Filtration In a Bottle = Genie In a Bottle?

Do you use any types of "Filtration In a Bottle" in your reef aquarium?

  • YES (tell us in the thread)

    Votes: 93 29.9%
  • NO

    Votes: 177 56.9%
  • No but may try something in the future

    Votes: 35 11.3%
  • Other (please explain)

    Votes: 6 1.9%

  • Total voters
    311
Depends on what we’re calling filtration in a bottle. I carbon dose with vodka and also dose phyto and live bacteria. All of these when clombined with other filtration methods make all the difference. Carbon dosing with a good skimmer is enough to keep my nitrates and phosphates down or even bottom them out if I’m not careful.
 
How do you know if chemical filtration products are beneficial to your tank?
You compare the results pre and post use. It is unclear, though, what question you're asking. At first I thought you meant bacterial products to remove sludge, etc - but in the question above you are talking about chemical filtration products - and I'm not sure what you actually are asking. I would not consider Lanthanum, Vodka, GFO, etc etc etc as 'filtration products'.
What do you use and how do you use it?
I use activated carbon - which I suppose could be determined to be a 'chemical filtration product'.
 
I'm not sure which you mean, but I've been running MB clean and 7 to deal with a Dino issue, and it's helped a ton!
 
I’ve used bacterial cleaners - brightwell razor and microbacter clean. They seemed to live up to what they said. The rocks became very clean looking. I noticed the yellow sponges the most, they looked new and clean vs before kind of plugged up with detritus. Even vacuuming the sand after a week of treatment, it was noticeably cleaner of the brown crud.

I also believe that those products made my yellow tang sick, and he stopped eating for almost 3 weeks and basically swam in a stationary spot in a cave almost all day long. I figure any algae he was picking was tainted with that bacteria and just didn’t agree with his stomach. Once I stopped treatment, heavy skimming, carbon, uv turned on again, w/c etc and he started getting better, now back to normal behavior but still a tad thin.
 
i think carbon dosing like nopox as part of a routine for heavily stocked tanks is beneficial…
not as a cure all,
but more as a preventative to avoid skyrocketing nutrient levels that can otherwise get out of hand.
Agreed. Very beneficial in small, regular doses to keep nitrates under control.
 
SunnyX coral snow method... that is basically a filter in a bottle. Or a pre-filter flocculant anyway.
 
MB7 and MBclean I want to say they worked as described. I started using a few drops of both once a week on my new tank I recently set up and I haven’t had a bad algae bloom yet
 
For my reef tank populated with let's just say fish that eat alot, Nopox has been a savior for the last 5 years. As my tank is in my bedroom I have limited options, limited by space so this helps me keep things simple, which is my mantra.
Nice tank!! What size is it and how old?
 
Calcium Carbonate and MB7 once a week thinking of increasing to twice a week. Still thinking about it.
 
Currently dosing TM NP-Bacto-Balance daily in my 50-gal AIO (previously dosed TM Elimi-NP). Every time I think, "Carbon dosing is a pain, and I don't think it's doing anything anyway", and I try quitting and my nitrates start climbing. So, it seems that carbon dosing is an effective part of my tank's filtration.
 
I use MB7 (possibly bacteria in a bottle) to mix DIY Coral Snow per @SunnyX. I dose it once a week as part of my maintenance routine... Blast rocks with turkey baster, scrub problems areas with a brush, then dose DIY Coral Snow. The process seems to limit the excess organic mass that wants to build up on my rocks, makes the water very clear, and seems to make it hard for Cyano to get a foot hold.
I find this thread interesting and wonder how much it relates to the Biome cycle experiment currently under way at BRS. There is a ton of real experience out there in fighting this like cyano that work for some but not for others. I get the impression that is because the things that are unseen and untested in our tanks make more of a difference than we thought, and a little bit of a shotgun approach "may" fix it, but it might not.

That said, @ReefGeezer , have you tried adding a healthy dose of copepods to your tank? That is probably pretty close to "filtration in a bottle"!

Just curious. It helped mine, and I tried every non-chemical remedy, but I ended up having to use chemiclean at half the recommended dose to finally get rid of it. I am sure it was a biome imbalance issue, but since I didn't and can't measure that now, I will never know.
 

IF YOU HAD TO TAKE A REEFING EXAM, WOULD YOU PASS?

  • Yes!

    Votes: 32 45.7%
  • Not yet, but I have one that I want to buy in mind!

    Votes: 9 12.9%
  • No.

    Votes: 26 37.1%
  • Other (please explain).

    Votes: 3 4.3%
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