Vodka stopped working

[scotty333]

Guys,

I can’t seem to drop nitrates despite the amount of vodka I dose , currently 35ml a day
They are around 18 right now but every time I test despite increasing the dose they seem to always go up
Volumes 380l and it’s moderately stocked.
Food is 13g of mysis and 1” of nori

Any ideas would be useful

 

[Dan_P]

Guys,

I can’t seem to drop nitrates despite the amount of vodka I dose , currently 35ml a day
They are around 18 right now but every time I test despite increasing the dose they seem to always go up
Volumes 380l and it’s moderately stocked.
Food is 13g of mysis and 1” of nori

Any ideas would be useful

Is there a skimmer attached to the system?

I have read about this situation before but I don’t recall there being a remedy or explanation.

 

[I never finish anythi]

What are you phosphate levels?

 

[scotty333]

Is there a skimmer attached to the system?

I have read about this situation before but I don’t recall there being a remedy or explanation.

Yes I have a big skimmer , not that it makes a difference since I was without it for a week and made no difference to the dosing of vodka

 

[scotty333]

What are you phosphate levels?

.04-5

 

[I never finish anythi]

I found elimi n p worked better for me than vodka and vinegar.

 

[scotty333]

I found elimi n p worked better for me than vodka and vinegar.

Can’t reduce po4 though
It’s weird , it used to work with like 10ml a day

 

[I never finish anythi]

Can’t reduce po4 though
It’s weird , it used to work with like 10ml a day

Tbh it never done nothing for my po4 just brought down nitrate . I now use the bacto balance version with great results. . Maybe try the DIY nopox version.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

What size is the tank again?

 

[Dan_P]

Yes I have a big skimmer , not that it makes a difference since I was without it for a week and made no difference to the dosing of vodka

OK thanks.

I found in my experimental aquaria which are not filtered (that is why I asked about skimming), nitrate consumption during carbon dosing can stop, likely because of the accumulation of bacteria. The large bacteria population becomes carbon limited. The only solution is to remove the bacteria or let them die off before restarting the carbon dosing. The problem with a bacteria die off is that nutrients are returned to the aquarium. Sorry about not really helping you.

 

[Reefering1]

OK thanks.

I found in my experimental aquaria which are not filtered (that is why I asked about skimming), nitrate consumption during carbon dosing can stop, likely because of the accumulation of bacteria. The large bacteria population becomes carbon limited. The only solution is to remove the bacteria or let them die off before restarting the carbon dosing. The problem with a bacteria die off is that nutrients are returned to the aquarium. Sorry about not really helping you.

So possibly the skimmer isn't effective enough, allowing the accumulation of the bacteria?

 

[Dan_P]

So possibly the skimmer isn't effective enough, allowing the accumulation of the bacteria?

I am just starting to accumulate information which seems to point to nitrate being consumed by bacteria both in the water which the skimmer could capture and in a biofilm which can’t be removed by the skimmer. There is another version of biofilm known as biofloc which can float in the water and probably be skimmed. Your skimmer could be OK but the bacteria are stuck to the surfaces. Just guessing at this point.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

OK thanks.

I found in my experimental aquaria which are not filtered (that is why I asked about skimming), nitrate consumption during carbon dosing can stop, likely because of the accumulation of bacteria. The large bacteria population becomes carbon limited. The only solution is to remove the bacteria or let them die off before restarting the carbon dosing. The problem with a bacteria die off is that nutrients are returned to the aquarium. Sorry about not really helping you.

I understand the dying part, but what does carbon limited mean in this context? I'd argue it means they are no longer organic carbon limited.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

So possibly the skimmer isn't effective enough, allowing the accumulation of the bacteria?

It would not be my guess that this is happening in a real reef tank. If vodka truly becomes basically unused to grow any new tissue by any organisms using nitrate, I think that is more likely to mean a trace element or N or P are limited their growth.

 

[Dan_P]

I understand the dying part, but what does carbon limited mean in this context? I'd argue it means they are no longer organic carbon limited.

Not quite following your question.

 

[towels]

You may need to drink more Vodka /s

Following

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

OK thanks.

I found in my experimental aquaria which are not filtered (that is why I asked about skimming), nitrate consumption during carbon dosing can stop, likely because of the accumulation of bacteria. The large bacteria population becomes carbon limited..

What does the above sentence in bold mean? The large population needs what sort of carbon to grow?

 

[Dan_P]

What does the above sentence in bold mean? The large population needs what sort of carbon to grow?

Got it. Let’s start with the observation and you can better visualize the limb on which I am crawling.

With unlimited nitrate and phosphate, repeatedly adding the same size carbon dose to unfiltered aquarium results in a rapid consumption of nitrate for two doses and then the consumption of nitrogen levels off. If you are watching carefully :-) the first dose does not result in nitrate consumption for at least ten hours. OK, here’s where I start crawling out onto the limb.

I think that these observations are consistent with the aquarium bacteria going through lag, exponential growth and stationary phases. The reason for entering the stationary phase is the amount of available carbon in the dose can no longer support doubling of the population and growth (nitrate consumption) grinds to a halt. This happens with any dose level, although the total amount of nitrate consumed before the stationary phase is correlated to the carbon dose size. I have been able to entice the bacteria to skip the stationary phase and deplete the nitrogen (ammonia in this case though I am going to repeat the experiment with nitrate) by removing 90% of the bacteria 24 hours after each dose (90% of the medium filtered with a 0.45 μ filter). So, I conclude, no more bacteria growth and no or very little nitrate consumption can occur until the population size is reduced.

Edit: increasing the size of the dose when the culture is in the stationary phase results in rapid nitrate consumption.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Got it. Let’s start with the observation and you can better visualize the limb on which I am crawling.

With unlimited nitrate and phosphate, repeatedly adding the same size carbon dose to unfiltered aquarium results in a rapid consumption of nitrate for two doses and then the consumption of nitrogen levels off. If you are watching carefully :) the first dose does not result in nitrate consumption for at least ten hours. OK, here’s where I start crawling out onto the limb.

I think that these observations are consistent with the aquarium bacteria going through lag, exponential growth and stationary phases. The reason for entering the stationary phase is the amount of available carbon in the dose can no longer support doubling of the population and growth (nitrate consumption) grinds to a halt. This happens with any dose level, although the total amount of nitrate consumed before the stationary phase is correlated to the carbon dose size. I have been able to entice the bacteria to skip the stationary phase and deplete the nitrogen (ammonia in this case though I am going to repeat the experiment with nitrate) by removing 90% of the bacteria 24 hours after each dose (90% of the medium filtered with a 0.45 μ filter). So, I conclude, no more bacteria growth and no or very little nitrate consumption can occur until the population size is reduced.

Edit: increasing the size of the dose when the culture is in the stationary phase results in rapid nitrate consumption.

An alternative view to the “lag” is the the numbers of bacteria that consume these organics is initially low enough that even rapid doubling is not detectably impacting nitrate or ammonia until the bacteria reach sufficient quantity to move the total N.

That said, there may well be a lag as they change their controls to uptake the organic and the N sources to grow faster.

When we get to the end of the rapid growth phase, I’m not seeing a reason to think there is a carbon limitation (does adding more organic reignite rapid growth?) as opposed some some other limitation.

In any case, in a reef tank dosing new vodka every day, I cannot see how a dose that once drove growth no longer does due to any sort of organic carbon limitation, the limitation must be something else.

 

[UMALUM]

Wouldn't the simplest thing be to dose phosphate in conjunction with the vodka?