Bio pellets and Rowaphos

[Empress]

Will something bad happen if I use the two of these running at the same time?

I just set up a bio pellet reactor which pulls water from the return section of my sump and drains in the skimmer section.

I want to add Rowaphos in the filter bag that comes with it into the narrow baffle closest to the skimmer (but not right next to the skimmer).

Will this be ok or will I run into chemistry problems?

I know the instructions say not to use the two together but some reefers are doing it.

My PO4 is .17 and NO3 is 25. I'm having bad luck with keeping sps.

 

[Reeferdood]

The problem with bio pellets is that they sometimes take a long time to work, if ever.
Your nitrates are not horribly bad so what I would do is employ the rowaphos or GFO to bring your phosphates down then employ some other means of carbon dosing. As you can tell, I am not a fan of pellets whatsoever..

 

[Empress]

I was dosing vinegar and that didn’t bring my nitrates down at all. I was using Randy’s formula for 6 months now. All vinegar did was lower my pH. So I quit using vinegar. I won’t use vodka. Is there anything else I can use to lower nitrates that won’t interfere with Rowaphos or GFO (besides water changes).

 

[mta_morrow]

Do you have the ability to to use an algae scrubber or macro algae reactor?

Or set up a refugium?

And, what is your water volume?

 

[rob safron]

How long did you try the Vinegar for? It took a couple months to really kick in for me.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

I was dosing vinegar and that didn’t bring my nitrates down at all. I was using Randy’s formula for 6 months now. All vinegar did was lower my pH.

The vinegar itself doesn't lower your nitrates. The vinegar feeds bacteria, which consume nitrates and phosphates from the water column as a result. If you're low on nitrates or phosphates, then bacteria can't grow and the vinegar won't get used (it will lower your pH though). If the vinegar did not lower your nitrates, the bio-pellets won't either. They both work the exact same way.

I personally would not use Rowaphos or bio-pellets until you have a better idea of what's going on with your nutrients. Why do you want to reduce nitrates and phosphates? What are your current levels?

EDIT: Re-read your post, saw your phosphate and nitrate levels. The nitrates might be a bit high, but overall, they don't look too problematic. Why do you want to reduce them?

 

[Empress]

I want to lower at least the phosphates because i can’t seem to get acropora to stay alive without them turning white. And montipora are alive but they’re brown. I’m striving for a colorful tank with mostly sps. My PO4 are too high.

 

[mclark452]

I was dosing vinegar and that didn’t bring my nitrates down at all. I was using Randy’s formula for 6 months now. All vinegar did was lower my pH. So I quit using vinegar. I won’t use vodka. Is there anything else I can use to lower nitrates that won’t interfere with Rowaphos or GFO (besides water changes).

What do you have against Vodka? I would recommend you try using Nopox. Basically its a mixture of vinegar and alcohol. I've found it to be very effective at reducing nitrates.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

I want to lower at least the phosphates because i can’t seem to get acropora to stay alive without them turning white. And montipora are alive but they’re brown. I’m striving for a colorful tank with mostly sps. My PO4 are too high.

I would not blame this on phosphates. Acropora turning white is a result of them bleaching and dying. Almost anything can be causing that. The montipora turning brown might be related to the high nitrates, but this also is probably not related to the high phosphates. Some tanks have phosphates in the 1 ppm range or higher. While I wouldn't personally try to run phosphates that high, there is nothing that is intrinsically "too high" about your phosphates. I think something else is going on here.

How old is your tank? What lighting do you have? What kind of flow do you have? What do you use for filtration? What are your test results for alkalinity, calcium and magnesium?

If you would like to reduce phosphate and nitrate, macro algae or an algae scrubber might be a decent choice in this case. They will not drive nutrients too low because they stop growing as nutrients drop. They also automatically turn back "on" again and resume growth when nutrients are available again. But I don't think that nutrients are the problem here.

 

[mclark452]

You can use rowaphos or gfo in conjunction with biopellets. But use small amounts. Not because anything "bad" will happen, more so because the junk created by the pellets will clog the sponges in any reactors you use for the other medias well before they are exhausted and you will end up just wasting expensive media.

 

[Reeferdood]

I would not blame this on phosphates. Acropora turning white is a result of them bleaching and dying. Almost anything can be causing that. The montipora turning brown might be related to the high nitrates, but this also is probably not related to the high phosphates. Some tanks have phosphates in the 1 ppm range or higher. While I wouldn't personally try to run phosphates that high, there is nothing that is intrinsically "too high" about your phosphates. I think something else is going on here.

How old is your tank? What lighting do you have? What kind of flow do you have? What do you use for filtration? What are your test results for alkalinity, calcium and magnesium?

If you would like to reduce phosphate and nitrate, macro algae or an algae scrubber might be a decent choice in this case. They will not drive nutrients too low because they stop growing as nutrients drop. They also automatically turn back "on" again and resume growth when nutrients are available again. But I don't think that nutrients are the problem here.

I agree, was going to ask the OP the same things..

 

[rob safron]

A phosphate of 0.17 and nitrate of 25 is certainly not detrimental, however, not ideal for SPS. You probably won’t get the nice and vivid colors at those nutrient levels and certainly could be a cause for browning. There are many ways to get nutrients down including Vinegar/Vodka or refugium with micro algae. I personally use vinegar which works great. I could not get my algae to grow regardless of light, flow and nutrients. As I mentioned above, Vinegar takes time, took me months to go from nitrate of 40 down to 2 or 3. Won’t happen overnight but a refugium won’t either.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Will something bad happen if I use the two of these running at the same time?
.

Not if they are both used in appropriate amounts.

 

[Empress]

Thanks for all your responses guys. I think I'll go back to using vinegar. I probably just didn't give it enough time to work. I tried nopox but it caused a horrible cyano outbreak (hence the vodka).