Does anyone dose ammonia and/or how would one try?

[SMSREEF]

So why is it that almost everyone i know that had dino problems always relates to having very low levels of nitrate and phosphates? In my case everytime i see phosphates hit 0.03 or lower i start seeing problems.

Probably because low phosphate and low nitrate = less nutrients for the algae and bacteria that compete with Dino’s for real estate and other elements. Also many tanks are started with dead rock so they have less competition to begin with.

Less competition = better survival for Dino’s

Increase nutrients and add some real live sand (not the stuff from a bag) or real live rock and Dino’s will eventually be outcompeted and outnumbered. But they are just waiting for their time to rise again.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Probably because low phosphate and low nitrate = less nutrients for the algae and bacteria that compete with Dino’s for real estate and other elements. Also many tanks are started with dead rock so they have less competition to begin with.

Less competition = better survival for Dino’s

Increase nutrients and add some real live sand (not the stuff from a bag) or real live rock and Dino’s will eventually be outcompeted and outnumbered. But they are just waiting for their time to rise again.

That is my interpretation as well.

 

[Marc2952]

Probably because low phosphate and low nitrate = less nutrients for the algae and bacteria that compete with Dino’s for real estate and other elements. Also many tanks are started with dead rock so they have less competition to begin with.

Less competition = better survival for Dino’s

Increase nutrients and add some real live sand (not the stuff from a bag) or real live rock and Dino’s will eventually be outcompeted and outnumbered. But they are just waiting for their time to rise again.

Oh i know that its just that some people say that its best to have lower nitrates and phosphates, that its not needed when infact its not the case unless you started with live rock. Im currently going fallow and have issues with keeping nutrients up i was thinking of adding a drop of ammonia a day instead of nitrates since from what some people here have said corals use it better then nitrates.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Oh i know that its just that some people say that its best to have lower nitrates and phosphates, that its not needed when infact its not the case unless you started with live rock. Im currently going fallow and have issues with keeping nutrients up i was thinking of adding a drop of ammonia a day instead of nitrates since from what some people here have said corals use it better then nitrates.

I think "use it better' is not really established.

Organisms may take up ammonia over nitrate when they have both (that's what is established in the scientific literature), but that may just be because they need less processing to make the N useful, and ammonia may be just available in the ocean as nitrate.

As an analogy, if you could eat a hamburger on your porch, or could walk across the street to get a hot dog, there is more work to get the hot dog. That doesn't mean the hamburger is necessarily better for you, even if more people elect to eat it because they do not want to walk across the street.

 

[schuby]

Oh i know that its just that some people say that its best to have lower nitrates and phosphates, that its not needed when infact its not the case unless you started with live rock. Im currently going fallow and have issues with keeping nutrients up i was thinking of adding a drop of ammonia a day instead of nitrates since from what some people here have said corals use it better then nitrates.

Everyone has their own beliefs about what level each element in our tanks should be. My go-to reference is from RHF: https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/optim...oral-reef-aquarium-by-randy-holmes-farley.79/

I don't conform to every recommended level, but it is my baseline. His explanations help me understand impact. I read many threads on this site. When I see a tank that I like, then I take notice of where they say they run their parameters. When many of these tanks run at similar values, but vary from RHF's optimal values, then I strongly consider changing my tank. Two such changes I chose for my tank is phosphate (0.1 < target-level < 0.25) and nitrate ( 15 < target-level < 30). I don't claim to know exactly why certain levels work better than others, but I can accept that they do without a scientific study proving each one.

If you read many threads on here, then you find little nuggets of explanation/theory that certain levels of specific elements promote growth and other levels inhibit growth. We try to keep levels that promote positive results and inhibit negative results. I really enjoyed RHF's battle-ground analogy for ORP. Things in our tanks are never constant or unchanging as they may visually appear, even for a second.

 

[flampton]

f-

In the other thread you said something about dosing aminos as a poor substitute that would end up as ammonia. Did I understand that correctly? Do aminos ultimately break down into ammonia after being dosed? I ask because I am dosing a few drops of aminos twice weekly in my nano, and the corals in it are very colorful.

Yes that is an interesting question and I hope to simplify the answer as best as possible.

While we can't see bacteria in the water column (most of the time, haha) they are at a level of about 100,000/ml in a skimmed tank with no carbon dosing, and will be much higher in those that do provide carbon or lack a skimmer. (here is a hobby paper on bacterial levels if you're interested...
https://reefs.com/magazine/bacteria...ing-and-granular-activated-carbon-filtration/

As you can imagine that if there is 100,000 cells in a milliliter they're pretty small and so what that means is that each cell has a large surface area to volume ratio. This allows bacteria to import and utilize molecules much faster than larger cells. And so when you add amino acids to your water the bacteria will outcompete other organisms for the majority. As these organisms use the carbon of the aminos for energy as well as building structure, but use the amine groups of the aminos only for building structure this makes it necessary for the organism to 'waste' ammonia into the water. (Also one of the reasons why fish and other heterotrophic organisms are releasing ammonia as well, carbon is also needed by these organisms in higher amounts then nitrogen compounds)

So you feed aminos and the amines the bacteria don't use will be released as ammonia. So the benefit you're seeing is likely do to increase ammonia/nitrogen flux excepting the below.

Now I have to clarify when I said waste of money in the original thread. The aquarium amino acid products on the shelf are very expensive for what they are. However, if you're purchasing bulk powdered amino acids you can probably find some of them for almost as cheap as some of the ammonium salts. However as I'm not sure about other biological effects I try to stay away from making up my own amino concoctions for now. (as yes there is definitely aminos that have specific biological effects like inducing feeding responses in various corals, but the most effective compound seems to be different for each species and probably represents what they see in their native niche. Also while this maybe considered a positive, not sure if the same amino might not induce a stress response in another organism)

So if you're dosing a amino product so you can spot feed your LPS easier, might be worth it. I'd just use the smallest amount possible to save money and lessen any other impacts.

And I do want to clarify that even though a amino is signaling to feed doesn't mean the coral animal is transporting it in appreciable amounts. You can think of it like our sense of smell as we're detecting compounds in the air but not getting any 'real' nutrition from them.

 

[flampton]

I think "use it better' is not really established.

Organisms may take up ammonia over nitrate when they have both (that's what is established in the scientific literature), but that may just be because they need less processing to make the N useful, and ammonia may be just available in the ocean as nitrate.

As an analogy, if you could eat a hamburger on your porch, or could walk across the street to get a hot dog, there is more work to get the hot dog. That doesn't mean the hamburger is necessarily better for you, even if more people elect to eat it because they do not want to walk across the street.

Well I have to disagree slightly. Many organisms within our tank cannot use nitrate at all. So if they lack ammonia they will not be able to compete with nitrate users. A hypothesis for dinoflagellate overgrowth could be the lack of ammonia to allow proper competition from the resident heterotrophs. Unfortunately I will agree that this is just a hypothesis as I can't find anyone who has managed to greatly increase nitrogen flux without raising their nitrates. (so basically just the ocean at this point, lol!) So nitrates become visible, dinoflagellates decrease and thus it was nitrates. Even dosing nitrates will flux back to ammonia as you have DNRA organisms as well as algae consumers. It is going to be tough one to tease it out.

Edit: same with phosphates, but may have other mechanisms going on that I'm still trying to work out

 

[2Sunny]

I have two different ammonium sources I'm trying. I have ammonium chloride as my standard and I'm experimenting a little with ammonium acetate (hypothetically much safer than NH4Cl). As with kalk you won't probably be safe enough to dump in a weeks worth at one time though. First thing first you need to order some from Amazon or the like. Don't buy premade solutions unless you're not comfortable with weighing out your ingredients. 1 pound Of NH4Cl is 8.49 from Alpha chemicals. As with any ammonium compound make sure to have ppe and be aware of breathing any of it in. Basically don't just pour it out like it's flour.

Next you have to decide your initial dose. Not sure of your tank size. You can start with a solution that you can dose 0.125-0.25ppm (mg/L NH4) over a 24 period. If you want to monitor your ammonia you can but I don't think you'll see anything unless you use something that can detect these low concentrations accurately. (with the dosing over 24 hours it would be unlikely to see anything from these starting doses)

Now here is where it will get a little more complicated. For all readers this is VERY important. If you dose any carbon (including using macros and ATS) this will effect the rate of ammonia turnover. Meaning that you may need much more ammonia then you realize to get nitrates to show up.

. . .

So I ordered the Alpha Chemicals 1 lb ammonium chloride from Amazon. Questions.

1) Do you have a scale to recommend that measures mg?
2) Assuming my system is 2000L are you saying to add 250 mg of NH4Cl?
3) What is the solubility of NH4Cl? Can I make a solution of 1 g NH4/ 1L RO and would that equal 250 ml to dose the above?

Thanks for the patience and discussion. I look forward to experimenting with this idea.

 

[Dennis Cartier]

I use the same one you have ordered from Amazon. Randy posted a formula here Ammonium chloride solution for dosing that I use.

Dennis

 

[2Sunny]

I use the same one you have ordered from Amazon. Randy posted a formula here Ammonium chloride solution for dosing that I use.

Dennis

Great link. Thanks.

So, if I understand correctly I would need 250 mg / 0.32% = 781.25 mg ammonium chloride daily to reach 0.125 mg/L in a 2000L system.

 

[Dennis Cartier]

That looks about right to me. I got 787.5 mg when I did it on my end but it may be down to rounding.

Dennis

 

[flampton]

So I ordered the Alpha Chemicals 1 lb ammonium chloride from Amazon. Questions.

1) Do you have a scale to recommend that measures mg?
2) Assuming my system is 2000L are you saying to add 250 mg of NH4Cl?
3) What is the solubility of NH4Cl? Can I make a solution of 1 g NH4/ 1L RO and would that equal 250 ml to dose the above?

Thanks for the patience and discussion. I look forward to experimenting with this idea.

I use a Taylor precision digital diet scale I found it at the local grocery store. It's accurate enough for this.

You definitely can make a solution you're proposing but like mentioned you'll need to take into account the chloride. The correct number is 33.7% Ammonium. So ~3g per liter will give you a 1g/L solution. However that is very dilute. You'll be using a liter every four days. However a counterpoint is that the solution is weak enough that the whole liter could be dosed without any real problems.

 

[Lasse]

I use NH4Cl and have a stock solution with 38,16 gram diluted up tp 1000 ml. 1 ml of this solution rise NH3/NH4 concentration in 100 L with 0.1 mg/L (ppm). For the moment I dose 5 ml/day - It means that I add around 50 mg NH3/NH4 a day in my 300 L system. If nothing of it will be consumed or converted - it means around 0,01 mg/L (ppm) toxic NH3 in my aquarium - I can live with that. I have dosed this for more than two months now as a test if I could go down in NO3 in my aquarium. NO3 concentration for the moment is around 0.5 mg/L (adjusted to my NO2 concentration (0.02 mg/l (ppm)) I have started to dose NO3 today too.

If you want to have an idea of how much the toxic concentrations of NH3 will rise (in worst case) if you dose NH4 - please see this thread

Sincerely Lasse

 

[brandon429]

Great job that is a good read.

 

[SMSREEF]

Has anyone that previously dosed nitrate to keep levels 5-10 started dosing ammonia instead?

Have you noticed any increased coral growth, coral color change, other benefits in your tank (compared to when you were dosing nitrate).

 

[Lasse]

You pee urea, not ammonia. lol

But urea is good too - I think it rather common in Germany ( not to pee in the aquarium but to use urea)

Have you noticed any increased coral growth, coral color change, other benefits in your tank (compared to when you were dosing nitrate).

My corals grow well but that have they done for some time but I had problem with the growrate of my Chaeto and it have a better growrate now - but if that is caused of the NH3/NH4 dosing or not - I do not know.

But it is not dangerous to dose NH3/NH4 if you start with weak solutions and dose rather little in the beginning.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Scrubber_steve]

So, after an interesting discussion on nitrate dosing and looking at my Walt Disney coral and seeing it slightly less colorful than I have seen it in others tanks, I have decided I want to learn about and then try dosing ammonia instead of buying 20 damsels. Nitrate additives I see abound and have directions, but I see no ammonia additives for sale. In my limited knowledge, I understand stump remover is a form of ammonia, but I would have zero idea on how to make use of such . . .

so . . .

How would one get hold of ammonia? What calculations would be required? What would one monitor to check the impact?

And, no, I'm not going to run out and start dumping ammonia in my tank so don't worry. I'm just starting the learning process so I can understand what would be involved.

Thanks to any and all that have answers.

@Hans-Werner - "
ammonium and organic nitrogen are the preferred forms of nitrogen for zooxanthellae and most corals. Instead of dosing nitrate just dose a normal amino acid product or, even easier, just feed the fish more.
This has the disadvantage that you can´t control your N-dosage with a nitrate test kit but I think you are not dosing for the test kit but for the corals. You will see the success looking at your corals. The poor effect of nitrate in some corals and the problem of dosage of ammonium is one of the causes why I usually recommend to feed more instead of dosing inorganic solutions. The other cause is that with feeding you kill two (or even three) birds with one stone instead of probably creating nutrient inbalances with inorganic solutions."

 

[2Sunny]

@Hans-Werner - "
ammonium and organic nitrogen are the preferred forms of nitrogen for zooxanthellae and most corals. Instead of dosing nitrate just dose a normal amino acid product or, even easier, just feed the fish more.
This has the disadvantage that you can´t control your N-dosage with a nitrate test kit but I think you are not dosing for the test kit but for the corals. You will see the success looking at your corals. The poor effect of nitrate in some corals and the problem of dosage of ammonium is one of the causes why I usually recommend to feed more instead of dosing inorganic solutions. The other cause is that with feeding you kill two (or even three) birds with one stone instead of probably creating nutrient inbalances with inorganic solutions."

Perhaps read some of the discussion leading up to this. I have had very nice reefs that followed the principle of more fish. You missed the whole point of this discussion, and my experiment.

 

[ingchr1]

Cross posting this from another thread.

I'm on to a new slide and this slide appears to be working, where the last one was just reading a constant 0.001 for Ammonia. This slide is also from 2018. The pH is also tracking with my controller. I did calibrate the pH probe on the controller and trimmed the Seneye to match.

I have also started to dosing NH4Cl to bring up my Nitrates. They were very close to zero, only very slight pink on Salifert, and I was starting to see Dinos. Since I've started dosing my NO3 has come up and the Dinos have improved. The samples are more pink, but still less than 1. I am dosing Dr Tims NH4Cl since I had some left over from cycling the tank. I am adding 8 drops a day, 4 in morning and 4 in evening. Per Dr Tims this is 16mg of total ammonia-nitrogen (TAN). I started with 4 drops a day, but NO3 did not increase. My tank has 31 gallons of water in it.

I add the drops (4) one chamber over from where my Seneye is. Here are the readings from this morning when the drops were added.

 

[Jon_W79]

I think that if the corals are getting plenty of the other nutritional needs met that they get from the fish being fed, but are lacking ammonia, then I think ammonium might be worth dosing. I think an example of this could be an aquarium that has a decent amount of fish that are well fed, but the aquarium has a very high nitrifying capability, and the ammonia is removed too quickly by the nitrifying bacteria.