Biopellets vs nitrate reactors

[Oscarmk]

I have a 2 month old 75 Gallon with base rock and 4 fish at the moment, occelaris clownfish, royal gramma, mccosker's flasher wrasse and purple firefish. While the levels are all good, I have noticed the nitrates are starting to climb and are around 20 ppm now, note that I added a lot of liquid ammonia while doing my fishless cycle, and I did not do a large water change after it, I have been simply doing 5 gallon water changes weekly. At the end of my cycle nitrates were at 10 ppm, but now they are at 20, possibly a little higher. The tank does not have any corals at the moment, it is bare bottom and has 70 pounds of base rock, I am running filter socks in a RS-100 eshopps 3rd gen sump with a Reef Octopus SSS-150 that I have set to super wet skimming. There is a tiny bit of diatoms in my white HDPE board at the bottom, as I would have expected not a single trace of algae, not even film algae on the glass, I haven't even had to clean the glass in this 2 months and it looks all clear.

While everything is going great so far, I am getting concerned about the 20 ppm nitrates, on my 29 biocube there was plenty of algae which bounded the nitrates immediately, hence they would always read zero, the upside of having algae I suppose, however I am tired of algae and decided to not have a single piece of live rock this time so that there simply wouldn't be algae on my tank, so far working even better than I expected. With that said while I plan to buy all my coral aquacultured from liveaquaria, quarantine and use coral rx on them, I imagine at some point I will have some algae, therefore I will not buy a single coral until both phosphate and nitrate is undetectable on my system, this is apparently harder than I though, it was so easy with all the algae growing on the biocube, but now exporting nitrates seems to be harder.

I definitely do not overfeed and I syphon the uneaten food when I do my water change, but I am starting to think I will need more than that. After some research I came across biopellets and nitrate reactors. I will also likely run phosban. After reading endless articles on biopellets I am quite frankly a little worried about them, first it seems that you need to have just the right bacteria on the tank, and that if for any reason the biopellet reactor, well the pump powering starts working for a extended period of time the bacteria goes anaerobic killing -everything- in the tank, this obviously makes me concerned. On the other hand I haven't found much information about nitrate reactors other than they seem to be more expensive and apparently require more maintenance. Does anyone have any experience with either biopellets or nitrate reactors?, any specific brand recommendations?. I do not have space to run RDSP or a refugium, although I could grow some Cheato, but I have also read many threads about that not working out so well.

What do you guys think biopellets or nitrate reactors?

 

[Mike R]

Do a google search for MarinePure. The make a product that I'm currently using. This rock goes in your sump and comes in many various sizes. It is VERY porous and is excellent for housing those deep deep anaerobic zones that convert nitrates to nitrogen gas. I was also battling nitrates a while ago, but haven't had detectable nitrates since adding this product.

 

[mkaylor]

I just placed a BRS Biopellet Reactor on my 175 2 weeks ago So I can't really comment yet, except I have a lot of brown hair algae now. So better believe what people say about biopellets causing algae. We'll see how they work in the long run.

I just found and ordered some NOPOX. I think I'd like to try that and remove the Biopellets because of all the algae.

Mike, that MarinePure looks really interesting. But wouldn't that basically be like adding bioballs to a tank?

 

[Grant]

@mkaylor wrote:

It looks like the big difference would be that the MarinePure wouldn't trap detritus all around it. Especially the block versions. So you get a lot more bacteria from it without it holding on to the junk that's causing the nitrates in the first place.

 

[Mike R]

@Grant wrote:

It looks like the big difference would be that the MarinePure wouldn't trap detritus all around it. Especially the block versions. So you get a lot more bacteria from it without it holding on to the junk that's causing the nitrates in the first place."]

Exactly. You can use these in passive or active filtration scenarios. Passive where you just set these in your sump in a minimal flow area and are basically adding more "live rock" to your system. This provides the best anaerobic zones. Active filtration is where you're forcing your water to have to go through the marine pure media, like in a baffle or bubble trap area. I don't remember the exact numbers from when I was doing my research, but the 8x8x4 block provides the same surface area as several hundred lbs. of live rock. They are especially popular in new "modern" aquascapes where people go for the minimalistic look in their DT and achieve most of their biological filtration in their sumps.

 

[Oscarmk]

@Mike R wrote:

Thanks Mike, it looks interesting, would one 8 x 8 x 4 block remove nitrates in a 75 gallon?, or would that only help with ammonia and nitrites?. I think fitting one of those blocks on my rs-100 sump might actually be a little hard, the SSS-150 skimmer takes most of the space.

What about purigen?, as I understand it is a nitrate sponge. I also use that on my biocube, as well as chemi pure, nitrates always read zero, but I always attributed that to the algae binding them. Would purigen work?. Also looking into a nitrate reactor, if you have any recommendations on that.

I haven't read much about people using purigen in tanks bigger than 30g, is it just because it is expensive on the long run vs reactors?

 

[Mike R]

They also come in 8x8x1" thick. Plus, they can be easily cut into any shape/size to fit most any area.
I wouldn't say the block should be considered a "set it and forget it" when it comes to nitrates, but every little thing you can do to keep them in check helps (water changes, macro algae, not over feeding etc...) This is just a very easy/relatively inexpensive option that can only help boost the denitrification process in your system. As for your other questions, I have no experience with nitrate reactors, and I've always been leery of using aluminum based products due to their potential to leach back into the water column.

 

[Grant]

@Mike R wrote:

I'm considering one of the 8x8x1 blocks for this exact reason. I don't have a lot of rock in my display and I don't have space for that much in my sump, so this would be an ideal solution for me.

 

[Oscarmk]

@Mike R wrote:

I am thinking of ordering one 8 x 8 x 4, and cutting it in 2 pieces of 8 x 8 x 2, those two would fit perfectly, how easy are they to cut like this?, I imagine it could be hard since the cut is along the height. Do you think that could be easily done?, any tools that you would suggest to do this?.

Thanks.

 

[Mike R]

A band saw would be best IMO, but a circular saw or jig saw would most likely work too, you'd just have to make two passes (top and bottom) and it wouldn't look as pretty. I've personally never cut one but I feel it would cut very easily given how light and airy it is. If you're worried about figment, couldn't the spheres also be an option?

 

[Oscarmk]

@Mike R wrote:

Thank you, I didn't know there was a sphere option, but it seems like the blocks would provide more surface area?. I might just get 2 blocks of 8 x 8 x 1, would that provide sufficient area for a 75g to get some bacteria to process nitrates into nitrate gas?, or would that likely be insufficient?. If not I'll try to saw a 8 x 8 x 4.