that all of these probably explain a lot of topics found, I think the answer isn’t valid for all cases.
While I fully agree that an older system is going to be more stable, I believe is not the bacterial communities that are necessary for the corals. They will mostly provide stability for the system at a deeper level. Plenty of people are able to start reefs with dry rock and kept SPS’s in a very short time, suggesting that what is missing is not necessarily a bacterial community. Frag tanks with very little rock and large water changes are also a good example.
ALK, CAL, MAG, NO3 and Po4 are easily measurable and corrected.
As a biologist, the concept that time is needed to keep a certain organism is not entirely logical. While an organism may need time to grow or to reach maturity, they mostly need sources of food and energy. In the case of photosynthetic organisms that will normally be the light and then the macro and micro nutrients, as well as trace elements. Using simpler concepts, micro algae can easily be grown using only water and culturing media. If any of the essential ingredients of the media is missing, the algae will probably stop growing or die altogether.
While our corals are much more sensitive then micro algae and need more elements to grow, they are still mostly photosynthetic, so assuming all nutrients and trace elements are present, together with stable conditions of the major elements and a proper light source, keeping them should be possible from the start (as seen by plenty of successful tanks that have new sps’s add almost immediately).
The trend of people having very low nutrients with dry rock is very common these days.
As you both said, the rock will bind until it’s in equilibrium, but by the numbers presented in this thread, it may be able to strip very large amounts from the water and leave very little behind. If on top of this we add biology, with all the bacterial communities establishing themselves in the new rock, plus the normal algae growth in the system, I would suspect there is little left for the corals to survive on until this entire process is finished. If this is true for phosphate it may be even more so for some of the other trace elements that are found in much smaller amounts and that even ICP tests have a hard time reading.

Isn’t it possible that what we are mostly seeing with new tanks is caused by lack of nutrients and trace elements, rather than stability itself?
Or in other words, systems only become stable once the rock (directly through binding and indirectly through the growth of bacteria) stops striping all elements from the water and reaches a balance?

Hopefully it makes some sense, what I just wrote.

(We can move this to another topic if you prefer not to have it here)

 

[KimG]

Final measurement was 52 ppb in the water. .1594ppm.

57.4 total ppm added yields an absorption of 359x at a ratio of about 5 gallons per 1 pound of Florida-based aragonite. We also know that the aragonite is not likely saturated. Is there anything else to learn from?

Another quick question jda. (sorry to much professional and hobby curiosity in one go)

When you ran the trial, the values you posted:
I'm assuming that the 57.4 ppm is measured with the Hanna URL? If so, is that the equivalent to approximately 175ppm phosphate? (sorry,never used a hanna checker before).
Also, I'm assuming that is the equivalent to 175 mg/l of phosphate, so in total 175*18,9=3307mg or 3.3 g of phosphate that you added?
Can you tell me if I miss interpreted something?
Thank you again