Biopellet Question (actually bacteria question)

M

matt_longview

If my nitrates are 0, but my phosphates are up, will I be able to increase carbon to decrease phosphates or do nitrates need to be present to reduce phosphates?
 
From my little research, pellets work wonders on nitrates, but as a by product, they reduce phosphate... this isn't to say it will eliminate it.

There are a lot of people that do pellets and GFO because of this.
But I only run 1/4-1/3 recommended pellets..... and no carbon or GFO and I don't have algae so i never test for phosphate...
 
Backup question. If I have not had a detectable nitrate reading in over a year, but am looking to lower phosphates, would GFO be a better medium for my tank than biopellets?
 
GFO is an option however there are cheaper method's available. Have you ruled out the chance that phosphates may be coming in from the food types....or feeding frequency?? There's a very effective phosphate removal medium that can be purchased from Leslie's pool supply however the name escapes me right now. I plan to use the leslie's pool supply stuff on the cube tank I'm setting up. [smilie=smile.gif]

Cheers,
 
Lanthanum chloride is what I think you're thinking of. Marc has used it for a long time, but I can't find his write up of how often or what dosage.
 
You've got to be careful with Lanthanum. Dosing is tricky and shouldn't be taken lightly. As far as I know, that is what is in all of the liquid Phos removers in our hobby. It precipitates and needs to be removed properly or it will eventually break down and release all of the bound phos at once. I've seen many tanks be taken over with an explosion in algae growth, sometimes crash after stopping Lanthanum dosing. Do your research before diving into that one.
 
And to the original question, I believe GFO would be a good fit for your set-up. We run Bio-pellets and GFO on the majority of the set-ups in the store. This combination has been working very well for at least a year now.
 
Thanks for the answers guys. Just to give some data to this thread in case someone searches for it in the future. Prior to starting biopellets my phos was .10 (hannah checker) and I was feeding every two to three days. Upon starting biopellets I began feeding heavy every day and my phos lowered to .04, but I'm wanting .01-.02. Yesterday I added 2 tablespoons of Brightwells phosphatR in a media bag suspended in a low flow area of my filtering. This morning my phosphates had dropped to .02! Win. :)

My tank is a 29g that is absolutely packed with SPS. Everything is happy.
 
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