Looking for thoughts on organic carbon dosing and nitrate

[biom]

Yes but still in tanks with high NO3 levels (over 50 mg/L) I have seen down going of phosphate but not any significant down going of the NO3. After around 3 - 4 weeks (without any WC. PO4 adding or so) but still the same DOC dose - a fast down going without any signs of cloudiness or raised amount of skimmate (large bacterial biomass) Clearly this fast down going has not been related to bacterial growth.

And what will happened with this big amount of OC (let say ethanol) dosed for a month until we are waiting for this lazy anaerobic denitrificators to start working? Except fish being constantly drunk and with hangover
DOC is one of the most valuable compounds (if not The most) in the nature there is little chance to stay unconsumed for months waiting for anaerobic denitrification to kick in.

Denitrification bacteria need phosphate as much as the other bacteria to grow and multiply if there is phosphate limitation it will limit denitrification bacteria to grow too.

 

[BaliReefBox]

Question for you good people. do you dose your vodka/vinegar in one dose or split in a couple of doses a day. If once a day is it when the lights come on? cheers

 

[biom]

Yes there is "super" bacteria out there - but there is no evidence they are present in our systems - so I will stay with the classic denitrification pathway for the moment.

Oh, they are not "super" bacteria at all, it is just the strain that the authors found very capable of reducing nitrates ( 600 mg/l nitrate to almost zero for less than 48 hours!) for the needs of wastewater treatment. There are many other species and strains of bacteria that are capable of aerobic denitrification and I am pretty sure aerobic denitrification bacteria are as common as anaerobic ones. I dont see a reason in our tanks there will be only anaerobic denitrificators but no aerobic ones, it is counterintuitive given the fact we are trying to keep tank environment as aerobic as possible.
I don't like "classic" term usage here because it sounds like "more common" the fact somebody discovered anaerobic process earlier doesn't make it more classic process in terms of more common.

Let me correct my self. I still convinced that the large NO3 reduction use of DOC can give is due to denitrification (not a assimilatory) pathways but I open for that it can be aerobic heterotrophic denitrification or/and the more classic anaerobic version.

Because I cant find thumbs up emoji and because I am pretty sure you like classic philosophers (like I do - Socrates: "The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old but on building the new"
.

 

[biom]

Question for you good people. do you dose your vodka/vinegar in one dose or split in a couple of doses a day. If once a day is it when the lights come on? cheers

You can dose it at once or split it in equal doses there is no much difference IMO the final result is the same. Quite often the amount dosed is very small (1 ml/100l ) and if you have small tank it will be not possible to split dosses without dilution.
Many people are dosing when the lights are on - because during the dark hours oxygen is lower and organic carbon will simulate bacterial growth which means even more oxygen will be consumed and this could be dangerous.
Sometimes (as for this experiment) I am dosing when the lights go off - i have a bit oversized skimmer to aerate the water and prefer to feed non-photosynthetic bacteria instead of algae and photosynthetic bacteria. But honestly don't see much of difference in dosing both ways.

 

[biom]

There are aerobic denitrifying phosphorus accumulating bacteria (ADPAB) capable of aerobic denitrification and phosphorous accumulation simultaneously which means in theory denitrification can lead to significant phosphate reduction too.

 

[Lasse]

And what will happened with this big amount of OC (let say ethanol) dosed for a month until we are waiting for this lazy anaerobic denitrificators to start working? Except fish being constantly drunk and with hangover

Its consumed totally cause if you do not overdose - it is limited. It has been transformed into biomass and also some CO2

DOC is one of the most valuable compounds (if not The most) in the nature there is little chance to stay unconsumed for months waiting for anaerobic denitrification to kick in

Its not stored but when the facultative aerobs turn over to anaerobic respiration (using NO3) - they take available DOC from the daylily dosing. As I have said before - anaerobic respiration is around 19 times less effective than aerobic respiration according energy gain - they also grow slower - lesser DOC into biomass

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

There are aerobic denitrifying phosphorus accumulating bacteria (ADPAB) capable of aerobic denitrification and phosphorous accumulation simultaneously which means in theory denitrification can lead to significant phosphate reduction too.

That golden calf has been waste water technicians wet dream since the eighties They have nor succeeded to tame it yet

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Question for you good people. do you dose your vodka/vinegar in one dose or split in a couple of doses a day. If once a day is it when the lights come on? cheers

Optimally, organic carbon dosing is spread out over the daylight hours, IMO, because it tends to lower both O2 and pH.

Manual once a day dosing in the late AM/early afternoon is OK for vodka. For once a day dosing of vinegar, I'd saturate it with calcium hydroxide so there is no immediate pH lowering effect.

 

[GARRIGA]

Due to affects on pH. Why I chose NoPox. Assumption being they used both vinegar and vodka like ingredients to offset the affect each had on pH. My assumption could be completely off.

 

[biom]

Due to affects on pH. Why I chose NoPox. Assumption being they used both vinegar and vodka like ingredients to offset the affect each had on pH. My assumption could be completely off.

They are using vodka and vinegar in NO3PO4-X because they commercialized vodka/vinegar dosing method practiced by reefers in forums for years. Of course they are not using vodka or vinegar, that would be very expensive, they are using acetic acid and denaturalized ethanol (that is why there is some methanol and isopropanol).

 

[GARRIGA]

They are using vodka and vinegar in NO3PO4-X because they commercialized vodka/vinegar dosing method practiced by reefers in forums for years. Of course they are not using vodka or vinegar, that would be very expensive, they are using acetic acid and denaturalized ethanol (that is why there is some methanol and isopropanol).

Why I said ingredients like vinegar and vodka. Wasn’t implying they were using actual vinegar and vodka and know the hobby been using those although all obtain from a commercial need and not for aquarium use. Fact is I can’t think of a single application used in aquariums today not derived from some commercial purpose such waste water treatment or food production other than supplementing items such as calcium.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Due to affects on pH. Why I chose NoPox. Assumption being they used both vinegar and vodka like ingredients to offset the affect each had on pH. My assumption could be completely off.

All organic carbon dosing will tend to lower pH, since it ends up as CO2, , unless it has other ingredients in it (such as calcium hydroxide in vinegar). The vodka effect is just slower building than the vinegar effect.

 

[GARRIGA]

All organic carbon dosing will tend to lower pH, since it ends up as CO2, , unless it has other ingredients in it (such as calcium hydroxide in vinegar). The vodka effect is just slower building than the vinegar effect.

Thought vodka raised pH. Wasn’t aware it also contributed to co2.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Thought vodka raised pH. Wasn’t aware it also contributed to co2.

It has no pH raising effect. As it is metabolized, it produces CO2. Assuming both are metabolized, one acetic acid molecule from vinegar and one ethanol molecule from vodka produce the same: 2 CO2 molecules.

 

[Treefer32]

I think I am an anomaly to this .. I have been dosing vodka for a few months now i am up to 15 ml per day Also have biopellets.in a fluidized reactor
. Protien Skimmer is not over active at all. I see no reduction in Nitrates or Phosphate . I used to increase 1 ml per week and have recently started increasing 2 ml per week.. tonight when I get home and test I suspect I will need to go up again.

I had a very similar experience. I'll detail my own in this thread, but, yes! I was up to 65 ml per day of vodka, with a fluidized biopellet reactor and a separate matrix rock reactor. My nitrates rose week to week.

 

[BaliReefBox]

I had a very similar experience. I'll detail my own in this thread, but, yes! I was up to 65 ml per day of vodka, with a fluidized biopellet reactor and a separate matrix rock reactor. My nitrates rose week to week.

Jeez your tank almost qualifies for AA...

 

[BaliReefBox]

Thankyou all for your input.. really appreciate it.

 

[GARRIGA]

It has no pH raising effect. As it is metabolized, it produces CO2. Assuming both are metabolized, one acetic acid molecule from vinegar and one ethanol molecule from vodka produce the same: 2 CO2 molecules.

My confusion came from watching a video few years back by Reef Man where he mentioned vinegar reduces pH too much. I just assumed that vodka raised it because of the mixing of the two components. Once I discovered that NoPox was mimicking the two components I came to that conclusion and why I started using that vs just vodka or making my own cocktail plus it came with a ready to dose bottle.

If both create the same volume of co2 then is vinegar reducing pH greater because it takes a greater volume to provide the same nitrate reducing affect thereby producing more co2 per nitrate volume reduced?

 

[Treefer32]

@BaliReefBox see below - yes it did qualify for AA explains my fish behaviors!

I'm glad this thread was brought up because my 340g display defied logic. So, I believe there is something else at play. Scientists have complained that we need macro resources to study things at a large scale in the universe. It seems to me we need to study effects of carbon dosing on macro scales of aquariums. E.g. 500 gallon tanks, vs. 1000 gallon tanks, vs. 5000 gallon tanks.

Is there a ratio where carbon dosing has other unintended effects than reducing nitrate?

For me, my results were simple. I logged all my phosphate and nitrate Hanna tests in Apex while I was dosing straight vodka.

I'm pasting in a comparison chart of phosphates to nitrates since October of 2022 to current. I want you to guess when I stopped vodka dosing? I'll give one Hint I had started vodka dosing last spring about this time frame - May / June 2022.

***** Stop Reading Here to formulate your Guess as to when I stopped dosing******
5
4
3
2
1

I stopped dosing this past January. I was so fed up with nitrates and bacterial slime all over my tank. My gyres were constantly being gummed up by brown sludge. I had so much cloudy particulate in my 340 gallon display it was depressing to look at.

I stopped dosing vodka cold turkey. I did 2-3 50 % water changes between January and February. And you can see from January to Mid May my nitrates dropped steadily with no additional water changes since February. Also, no additional Vodka dosing. Once I got nitrates down from 65 ppm to under 35 ppm or so, something took off in the tank. Last week Nitrates hit there low point of 8 ppm. Afraid I'd bottom out I fed my old nitrate generating food. (Which I had stopped feeding last November / December). A couple feedings of that food and nitrates rose from 8 ppm to 13 ppm in a 1 week period.

My phosphates were all over the place. You can see when my nitrates hit 66 my phosphates peaked at .34 ppm. You can see in February my phosphates went from .3 down to .04 - .06 ppm down to 0.

I had phosphate present the majority of the time I was vodka dosing. At times very high phosphates.

Since stopping vodka dosing the results have been phenomenal over the last 4 months:

Coral Coloration has vastly improved
PH rose from a low of 7.6 - 7.7 to a low of 7.85 at night and 8.05 during the day
Cloudiness in the water has significantly reduced
Sludge on pumps has been eliminated
I didn't know why, but I had issues growing coraline algae on rocks and glass for the past 4 years. It's now taking off in a number of places.
I went from using over 110 inches of filter paper on my Reef Mat 1200 down to using 40-50 inches per day! Saving me $35 + 2 bottles of vodka a month = $55-$60 a month in savings)

The difference between when I was dosing and now, is night and day. People wouldn't recognize the tank.

Some things to note: I ran all of the below while carbon dosing
I do run a skimmer
I do run a Reefmat
I do run an algae turf scrubber (which was producing massive amounts of algae weekly)
I do run a fluidized pellet reactor with pellets that break down to do carbon dosing
I do run a Nu-Clear Cannister filter - Cartridge removed full of Matrix rock and Aqua Char


At my peak I was dosing 65 ml of vodka per day - I used a dosing pump on a timer and dosed 4-5 times a day.

I don't know if it took 6-8 months for bacteria to build up on the matrix rock while carbon dosing, if it took a year for the pellet reactor to kick in. But I credit my success now to those two things running in tandem and removing the vodka dosing all together. I don't know if there was competition. That while vodka dosing the pellets and the matrix rock were competing and dying causing a build up of nitrates instead of consumption? The output of the matrix rock and the pellet reator, 1 goes to my skimmer intake, and the other goes to the beginning of my sump. They are both ran off my return pump.

I feel like my case, is epidemy of failed vodka dosing. My Nitrates sky rocketed while dosing. . .

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

My confusion came from watching a video few years back by Reef Man where he mentioned vinegar reduces pH too much. I just assumed that vodka raised it because of the mixing of the two components. Once I discovered that NoPox was mimicking the two components I came to that conclusion and why I started using that vs just vodka or making my own cocktail plus it came with a ready to dose bottle.

If both create the same volume of co2 then is vinegar reducing pH greater because it takes a greater volume to provide the same nitrate reducing affect thereby producing more co2 per nitrate volume reduced?

Vinegar contains acetic acid, which causes a portion of its pH drop instantly, and then less of a drop later when it is converted to CO2.

All of the pH lowering from CO2 comes later and more slowly with vodka.

Thus, folks can be rightfully concerned about the instantaneous pH drop when using vinegar in substantial amounts, but when slowly dosed, the pH effects ought to be similar for the same number of molecules dosed.