NP-Bacto-Balance Questions

[TheSheff]

NP-Bacto-Balance essentially supplies nutrients to the corals at the lowest levels right? So, would these levels show in a test kit? Can you explain the process of dialing in my dosage for this product? I'm starting at 0.40 mL for my (40 gallon DT, 20 gallon sump) tank.

 

[Troylee]

Bacto balance is a carbon source like nopox or vodka. It’s used to bring down nutrients in a tank and that’s pretty much how you adjust your dose! Start testing no3 and po4 daily or every other day or so till you get the numbers you want from x amount of product.

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

The nitrogen appears to not show up in testing. It did help me keep nitrates detectable when I used to have issues keeping nitrates above 0. I think this is due to it supplying a nitrogen source so my tank wasn't so incredibly nitrogen starved that it used every last no3 available.

For my dosage, I went with the recommended 1year max ammount.

To my knowledge, you dose this based on phosphate levels and ignore nitrogen. At least as far as when switching between Plus NP, bacto balance, and elimi NP.

I do dose ammonium chloride when my nitrates get down to 1. usually until I am in the phosphate range to switch back from Elimi NP to bacto balance my ammonia dosing gets cut in half.

Using the bacto balance line, my nitrates were frequently not detectable the first few months, and while I didn't notice an issue allowong my nitrates to sit at 0, I got nervous i would end up dealing with dinos again and went back to making the effort to keep it up.

Was dosing neo nitro at 15ml per day to keep NO3 above 0, after using plus NP to raise my phosphate, i only needed 5ml to detect nitrates. The amount of ammonium I dose now is the equivalent to 2ml neo nitro in NO3, so while I am still bottoming out nitrates using the product, my system is clearly less nitrogen starved.

I dose 1/2 a pump into my 80G total water volume system, that is a year old.

 

[TheSheff]

Bacto balance is a carbon source like nopox or vodka. It’s used to bring down nutrients in a tank and that’s pretty much how you adjust your dose! Start testing no3 and po4 daily or every other day or so till you get the numbers you want from x amount of product.

ahhhh. So there should be a certain dosage that won't necessarily decrease my nutrients. Similar to how I would determine the dosage of a normal calc,alk,mag product would?

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

Bacto balance is a carbon source like nopox or vodka. It’s used to bring down nutrients in a tank and that’s pretty much how you adjust your dose! Start testing no3 and po4 daily or every other day or so till you get the numbers you want from x amount of product.

Its not exactly like those products, and does supply some amount of usable nitrogen, it's just not measurable as it is not ammonia nitrite or nitrate.

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

ahhhh. So there should be a certain dosage that won't necessarily decrease my nutrients. Similar to how I would determine the dosage of a normal calc,alk,mag product would?

Elimi NP is for reduction, bacto is for maintain, plus is for addition.

You will just have to test and figure out where you are. It is recomended to switch to plus NP at less than .03 phosphate, or elimi NP at .08~.1 phosphage.

 

[TheSheff]

Elimi NP is for reduction, bacto is for maintain, plus is for addition.

You will just have to test and figure out where you are. It is recomended to switch to plus NP at less than .03 phosphate, or elimi NP at .08~.1 phosphage.

So I guess at that point the sole purpose of bacto balance would be to feed the corals right? Because you could theoretically just dial in either a dose of plus-np or elimi-np instead right?

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

So I guess at that point the sole purpose of bacto balance would be to feed the corals right? Because you could theoretically just dial in either a dose of plus-np or elimi-np instead right?

I would say primarily yes, but it definitely would have a reducing effect if you skim as there is noticeably thicker waste produced while dosing.

I think it might also have the secondary bennefit of helping to take the nutrients away from pest photosynthetics. And populate some surface area with more heterotrophic bacteira.

Edit: bacto balance specifically I mean, the other 2 it's more intended/profound affect on nutrient levels.

I do just switch between them interchangeably, i dose double for plus NP, but its been quite a while since I have had phosphate drop low enough to switch.

 

[14 foot reef]

Lou from Tropic Marin has some fabulous youtube videos on deep explanation of these 3 products. There will be a lot of negative post about this product line, but it truly works in my system exactly how Lou describes it.
This is a pretty good one, there is a longer version from Macna

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

Lou from Tropic Marin has some fabulous youtube videos on deep explanation of these 3 products. There will be a lot of negative post about this product line, but it truly works in my system exactly how Lou describes it.
This is a pretty good one, there is a longer version from Macna

Oooo I haven't seen this one.

Also, it clearly in my system made my coral growth and polyp extension increase dramatically, BUT its all anecdotal and while it's a magic product for me, may produce completely different results else where.

The logic they give on how it works, makes 100% sense to me and makes nutrient control fit together in a nice neat puzzle in my mind, which that alone might be the reason I see it as such a huge positive on my system, prejudices and biases and such.

 

[exnisstech]

I may be wrong but I was under the impression plus and elimni were to be used to get levels where desired then bacto balance to maintain. I may very well be wrong but it seems to me using one product to raise, another to lower, and a third to maintain is just marketing to get sales. I do dose bacto balance on 2 tank so I'm not a TM hater. I have never used plus or elimni.

 

[14 foot reef]

I may be wrong but I was under the impression plus and elimni were to be used to get levels where desired then bacto balance to maintain. I may very well be wrong but it seems to me using one product to raise, another to lower, and a third to maintain is just marketing to get sales. I do dose bacto balance on 2 tank so I'm not a TM hater. I have never used plus or elimni.

Per Lou, you are spot on 100% correct here in your impression.

 

[exnisstech]

Per Lou, you are spot on 100% correct here in your impression.

I guess I should have watched the video busy morning lol

 

[Sophie"s mom]

The nitrogen appears to not show up in testing. It did help me keep nitrates detectable when I used to have issues keeping nitrates above 0. I think this is due to it supplying a nitrogen source so my tank wasn't so incredibly nitrogen starved that it used every last no3 available.

For my dosage, I went with the recommended 1year max ammount.

To my knowledge, you dose this based on phosphate levels and ignore nitrogen. At least as far as when switching between Plus NP, bacto balance, and elimi NP.

I do dose ammonium chloride when my nitrates get down to 1. usually until I am in the phosphate range to switch back from Elimi NP to bacto balance my ammonia dosing gets cut in half.

Using the bacto balance line, my nitrates were frequently not detectable the first few months, and while I didn't notice an issue allowong my nitrates to sit at 0, I got nervous i would end up dealing with dinos again and went back to making the effort to keep it up.

Was dosing neo nitro at 15ml per day to keep NO3 above 0, after using plus NP to raise my phosphate, i only needed 5ml to detect nitrates. The amount of ammonium I dose now is the equivalent to 2ml neo nitro in NO3, so while I am still bottoming out nitrates using the product, my system is clearly less nitrogen starved.

I dose 1/2 a pump into my 80G total water volume system, that is a year old.

A newbie to Bacto balance here. I saw this post and wanted to put my question here, as you seem to have specific knowledge. I used Elimi NP to gets things where they need to be, and want to start with the Bacto balance today. SO my question is, do I leave my skimmer, filtration, and UV on ? Or turn them off? If off, for how long? I can not seem to find this info on the internet. Not even at Tropic Marin. Thank you in advance for any help.

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

Speaking as just a hobbyist, everything I say is just my opinion.

On UV: UV may impact the bacteria population that consumes the carbon, but I've you have been running it with elimi NP, I would assume its just fine, and would personally not stop UV while dosing bacto balance.

On skimmer: the nutrient export method of carbon dosing partially relies on the skimmer, pulling out bacteria and microbes and sludge they excrete from feeding on the carbon dosing product. The skimmer itself seems completely unaffected with dosing, but probably will bubble down some immediately when adding, but I haven't noticed that myself.

TLDR, to my knowledge its standard practice to leave them on, especially the skimmer. I can see why reducing or turning off UV might be a benefit when starting carbon dosing all together to give bacteria a chance to flourish, but probably a negligible impact, and more than likely 0 impact if youve already been dosing Elimi NP, while running UV.

 

[Sophie"s mom]

Speaking as just a hobbyist, everything I say is just my opinion.

On UV: UV may impact the bacteria population that consumes the carbon, but I've you have been running it with elimi NP, I would assume its just fine, and would personally not stop UV while dosing bacto balance.

On skimmer: the nutrient export method of carbon dosing partially relies on the skimmer, pulling out bacteria and microbes and sludge they excrete from feeding on the carbon dosing product. The skimmer itself seems completely unaffected with dosing, but probably will bubble down some immediately when adding, but I haven't noticed that myself.

TLDR, to my knowledge its standard practice to leave them on, especially the skimmer. I can see why reducing or turning off UV might be a benefit when starting carbon dosing all together to give bacteria a chance to flourish, but probably a negligible impact, and more than likely 0 impact if youve already been dosing Elimi NP, while running UV.

Thank you for the reply. Pretty much what I was thinking but was not sure, and want to get it right.

 

[fzs122]

The nitrogen appears to not show up in testing. It did help me keep nitrates detectable when I used to have issues keeping nitrates above 0. I think this is due to it supplying a nitrogen source so my tank wasn't so incredibly nitrogen starved that it used every last no3 available.

For my dosage, I went with the recommended 1year max ammount.

To my knowledge, you dose this based on phosphate levels and ignore nitrogen. At least as far as when switching between Plus NP, bacto balance, and elimi NP.

I do dose ammonium chloride when my nitrates get down to 1. usually until I am in the phosphate range to switch back from Elimi NP to bacto balance my ammonia dosing gets cut in half.

Using the bacto balance line, my nitrates were frequently not detectable the first few months, and while I didn't notice an issue allowong my nitrates to sit at 0, I got nervous i would end up dealing with dinos again and went back to making the effort to keep it up.

Was dosing neo nitro at 15ml per day to keep NO3 above 0, after using plus NP to raise my phosphate, i only needed 5ml to detect nitrates. The amount of ammonium I dose now is the equivalent to 2ml neo nitro in NO3, so while I am still bottoming out nitrates using the product, my system is clearly less nitrogen starved.

I dose 1/2 a pump into my 80G total water volume system, that is a year old.

THIS ^ !

I've recently made the switch to the NP Suite of products and am experiencing the same 0.0 ppm (inorganic) Nitrate results using my trusty Hanna Nitrate HR kit.

Before the switch, I was using NeoNitro and NeoPhos to try to keep those numbers stable, but I see now that I was chasing numbers by doing that. My Nitrate target range at the time was 5.0 - 12.0 ppm. Two months ago, my Nitrate spiked 3 points to 12.7 ppm (the highest it had been in over a year). After 2 weeks of Elimi-NP, my Nitrates are pegged at 0.0. Even using Plus-NP and dosing NeoNitro (again) hasn't made Nitrate budge.

I think I just need to keep using NP-Bacto-Balance to keep the Phosphate levels in range and stop stressing about my inorganic Nitrate readings (even if they are zero).

@Court_Appointed_Hypeman, now that it has been another 6 months, are you still dosing Ammonium Chloride or NeoNitro or have things changed for your tank since then?

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

THIS ^ !

I've recently made the switch to the NP Suite of products and am experiencing the same 0.0 ppm (inorganic) Nitrate results using my trusty Hanna Nitrate HR kit.

Before the switch, I was using NeoNitro and NeoPhos to try to keep those numbers stable, but I see now that I was chasing numbers by doing that. My Nitrate target range at the time was 5.0 - 12.0 ppm. Two months ago, my Nitrate spiked 3 points to 12.7 ppm (the highest it had been in over a year). After 2 weeks of Elimi-NP, my Nitrates are pegged at 0.0. Even using Plus-NP and dosing NeoNitro (again) hasn't made Nitrate budge.

I think I just need to keep using NP-Bacto-Balance to keep the Phosphate levels in range and stop stressing about my inorganic Nitrate readings (even if they are zero).

@Court_Appointed_Hypeman, now that it has been another 6 months, are you still dosing Ammonium Chloride or NeoNitro or have things changed for your tank since then?

I had a few months ago, accidently neglected checking my levels, bottomed out, got dinos. Dosed microbacter razor, which melted pounds of chaeto, which I assumed would send my nutrients high so I stopped the dosing for about 3 months, still fighting the danged ostreopsis, finally got the nerve to look at my nutrients and they were still bottomed out, may have been the entire time not sure.

I pulled out old bottles of neo nitro and neophos to get them up, did that for 2 weeks, then started dosing ammonium again since I was running out of neonitro. Things were trending in the right direction by this point, but I decided to try dr tims dino treatment, which.... I think I just added a ton of carbon to a barely any nutrient system is what that actually did, so.... reminder to test your levels guys.

I was probably dosing elimi NP for about a month eith 0 nutrients that entire time, I cut back on feedings too, just due to crazy life circumstances.

I am about to switch straight back to plus NP with a little ammonia again and test frequently while I finish off these dang dinos.


Before all of that though, I did stop dosing anything but TM bacto balance and it was smooth sailing, eventually my phos climbed up and I switched to elimi, which was keeping it strong right where I wanted it for a while. With my nitrates sitting around 5ppm for ~6 weeks.

Essentially ignoring the nitrate measurement seemed fine, but I will never ignore ore phosphate again, good lord did I dig myself a hole.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I've recently made the switch to the NP Suite of products and am experiencing the same 0.0 ppm (inorganic) Nitrate results using my trusty Hanna Nitrate HR kit.

Before the switch, I was using NeoNitro and NeoPhos to try to keep those numbers stable, but I see now that I was chasing numbers by doing that. My Nitrate target range at the time was 5.0 - 12.0 ppm. Two months ago, my Nitrate spiked 3 points to 12.7 ppm (the highest it had been in over a year). After 2 weeks of Elimi-NP, my Nitrates are pegged at 0.0. Even using Plus-NP and dosing NeoNitro (again) hasn't made Nitrate budge.

I think I just need to keep using NP-Bacto-Balance to keep the Phosphate levels in range and stop stressing about my inorganic Nitrate readings (even if they are zero).

I'll offer a counterbalance to the cheerleading going on here.

You may not be "chasing numbers" any more because you are adding unknown things you have no way to measure, but you are still adding stuff (now more expensive stuff) and hoping for the best.

It does not always work out (plenty of users were not successful), and you may have been just as successful adding a fixed amount of N and P daily as you are adding the fixed amount of this product.

Nitrate is NOT needed in a reef tank, but having detectable nitrate is insurance that available N is not too low. In your case, you have no such insurance.

 

[Court_Appointed_Hypeman]

I'll offer a counterbalance to the cheerleading going on here.

You may not be "chasing numbers" any more because you are adding unknown things you have no way to measure, but you are still adding stuff (now more expensive stuff) and hoping for the best.

It does not always work out (plenty of users were not successful), and you may have been just as successful adding a fixed amount of N and P daily as you are adding the fixed amount fo this product.

Nitrate is NOT needed in a reef tank, but having detectable nitrate is insurance that available N is not too low. In your case, you have no such insurance.

This is a good point, I will probably stay on the ammonia dosing train and just cut back if No3 climbs