Long term vodka dosing?

[Mattman1977]

Any long term vodka doser 2+ years on here? Have some questions you ya

thanks
Matt

 

[lapin]

I would ask your questions in a post and # Randy.

 

[andrewkw]

While not dosing straight vodka I have been dosing nopox then diy nopox (which is vodka, vinegar and rodi) for I dunno 5 years? Probably longer, maybe 7. Way back when I started it was to bring down no3/po4. Now it's just part of my daily routine that keeps my system stable. Obviously it is still helping keep nutrient levels low enough but at an even level not a reduction.

My experience is basically entirely anecdotal as these days I just periodically check the no3 / p04 levels and have not adjusted my dosing amount in years. Filter socks clog twice a week, skimmer is very dirty and cleaned out once a week. There have been no long term side effects. Corals are healthy as are fish. I should point out my bioload has not considerably changed in a long time and I roughly feed the same amount of food each week.

 

[Mattman1977]

Ok so here we go. Buddy has a 220gal tank been setup around 6 years. Live rock, 1” sand bed, t8 lights, in the beginning he had a sump with a maggus curve 7 skimmer, mostly softies with medium to light bio load. He started vodka dosing 4-5 years ago because of high nutrients.

around 2 years ago he switched the store bought skimmer out for a 5’ tall dyi bubble skimmer. This thing is awesome looking. Everything was smooth sailing. Not long after the skimmer he started going bare bottom little at a time during water changes he would remove some sand until it was all gone. Oh and around that same time he upgraded to t5 lights.

so this brings me to the reason i posted this is the tanks alk dropped low for no apparent reason. He doesn't chase numbers heck he is lucky if he every test anything but all of a sudden he lost a few new fish so he decided to test his water and the alk was at 6 dkh and cal of 400. Kind of off balanced.

Hes working on getting his water parameters back in check but thats not what im asking information on. Im wondering if his no3 and po4 were in check, between going bare bottom and huge skimmer then vodka dosing on top of it if it could of had any negative effects on the balance of his tank like dropping alk.

for the next few months im sure he will be testing until everything gets evened out but was trying to find any other long term vodka dosers out there and if there experiences or any in site on it would be great
@Randy Holmes-Farley

Thanks guys
Matt

 

[Mattman1977]

Cal was supposed to be 480 not 400.