What does adding Hydrogen Peroxide do to tank chemistry and organizims in tank

[SirRoadwolf]

I have read that adding hydrogen peroxide to the tank can reduce or kill off the rather thick brownish and a patch or two of red slime coating on the sand bed . . .

Thank you SO much for this post! I had always wondered what adding hydrogen peroxide would do to help, but never came across any references to it in my browsing of aquarium related chemical additives. I have a similar issue, and will begin adding Hydrogen Peroxide asap to see if it helps.

Having had a rough year with the aquarium due to neglect on my part (a divorce and all the drama associated with that distracting event), things have been challenging to get back on course now that things have calmed down.

My fish are fine, but my corals began to die off, and I couldn't figure out why.

Currently my stats are:
1.024 specific gravity, 0.02 ppm Phosphates, 0ppm Nitrate, and about 40 ppb Nitrite. PH is hovering around 8.1, and Calcium is up about 520, with Mg up around 1500, dhk is around 7.8 as well. So it doesn't seem like a chemistry issue, unless having too much calcium and Mg is bad.

I began adding vinegar, 1ml per 10gal, a while back to control a bad nitrate spike I had, and it seems to have worked well to get things on track. I also recently began adding a Ph Buffer to try to raise my PH, as I was told 8 was too low.

I also experimented with adding Sodium Silicate, Ferrous Sulfate Heptahydrate, and Potassium Chloride. I noticed a growth and brightening in my surviving corals after adding those chemicals, however no change in the amount of cyno / hair algae.

I look forward to see results of hydrogen peroxide!

 

[LARedstickreefer]

That's a massive overdose, 1 ml per gallon, and it still wouldn't kill your filter it could kill the animals

One mil per ten gallons is safe
I'm going back to see if I mistyped any doses

Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

The best way to prepare your sand for use in a transferred reef tank, an upgraded reef tank, a reef tank under invasion etc is to put the sand in sections in a bucket and TAP WATER rinse it outside over and over with the garden hose until all the silt / waste is ejected, expect hours of work per...

www.reef2reef.com

There's our cyano works thread. Red beds in, clean beds out like clockwork. Two things we disavow there: ammonia testing and bottle bac crutching. The whole think is work in large and small tanks and not one ammonia test, ammonia is always predictable and follows detritus, that's what we are mindful about

*lack of surface area does not occur in reefing if you are using any degree of matured live rocks...that's how we get away with instant sandbed removal in a ten year system without a ramp down phase. Live rock has such massive surface area, even the manmade stuff, that sandbed bacteria are incidental and not a breakpoint to healthy filtration. They're excess, so do whatever you want to them (tap rinse a bed, replace it, rip it out and go bare bottom, all the same)

If we were accepting ammonia tests, they'd always say .25 so why bother (non seneye ammonia readings - don't want)


The thesis of that thread is your filter bacteria are to be trusted at all times they don't need your help. Work deliberately to win, hesitation and partiality kills. Leave no cloud in the sand and the method can be trusted.

I dose 1ml per gallon of the 3%. Been doing it for quite awhile. Nothing is affected aside from some of the zoas closing up for a few hours.

 

[brandon429]

Nice, I’ll relay that as an updated upper limit that’s hilarious strong

**takes work thread patterns to show it’s safe though I gotta stick with the 1:10 or Murphy’s law will have people doing 10x then reporting I killed their tank

Still it’s great info, I know eighty dino battlers who could use the updated ld50 levels to make attack plans

 

[LARedstickreefer]

Nice, I’ll relay that as an updated upper limit that’s hilarious strong

**takes work thread patterns to show it’s safe though I gotta stick with the 1:10 or Murphy’s law will have people doing 10x then reporting I killed their tank

Still it’s great info, I know eighty dino battlers who could use the updated ld50 levels to make attack plans

Got to remember that peroxide is very unstable and breaks down very fast. I dose with lights off to try to lengthen time it stays peroxide.

Now, dipping sps is a killer. I accidentally got some peroxide on a Montipora and it bleached the areas that were touched.

 

[brandon429]

would be amazed if the list of tolerants vs sensitives stays unchanged at those levels

I used to get raked over the coals for pods loss TMZ supposedly verified at 1:10

Which is why we then featured 1200 tanks with pods not dying at 1:10, to broaden horizons.

1:1 they’d have nuked my account the second I pressed post heh
full on squelched, regulated, to the burnpile with that knowledge.


Love R2R and free science exchange. We want to know the boundaries of peroxide it seems to always reveal something new, and positive.

 

[LARedstickreefer]

would be amazed if the list of tolerants vs sensitives stays unchanged at those levels

I used to get raked over the coals for pods loss TMZ supposedly verified at 1:10

Which is why we then featured 1200 tanks with pods not dying at 1:10, to broaden horizons.

1:1 they’d have nuked my account the second I pressed post heh
full on squelched, regulated, to the burnpile with that knowledge.


Love R2R and free science exchange. We want to know the boundaries of peroxide it seems to always reveal something new, and positive.

Has anyone observed lasting effects from 1:1 peroxide dosing, or just assumed?

I’m doing this morning and night, twice a day. Maybe my peroxide is bad.

 

[Tyler Bullock]

I also recently began adding a Ph Buffer to try to raise my PH, as I was told 8 was too low.

Personally, I would never use PH buffer in my tank. All PH buffer is, is alkalinity. You can have an alk swing by dosing that stuff.

 

[brandon429]

once we get about 100 people participating in tank dosing the various losses from sensitives were appearing at 1:10 so we pretty much stopped, as that was within the kill specs of most targets/algae/cyano etc.

we pushed it to the point of least reported losses + target kill, not that there wasn't plenty of room for further experimenting.


Dinos are literally the scourge of todays reefing, 1:10 is already known helpful for them. imagine 1:1 for the mean, ornery dino challenge tanks. we need to work up a little slower in my opinion for mass testing at those levels, but in the end today's reef tank challenges are getting stronger not weaker, we're losing tanks to dinos every day.

so, up the ante. use peroxide or any other tool, nobody seems to have mastered today's dino challenges although when that does come it'll be from threads within the nuisance algae forum ill bet

ill post vids of peroxide tolerance demo later this weekend during tank clean. straight 3% across my fav montis and then some 35% right in the mouth of a brain coral who is already adapted to that bc he gets spilled on lots of times. leave it maybe ten seconds then rinse off

ten seconds in the palm of a hand, thick dermis barrier, feels like an ant sting for 30 mins after the burn sets in, yet the coral literally doesn't care I cannot figure it out. a slimy green brain has 10x peroxide tolerance than the thick skin of a human palm

 

[sixty_reefer]

once we get about 100 people participating in tank dosing the various losses from sensitives were appearing at 1:10 so we pretty much stopped, as that was within the kill specs of most targets/algae/cyano etc.

we pushed it to the point of least reported losses + target kill, not that there wasn't plenty of room for further experimenting.


Dinos are literally the scourge of todays reefing, 1:10 is already known helpful for them. imagine 1:1 for the mean, ornery dino challenge tanks. we need to work up a little slower in my opinion for mass testing at those levels, but in the end today's reef tank challenges are getting stronger not weaker, we're losing tanks to dinos every day.

so, up the ante. use peroxide or any other tool, nobody seems to have mastered today's dino challenges although when that does come it'll be from threads within the nuisance algae forum ill bet

ill post vids of peroxide tolerance demo later this weekend during tank clean. straight 3% across my fav montis and then some 35% right in the mouth of a brain coral who is already adapted to that bc he gets spilled on lots of times. leave it maybe ten seconds then rinse off

ten seconds in the palm of a hand, thick dermis barrier, feels like an ant sting for 30 mins after the burn sets in, yet the coral literally doesn't care I cannot figure it out. a slimy green brain has 10x peroxide tolerance than the thick skin of a human palm

How where the losses monitored? At 1ml per 10 gallons.

Am conducting my own experience on a 60 gallon dosing 3ml every 2 hours and not reported any losses yet. Au contrair coral never seemed so happy and Water? Cristal clear fish almost seem that they flying in the tank. Only at day four so can’t really say much just yet but first results seem pretty good.

 

[LARedstickreefer]

I think we need a chemist and a biologist to join the discussion

I wonder how long peroxide stays together once it hits tank water and encounters so much catalyst?

 

[brandon429]

the one mil per ten gallon approximation comes from initial guesses people were using at nano-reef.com and reefcentral and here, r2r, Lee's peroxide thread stickied in the general forum is one of the old running ones. there's likely room to increase dose but we like to run it through pattern threads first to check for impacts among tanks in case there are unspoken variables or details we haven't uncovered yet

 

[sixty_reefer]

I think we need a chemist and a biologist to join the discussion

I wonder how long peroxide stays together once it hits tank water and encounters so much catalyst?

Am none of the above, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it only takes a few seconds to a reaction taking effect. I read that peroxide is a good oxidiser. And if used in excessively will kill bacteria but at the same time there’s no specific data about the peroxide reactions on a reef tank. If more data available couldn’t peroxide be a cheaper way and safer to ozone? Obviously I don’t have any data to back up my theory but isn’t the results people getting from dosing peroxide very similar to the ones dosing ozone? Obviously dosing peroxide would be way cheaper so can’t see any proper studies coming in the next few years.

 

[Stigigemla]

In sweet water I have used peroxide against cyano with succes. And it takes Columnella too. I just use an oxydator with standard dose and it is gone in 24 hours.

In salt water I have had limited succes. I have had succes with small attacs of Uronema with oxydator but thats all. It kills Lysmata shrimps and sometimes hermits. I have never seen a difference on corals or fish.

I think it is very difficult to guess how fast peroxide breaks down in a reef tank. When you add it it oxydates a lot of substances and the result of that is that the ORP level raises. Measuring ORP will just tell You how long that effect will be.

 

[mkwarner77]

It helped me kill off a bad dino bloom I had last summer. I learned that dino move into the water column at night and the peroxide kills the dino on contact. So I dosed on the heavy side last year when the lights were out. Now I do a 1mm per 10 gl every morning before the lights come on. dino and cyano haven't been a problem since. Fish coral and inverts have never show any reaction to it. At first I had the same concerns you had. I talked with the owner of my lfs and told him my concerns. He answered me by pouring about 1/2 a bottle into his 200gl display tank in the store. That answered all my questions lol.

 

[SirRoadwolf]

It helped me kill off a bad dino bloom I had last summer. I learned that dino move into the water column at night and the peroxide kills the dino on contact. So I dosed on the heavy side last year when the lights were out. Now I do a 1mm per 10 gl every morning before the lights come on. dino and cyano haven't been a problem since. Fish coral and inverts have never show any reaction to it. At first I had the same concerns you had. I talked with the owner of my lfs and told him my concerns. He answered me by pouring about 1/2 a bottle into his 200gl display tank in the store. That answered all my questions lol.

I love your LFS's response. That shows great confidence in it!

 

[brandon429]

Orp drops in a reef tank when dosing peroxide, paradoxically to what we would think. It then rebounds in a few hours going off the threads we can locate

I don’t know how the slow metering afforded by the oxydator changes the status if any

It was written that cleaving organic molecules in some way/acid production for that interval caused the drop but I don’t know the specific chemistry
search out orp readings in a reef tank post peroxide - all initial drops.

So in a clean glass pitcher of water (zero organics) then adding peroxide I’d love to see orp comparisons to a reef tank, maybe with no organics it raises?

 

[TARHEEL78]

Orp drops in a reef tank when dosing peroxide, paradoxically to what we would think. It then rebounds in a few hours going off the threads we can locate

I don’t know how the slow metering afforded by the oxydator changes the status if any

It was written that cleaving organic molecules in some way/acid production for that interval caused the drop but I don’t know the specific chemistry
search out orp readings in a reef tank post peroxide - all initial drops.

So in a clean glass pitcher of water (zero organics) then adding peroxide I’d love to see orp comparisons to a reef tank, maybe with no organics it raises?

Yeah, I'd say so, since I started using it you can see the drop every 12 hours when I dose.

 

[brandon429]

TarHeel hey since you have an orp measure handy do you have a way to test a clean cup of water before dose then after, just curious

 

[TARHEEL78]

TarHeel hey since you have an orp measure handy do you have a way to test a clean cup of water before dose then after, just curious

You just looking for orp on rodi water before and after dosing?

 

[brandon429]

Yes would be curious to see, seems to be a quick easy compare to see if organic sludges and slicks not in the cup cause a raise vs trough / opposite of the reef tank tendency