Nitrate Reduction 101 with sugar!!!

[iamwhatiam52]

Two posts mention "Randy". Who is Randy?

Also, we are admonished that "it's best to find the source of your excess nitrates rather than use quick fix solutions" and we all know this is true. BUT............. I know the source of my nitrates. I overstock, overfeed, underskim, hardly waterchange.

So.

Untill I get a little self control, or get a 3,985,983,757 gallon tank to keep all the creatures I love, I may resort to a quick fix from time to time.

[affan]

Originally posted by iamwhatiam52
I may resort to a quick fix from time to time.

I, too resort to a quick fix of coffee in the morning from time to time.

PS> Randy is Mr. Randy Holmes Farley. Chemist, Reefist, Bungee Jumper, and considered to be an authority on reef chemistry here on RC.

[Timbor]

Here is a 36 page thread in Randy's chemistry forum about this topic:

http://archive.reefcentral.com/forum...t=vodka+dosing

I would be cautious using sugar, ethanol, fructose, galactose, etc etc... any source of carbon because it could have the potential of bringing your nitrates and phosphates down to a dangerous low. I know everybody strives to reduce these molecules, but it should be noted that they are also necessary for life, you just don't need much.

again, proper husbandry would be the best first step. I would not rely on carbon-dosing. There is always a chance of overdosing.

Tim

[PatrickJ]

Originally posted by Timbor
Here is a 36 page thread in Randy's chemistry forum about this topic:

http://archive.reefcentral.com/forum...t=vodka+dosing

I would be cautious using sugar, ethanol, fructose, galactose, etc etc... any source of carbon because it could have the potential of bringing your nitrates and phosphates down to a dangerous low. I know everybody strives to reduce these molecules, but it should be noted that they are also necessary for life, you just don't need much.

again, proper husbandry would be the best first step. I would not rely on carbon-dosing. There is always a chance of overdosing.

Tim

Well, put and nuff said.

[crrichey]

Form personal experience I think this is a bad idea. We don't know enough about this to be fooling around with it. I had a tank crash because of my ignorance on the subject.

[Clouded]

Originally posted by iamwhatiam52
Two posts mention "Randy". Who is Randy?

Also, we are admonished that "it's best to find the source of your excess nitrates rather than use quick fix solutions" and we all know this is true. BUT............. I know the source of my nitrates. I overstock, overfeed, underskim, hardly waterchange.

So.

Untill I get a little self control, or get a 3,985,983,757 gallon tank to keep all the creatures I love, I may resort to a quick fix from time to time.

Like I said I did this to help cycle my tank faster, but I stopped once I got to where I wanted to be....

Your statement about a quick fix is one of the worst things I have heard. This is the mentaility that is taking over the medical world. Its easier to put people on meds then figure out the true problem and then fixing it...same thing here, you know what is wrong, but you chose not to fix just medicate it and hope nothing comes back to bite you in the ....

[affan]

Originally posted by Clouded
Like I said I did this to help cycle my tank faster, but I stopped once I got to where I wanted to be....

Your statement about a quick fix is one of the worst things I have heard. This is the mentaility that is taking over the medical world. Its easier to put people on meds then figure out the true problem and then fixing it...same thing here, you know what is wrong, but you chose not to fix just medicate it and hope nothing comes back to bite you in the ....

Yeah, I agree. But I'd rather not find the problem and cure it. Because Hydrocodone gives me this feeling of euphoria and I love everybody.

[xtrstangx]

Originally posted by Clouded
Carbon pulls stuff out not create more bacteria...suger creates bacteria, its like using vodka...If you do not beleive go ask Randy and see what he says...there are to many things in sugar that no one has really studied the effect of in our tanks...

I'm talking about Carbon (as in the element C if you don't understand), not activated carbon.

Sugar (specifically the carbon in it) promotes the bacteria to grow.

Common sugar (what you use when cooking, etc) is sucrose or C12H22O11. I haven't looked into it myself, but I am sure that the FDA has somewhat strict regulations about the purity required for sucrose.

Just for an example, lets say that it is 90% sucrose and 10% other stuff (by volume) and you are adding 1 tsp per day (say a tank volume of 200g). In a week, that not even 1 teaspoon of impurities in 200g of tank volume! A common conversion (not exact, but a good approximation) is 10 ml of vodka is 1 tsp of sugar. Most people (from what I've read) don't do much more than 10 ml a day.

Now consider that the FDA probably has higher regulations than just 90%. Honestly, for the small amount of sugar you are adding (fractions of a teaspoon to only 1 teaspoon), the impurities in it would be the last worry on my mind when dosing.

If you are worried about impurities, go talk to the people who dose kalk. They add a lot more kalk than 1 tsp a day and a lot of them use aquarium-grade products which can less pure than the food-grade pickling lime!

Edit- Feel like I should add a disclaimer to my post. Dosing any carbon source to your tank can be potentially very dangerous. If you rmove too much nitrogen and phosphates, corals will begin to die. Also, overdoses can lead to decreased oxygen levels in the tank from the bacteria's explosion in growth. If you decide to start dosing a carbon source (sugar or vodka), make sure to do plenty of reading and start with a low amount!

[Clouded]

I am not worried about it...Apparently no one read both my posts where I said I used this method to help cycle my tank quicker. However like I said before there has been no shown results of success in the run.

[xtrstangx]

Originally posted by Clouded
I am not worried about it...Apparently no one read both my posts where I said I used this method to help cycle my tank quicker. However like I said before there has been no shown results of success in the run.

I've read plenty of success stories of people who have dosed vodka in the long run. Whether its vodka or sugar, you are just introducing a carbon source to promote bacterial growth..

This quote makes it sound like you are worried about it, IMO:

Originally posted by Clouded
there are to many things in sugar that no one has really studied the effect of in our tanks...

[Clouded]

Originally posted by xtrstangx
I've read plenty of success stories of people who have dosed vodka in the long run. Whether its vodka or sugar, you are just introducing a carbon source to promote bacterial growth..

This quote makes it sound like you are worried about it, IMO:

Yeah in the long run...I just did not want people to take the posters word as gold.

[dandy7200]

Originally posted by xtrstangx
I haven't looked into it myself, but I am sure that the FDA has somewhat strict regulations about the purity required for sucrose.........

The FDA has an allowance of 10ppm rat feces in food for human consumption

.......the impurities in it would be the last worry on my mind when dosing.

Well it's your tank

[CoMMaNdeR]

Guys the sugar you are talking about is the normal sugar we use in our homes to make coffee etc ?

[subzero420]

Hmm very interesting. What happens when you stop dosing sugar, do your nitrates go crazy or slowly start rising?

I honestly doubt that the amount of impurities in the sugar would be a problem considering its food grade.

[djc1026]

Isn't Marc Weiss's product "Coral Vital" basically sugar water, some kind of glucose/succrose concocture? It doesn't list it's ingredients, and his people won't tell you. It looks and sort of smells like apple juice. Just a thought because I know people who use that and have used it for quite some time. Most have said great things about using it in the beginning and some have had tank crashes after several years. Now, there are many other things that could have caused the crashes. But....anyone know the chemical composition of this product?

Dave

[xtrstangx]

Originally posted by CoMMaNdeR
Guys the sugar you are talking about is the normal sugar we use in our homes to make coffee etc ?

Yes, common sugar (sucrose).

djc1026, buy some and drink a little.. does it taste sweet?

[Nano_reeflover]

So this method lowers both nitrates and phosphates? What would be considered a small amount to start out with? I have a 55 gal.

[xtrstangx]

Originally posted by Nano_reeflover
So this method lowers both nitrates and phosphates? What would be considered a small amount to start out with? I have a 55 gal.

Before you start dosing any carbon source, do a search for vodka . There are a few big threads that outline criteria and guidelines for dosing vodka.

1 tsp of sugar is equal to 10 ml of vodka (80 proof), so you'd probably start dosing at 1/10 tsp.. Keep in mind that if you start out with too much, you'll crash the tank. If you go too fast with it, you can crash the tank. If you go overboard with it, you can crash the tank. You don't want 0 N O3 and PO4, there has to be some in the water.

Research first!

[Timbor]

Originally posted by djc1026
Isn't Marc Weiss's product "Coral Vital" basically sugar water, some kind of glucose/succrose concocture? It doesn't list it's ingredients, and his people won't tell you. It looks and sort of smells like apple juice. Just a thought because I know people who use that and have used it for quite some time. Most have said great things about using it in the beginning and some have had tank crashes after several years. Now, there are many other things that could have caused the crashes. But....anyone know the chemical composition of this product?

Dave

It would make sense for a coral "food" product to be some sort of sugar-based solution. If you add the sugar to the tank, you will see a bloom in bacteria and plankton, which are small enough to be eaten by most corals (I would assume).

Tim

[RichConley]

Originally posted by PatrickJ
It needs scientific proof before it can be really excepted by the whole reefing and scientific community as fact.

Therefore, it needs to be tested by scientic conditions in a lab setting.
....

I am willing to try it by myself, but I will not make a claim that it does and be proven wrong by scietific fact.

I believe there have been PLENTY of scientific experiments proving that plenty of bacterial species can metabolize sucrose.

[Nano_reeflover]

Does tsp mean tablespoon or teaspoon? I'm not much of a cook

[Clouded]

Originally posted by Nano_reeflover
Does tsp mean tablespoon or teaspoon? I'm not much of a cook

Teaspoon.

[Nano_reeflover]

So 1/10 of a tsp would be a couple grains of sugar? lol That isn't much.

[solbby]

This thread is funny !

I have heard that maple syrup in a O2 free environment is also good food for anaerobes and facultative anaerobes.

[solbby]

Originally posted by fishykid9212
Hi, I have posted this trick to eliminate nitrates many times. I don't know why people use it but here it goes. My tank use to have high nitrates, as in off the chart. Around 60-80ppm, in 2 weeks they were down to zero WITHOUT water changes. I haven't done water changes in months and my nitrates are still at zero. Now I'm not a light feeder, I have a 92G FOWLR tank with a few damsels, an ocellaris clown, clarki clown, pajama cardinal, yellow tang and a hippo tang. Nitrates can only be eliminated naturally by anerobic bacteria, which of course is not in anyones tank since anerobic bacteria. There are very few of these bacteria in aquariums. In order to get this bacteria you need to feed it somthing, what happens to be sugar, plain old white granulated
sugar. Ok, now, this is how I did it...

First of all, you need to have a protein skimmer, it won't work without one, if you don't have one I would highly suggest getting one. As a start I would add 1/8 of a teaspoon of sugar for every 25 gallons of water, every other day. If you have any corals I would do every two days. You can add more but it's better to be safe than sorry. Doing this promotes the growth of anerobic bacteria as I mentioned before. Growing this type of bacteria will use up some oxygen in your tank, thats why it's better to start off with a low ammount of sugar. Your skimmer will supply oxygen as well as skim out all those anerobic bacteria that have just consumed nitrate. Therefore lowering your nitrates This truly does work and you will be very suprised how much money it saves you in salt for water changes. I'm not saying you never have to do them again, I'm saying you don't have to ever do water changes to lower nitrates. I have directed many people in the right direction, and not one of those people have told me that they lost live stock and/or corals in the process.

I am saying this because every day, I see some one on here that asks how to lower nitrates besides water changes and I am getting pretty tired of explaining this whole thing to them. I would really appreciate it if people can post there experience on this thread and help keep this thread alive. If there are any questions I am here I hope this will help people out.

Most of your "facts" are incorrect. Does "anerobic" bacteria = anaerobic, aerobic or facultative anaerobic?