Carbon Dosing Interval

[reefgeezer]

Hi everyone. I've been dosing vinegar manually @ 10ml 2X per day for quite a while. That seemed to work fine. Of course I couldn't leave well enough alone so I added a dosing pump. I'm now dosing 5ml @ 6X per day. I've increased the daily volume because I see less skimmer activity and have noticed a little HA and Cyano. I'm not sure that is even enough. The corals all seem fine and I don't have any stringy bacterial colonies anywhere. I guess I have two questions: Is dosing smaller quantities more often somehow less effective than adding larger doses; and do you think I can increase the quantity dosed?

[tmz]

Adding organic carbon in bursts likely enocurages more anerobic activity as bacteria quickly grow and create anoxic areas in the mulm. One study Randy cited a while back suggested an increase in anaerobic activity with bolus feedings. However, dosing significant amounts of vinegar without srpeading it out will create downward pH spikes short term.. Personally, I bolus dose but most of what I use is vodka which does not cause rapid precipitous pH drops .

I think you can increase it a bit. Most folks settle in around .4 to .8 ml per gallon for vinegar dosing or equivalent amounts of vodka and or vodka and vinegar.

[reefgeezer]

Thanks Tom.

[tmz]

You are welcome.I meant to say hypoxic areas(ie no free oxygen with nitrate present) in the mulm; not anoxic( no oxygen or nitrate) in the first sentence ,btw

[Catchoftheday]

tagging along

[reefgeezer]

You are welcome.I meant to say hypoxic areas(ie no free oxygen with nitrate present) in the mulm; not anoxic( no oxygen or nitrate) in the first sentence ,btw

I'll pretend I would have known the difference and say I assumed you meant hypoxic.

I'm gonna wait a week at the 30 ml/day rate and see what happens then go up like I am just starting. It's kinda touchy though. I don't have any detectable nitrates so I'm judging when to go to the maintenance dose based on bacterial blooms. The little HA and Cyano didn't start until I greatly increased feeding in an effort to get more coral color. I guess I just have to find the balance @ the new waste level.

[Raffm22]

Ok I have been dosing 60 ml of vinegar daily to my 150 gall system. I dose via bolus in a high flow area of my sump. I am having positive results. Are you recommending that I should dose say 20ml three times a day rather then all at once? If I start dosing vodka with vinegar will I have even better results?

[reefgeezer]

I did see more activity when bolus dosing twice a day. However, I didn't like the idea of affecting pH stability (even locally) as my dosage level went up. I was anticipating increased feeding and knew I'd have to add more.

FWIW, I don't trust vodka particularly when using a dosing pump. It is just so concentrated compared to vinegar. Measurement errors have more impact than vinegar. I also tried vodka in an earlier attempt to carbon dose and ended up with a lot of Cyano. VSV yielded a Dino breakout.

[Raffm22]

I will try 30 twice a day to see if that changes any....

[barjam]

There was a guy who posted on here who was doing vinegar bolus. His ph dropped for a few minutes and climbed right back up. I don't have a ph meter to test this myself.

One slight negative for daylight only or bolus dosing for me is if you are dosing quite a bit you can get a slight haze going on. Same dose spread out over 24 hours and no haze.

[reefgeezer]

I'd agree that the pH goes right back up. However, I was worried about precipitation in the area where the vinegar was being dosed since it is pretty close to my return pump intake. I thought it might make the pump require cleaning more often.

[tmz]

Ok I have been dosing 60 ml of vinegar daily to my 150 gall system. I dose via bolus in a high flow area of my sump. I am having positive results. Are you recommending that I should dose say 20ml three times a day rather then all at once? If I start dosing vodka with vinegar will I have even better results?

If the ph is not dropping a lot with the 20ml increment it's probably ok. I do bolus dose vinegar but only 80ml for 650 gallons . I don't think a switch to a vodka vinegar mix will improve the good results you are having with vinegar only.
The ethanol ( vodka) oxidizes to acetic acid( vinegar) in the tank. So ,except for one bacterial step they are the same.


I started with just vodka abut 5 years ago; had a little cyano on a sand bed in one frag tank, perhaps just a start up issue ; swithched 25% of the dose to vinegar; the cyano abated, perhaps by coincidence ; switched another 25% to vinegar and it came back; went back to 75% vodka and 25% vinegar and have almost never seen any cyano in overthe last 4 years. I think it's just how the bacterial cultures in my system work and it could vary for others.

Just vinegar, just vodka or a combination all work well. i'm sticking to what works for me .

[rishma]

any reason not to boost the pH of the vinegar with Kalk to alleviate the immeidate pH drop?

[tmz]

No, but you'll be adding extra alkalinity and calcium so it needs to be taken into account.

[vamaro]

I started dosing a week ago with vinegar. I am adding half a dose in the morning and half at night. If this works out for me, I plan on getting a doser to spread it out better throughout the day.