The Bacterial “Rip Clean” Method
- Thread starter sixty_reefer
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beesnreefs
Well-Known Member
@Dburr1014 would you remind me please, how much Actif are you dosin? How frequently? When did you start?Not much happening in my tank.
I haven't cleaned the tank glass in some time. I do have a little brown coating and a lot of coralline.
GHA looks like it stopped growing.
I also have a GHA issue and wondering how long it might take for Actif dosing to start making a difference
I stopped using reef actif. The tank I have been using it on is completely covered in cyano, tho corals don't seem to mind. I have to dose N and P and after thinking about it to me it didn't make sense to carbon dose and and then have to dose N and P to keep levels detectable. I believe reef actif is a form of carbon dosing. This is after cleaning a bunch of cyano out yesterday.
Dburr1014
7500 Club Member
Post #421 is when I started. January 30. Started@ 1/4 dose nightly and now up to full recommend dose. I think 10 days now at this level.
They recommend 3 doses weekly and I chose to do half of that but nightly. So it's still basically the same dose.
Dburr1014
7500 Club Member
Something else to note;Not much happening in my tank.
I haven't cleaned the tank glass in some time. I do have a little brown coating and a lot of coralline.
GHA looks like it stopped growing.
My clam I bought in March of 2019 at 4" has grown quite big. I found it today knocked to its side. I glued a flat rock to my Rockwork and placed the clam on that. The flat rock is still attached to the clam. Anyway, I have been pulling hair off the back side of the clam for months. It was thick. Well today since it was dislodged, I pulled it out of the tank thinking this was a great time to h2o2 and tooth brush it.
To my surprise...
Only little tuffs of GHA at the base. Where did it all go?
EASTERN INDIGO
Active Member
I'm just like you. less work / more viewing pleasure. I would be grateful for furter instructions/info/links or Vulkan Mind Melds.Not to be confused with other similar threads were you are required to work hard, I’m a laid back kinda reefer and hard work is just not for me, sorry I prefer to allow the bacteria to do that work for me.
The goal of this thread is to discuss and illustrate the use of carbohydrates into clean reef tanks from pollutant that aid the growth of algae and other nuisances bringing biofloc knowledge to the reef aquaria hobby.
Peer reviewed paper
Effect of different biofloc starters on ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite concentrations in the cultured tilapia Oreochromis niloticus system
Background: High stocking density and intensive feeding in aquaculture systems lead to the accumulation of organic waste, which results in an increase in ammonia, nitrite, and nitrite concentrations in culture media. Biofloc is a potential technology ...www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
( Not that anyone going to read anyways, folks just like to see links )
The above paper illustrates that the use of carbohydrates can be used to reduce ammonia and other pollutants in a system by just feeding the bacteria, yes that’s that simple bacterIa also requires feeding the more carbon they get the more nitrogen and phosphorus compounds they will assimilate into body mass.
To remove the bacteria and the nutrients assimilated from the system is fairly simple, just perform a water change if you don’t have a skimmer, introducing filter feeders to prey on the bacteria and transfer those nutrients into the filter feeder body mass, zooplankton will also prey on bacteria and get eaten by fish transferring nutrients that way by trophic levels and natural as you would see it happen in the sea.
I’m not suggesting to anyone to use tapioca, molasses or sucrose into they’re system, we’re not on a cooking forum just be smart and use the only source of carbohydrates that I know that are made for reef systems, just get some Reef actif and fallow instructions (I don’t own any shares in the company by the way) I just find the product fairly safe to use for any level of experience in aquaria.
Example of a new system, 9 months or so that never had an algae issue, gets a crazy amount of food and often feed reef actif daily after light out.
there is no GAC or GFO from the beginning, there is no mechanical filtration every nutrient that goes in will end up in the fish belly or in a coral filter feeder etc… glass maintenance is just every 3-4 weeks not really sure I think last time I clean it was around Xmas there was many feather dusters starting to grow on it
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Still better than having to clean the tank myself imo.
Happy to hear any thoughts from others
I have a 210 with only easy corals and a low moderate fish density. I am constantly worried that I am UNDERfeeding them, and I would love to find a way to increase food wihout decreasing water quality.
Email [email protected] or post here for others.
Thanks
Ira
Dburr1014
7500 Club Member
Not sure what's going on.Something else to note;
My clam I bought in March of 2019 at 4" has grown quite big. I found it today knocked to its side. I glued a flat rock to my Rockwork and placed the clam on that. The flat rock is still attached to the clam. Anyway, I have been pulling hair off the back side of the clam for months. It was thick. Well today since it was dislodged, I pulled it out of the tank thinking this was a great time to h2o2 and tooth brush it.
To my surprise...
Only little tuffs of GHA at the base. Where did it all go?
Past couple days my GHA has started growing, like noticeable growing.
The only couple things different are:
1) started dosing phyto nightly. More than what the Seachem package says. I've been doing about 6 ml nightly and the package says 10 ml 2 or 3 times a week. This is based on 100 gallons.
2) my Po4 was going low so I dosed some. Maybe a tad more than I should have. This was a week ago, it was reading 0.05 and I dosed it up to 0.2, it is currently back to 0.1 as tested tonight. I have dosed before with nothing happening but not this much.
Tomorrow I will try to take some pics before I start to clean some out manually.
HomebroodExotics
Well-Known Member
You are feeding the algae. Don't dose phosphate nor that phyto imo.
Dburr1014
7500 Club Member
I stopped phyto last night.
Only dose phosphate to make sure it's not going to hit zero. My system has cronic low no3. I am dosing NO3 @ 0.66ppm daily to keep it @ about 5 ppm. Last night test was 4.5 ppm. When I dose no3, po4 can hit zero. When I don't dose no3, that will hit zero.
You think it's the phyto?
HomebroodExotics
Well-Known Member
The phyto is definitely just adding nutrients of some sort since it is a dead source of phyto.
I don't think its the phyto causing low N and P. It sounds like your tank is running about like mine, dose test etc. I have never added phyto. I'm testing daily because I have not been able to get things dialed in yet on this system.
Dburr1014
7500 Club Member
I do not think the phyto is causing low N and P either. Sorry if it sounded that way.
As I said earlier, I have cronic low N. I'm dosing N to keep it up. Keeping it up, drives P down because I'm sure I'm limited in N.
My refuge is growing faster than ever.
I started dosing phyto in hopes to feed the coral and everything else more as I'm dosing actif. I guess I was hoping it would starve out the hair even more. Safe to say I was wrong in this thinking. I have stopped dosing phyto.
In my opinion Lou should be guiding tanks right here in this thread, in order to speak about the product in its practical application for everyreefer if its meant to be an invasion reducing additive. That's how sixty positions it, as a rip clean replacement for physical work. Lou may not be aiming for that detail, if this is a claimed excellent reef food additive I think there's plenty of support for that already on the web and he does not need to guide outbound reefs using it for proofing.
clearly it's a high quality product, I'm sure production methods are exacting/outcome in test tanks, at the production facility and in many homes = verified with reef actif I honestly believe it. their salt was the best I ever used in my tank it made a tangible difference in coral growth rates on my lps is my specific finding
tanks on file here like Graeme's really need to be fixed live time for us to prove this as an invasion control or export replacer. I guess will have to wait to see if the talk is informational and doesn't venture too far into invasion correction/we need G's reef fixed here using the additive for sure in order to cross-apply this retail additive to many uses. so far, it's utility is feed mobility and acquisition benefits to corals.
clearly it's a high quality product, I'm sure production methods are exacting/outcome in test tanks, at the production facility and in many homes = verified with reef actif I honestly believe it. their salt was the best I ever used in my tank it made a tangible difference in coral growth rates on my lps is my specific finding
tanks on file here like Graeme's really need to be fixed live time for us to prove this as an invasion control or export replacer. I guess will have to wait to see if the talk is informational and doesn't venture too far into invasion correction/we need G's reef fixed here using the additive for sure in order to cross-apply this retail additive to many uses. so far, it's utility is feed mobility and acquisition benefits to corals.
@Graemesreef please can you post a full tank shot as the tank sits now, after dosing has been in place a while we really need that here, how the tank looks today
* I don't think if your system has algae or isn't fixed, that the additive or the claim has failed. you could be mid-cycle fix on the ecosystem/internal controls aren't speedy fast and we wouldn't expect them to be. It's positioned as a work-reducing way to rid the system of invasions, and it sure might be able to. legit tests are underway/adds value to the thread.
ending clean pics also offset nicely against updated ones. the fact you're using the doser + the evolution of your tank in pics is all that matters. It'll be perhaps the most important set of pics in the thread so far. Sixty's job will be to guide that evolution using remote means and no physical removal from your system, only the reef actif.
* I don't think if your system has algae or isn't fixed, that the additive or the claim has failed. you could be mid-cycle fix on the ecosystem/internal controls aren't speedy fast and we wouldn't expect them to be. It's positioned as a work-reducing way to rid the system of invasions, and it sure might be able to. legit tests are underway/adds value to the thread.
ending clean pics also offset nicely against updated ones. the fact you're using the doser + the evolution of your tank in pics is all that matters. It'll be perhaps the most important set of pics in the thread so far. Sixty's job will be to guide that evolution using remote means and no physical removal from your system, only the reef actif.
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Dburr1014
7500 Club Member
The algae came off relatively easy. Some Tufts came off right down to the Rock which I was happy to see. I certainly don't have as much algae as I used to before I started this program. But the Tufts I did have all of a sudden got along in the past week. I'm going to stop dosing the phyto and continue with the actif.
Here are some pictures that I took before I started pulling on the hair.
Graemesreef
Active Member
@brandon429 so I'm up to my eyeballs breaking off and moving anything that's in danger of being compromised by this outbreak. I think I understand the majority of your language and will be more than happy to help once i can catch my breath. Between now and then the only question I have is... If reef actif provides the beneficial breakdown of any organisms in any way that will possibly help turn that negative into a positive will that not only aid in the benefit of coral but as well macro algae? Turn's out this is Chlorodesmis in my display. I will keep in touch, but you know it's bad when BRS screams VIBRANT.
the truth is someone may decide to recommend some strategic hand-guiding or cleaning based on the pics so we need to see em when you are free to post
there's no harm in helping the doser act on less mass via initially cleaning the tank as a helpful mass reducer and not as a full disassembly cleaning either, perhaps someone might spot lighting areas being overdriven etc from the pics
folks will want to know how clean your sourcewater is: TDS etc/ they can factor that constellation of presentation along with the doser to give a good chance to help.
there's no harm in helping the doser act on less mass via initially cleaning the tank as a helpful mass reducer and not as a full disassembly cleaning either, perhaps someone might spot lighting areas being overdriven etc from the pics
folks will want to know how clean your sourcewater is: TDS etc/ they can factor that constellation of presentation along with the doser to give a good chance to help.
@Dburr1014 it seems to be working well, the corals certainly still have deep nice color/if you mentioned falls off easier perhaps some of the holdfasts in the algae matt were dying. nice
OP
OP
sixty_reefer
5000 Club Member
If your levels of n and p are nearly undetectable it will work against the beneficial bacteria, for it to work you would need to have po4 and no3 elevated at all times (this is due to heterotrophic bacteria not being able to divide and grow if nitrates or phosphates are depleted) also if you using neonitro for nitrates it will have contradicted elements.I stopped using reef actif. The tank I have been using it on is completely covered in cyano, tho corals don't seem to mind. I have to dose N and P and after thinking about it to me it didn't make sense to carbon dose and and then have to dose N and P to keep levels detectable. I believe reef actif is a form of carbon dosing. This is after cleaning a bunch of cyano out yesterday.
Try and use known sources of nitrates like calcium and sodium nitrate instead if possible.
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