Biopellets

[firewill65]

I have a stupid question about biopellets. Do biopellets just take the nitrates out of the water column but the underlying problem is always there? Meaning if biopellets dropped your nitrates and you stopped running them would they spike back up? I realize the skimmer does work when running pellets but I was just curious....any opinions would be helpful, thanks

[mikecc67548]

it is biological filtration. bacteria reside on the balls. Of course the nitrates come from somewhere and only way to rid it out of your system is waterchanges (The only solution to pollution is dilution) and bacterial conversion to N, sometimes misperceived as microbubbles when the bacteria is in full gear.

[firewill65]

so any detritus I have in my tank that's producing nitrates will continue to produce nitrates until I vacuum it out even if my biopellets are keeping my nitrates down?

[bertoni]

The bio-pellets act as a carbon source, and feed bacteria that consume the nitrate. If you stop running them, it's reasonably likely that the nitrate will spike back up, but that depends on how much nitrate export the system actually needs.

[mikecc67548]

I misread biopellets as bioballs........ oops.

[tmz]

By adding the organic carbon source, in this case polymer pellets, more heterotrophic bacteria grow which assimilate dissolved inorganic nitrogen and phosphate. These bacteria are then exportable via skimming while inorganic nitrogen and phosaphte are not.
This technique ups the ante on the export side of the ntirogen and phosphate side of a balanced nutrient system. If you lower the export by stopping the organic carbon dosing and keep the input side the same via feeding, etc., the nitrates and phosphates will go back to where they were before dosing organic carbon in time.

[firewill65]

Thanks Tom

[tmz]

You are welcome