- Location
- Hicksville
hello m/r i have 120 gal oceanic mixed reef tank and most of you know that my tank crashed last month and lost most of my fishes and corals and like everyone knows and been through that when you know that your tank is almost there and it can support it self and balanced eco system something always happens and all the hardwork goes down the drain. but then it makes you to think weather you should quit or carry on. but i decided to carry on not quit so after doing water change twice a week and cleaning up the rock and taking dead fish out one by one, cleaning up rock taking dyatom alage off and syphoning red slime algae (i hate it) from sand. but i still could not bring down my nitrates and phosphates. i even changed media every two weeks and cleaned out filters and ran tlf 500 bio pellets reacto. but then i started reading about vodka dosing since its another way to add carbon in your system to add bacteria in your system that consumes nitrates and phos bacteria and skimmer steps in and removes the bacteria from the system its been week and i have been dosing 40% proof vodka 1.5 ml eveyday and its been week my readings went down from 5 nitrate and 1.8 phosphate to 1 nitrate and 0.07 phosphate (hanna checkers readings). i will increase dose to 2.0ml and then run test again next sunday if the reading is 0 on nitrate and phosphate then i will cut dose down to half and keep it there and then i will try to remove media reactors one by one everyweek and test again if readings stay at 0 on both then i will putthem away for good and keep dosing vodka its much cheaper then buying media i will just keep carbon reactor but we see how its goes. live fishes are doing good and corals are opening normal i don't see any stress in live stock. keep ypu guys posted about outcome.
i have been testing for parameters and its looking good...... nitrates are down to .5 and phosphates are 0.05 this test is done with hanna checkers and then API test kit and both are if not same then very very close.
below are pics of readings after 5 days and diy vodka doser that i made. i don't like the idea of adding all at once so i have this drip unit. i mix 1ml vodka in 60ml rodi water and then let it drip slowly 1 drop every two seconds and slowly it finishes basically i use this method for everything i have to dose for exe.... iodine and mag. its best way to add then just dumping in the system.
link to pics------http://s1127.photobucket.com/albums/l630/ravi197699/?action=view¤t=IMAG0242.jpg
link to pics------http://s1127.photobucket.com/albums/l630/ravi197699/?action=view¤t=IMAG0242.jpg
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