pappone and BLU Coral method

[spongebobby]

I feed my tank with smaller amounts more frequently. I feed the pappone every other day. Instead of using the large cube trays, I used the small trays, they are about the size of a gumball . They are 3.6 ml each cube. I feed 1 cube every other day but dose AA every day. No bad algea growing so far. Been feeding for 3wks Sat. Pretty pleased so far.

[marsh]

“Pappone” Recipe – Italian Coral Food (Updated 1/14/2007)

Materials:
5 Oysters
5 Mussels
5 Clams
5 Shrimp (NOT cocktail shrimp, the big scampi type w/o the head and the shell)
1 Tablespoon of Sugar (not corn syrup, etc.)
200 mL of RO/DI water
10 g of Red Algae (Palmaria palmata; Bisck uses Julian Sprung's brand)
and/or 10 g of Spirulina, 10 g of Nori (spirulina is what Bisck prefers)

Methods: Make SURE that all ingredients are the freshest possible and DO NOT use frozen foods (unless it is impossible for you). Make sure everything "live" is rinsed and cleaned before putting it into the blender. Put all the ingredients into the blender and blend for 5 min, wait 2 min for it to cool, 5 more min blending, 2 min of waiting again, then finally another 5 min of blending (the pausing is so that the solution doesn't get too hot and "cook" from the heat of the blender/blades). Pour into cube forms (approx 10 mL each). Then freeze it all—you want to minimize how long everything is at room temperature.

Procedure: One hour prior to turning off your lights, you have the option of adding Amino acids to the tank*. (For example, 11pm Halides off, add AA’s, 12am, actinics off, then add pappone). Take off the cup of your skimmer, but leave the skimmer running (so you don’t have a massive drop in O2 levels overnight). After the lights are off, start with only a ¼ of a cube per WEEK for every 400 L of tank water (approx 100 gallons). Be sure to measure NO3 and PO4 the next morning so that these parameters don't spike after feeding. You can reduce the amount fed if you are having nutrient problems. Also don’t forget to put the skimmer cup back on the next morning before the lights go back on.

*If everything is going well. It is good to wait and see how the tank is doing for awhile before trying this. The whole point here is that you don't want to change anything too fast, because nothing good happens quickly in this hobby. (Another method to grind up amino acid pills in the next batch of food; however Bisck found that it sometimes causes diatom outbreaks in his tank).

from "Aquarium Corals" Eric H. Borneman T.F.H. Publications 2004 pg 64-65

Fresh seafood
6 whole fresh/thawed shrimp
12 fresh mussels
12 fresh clams
12 fresh oysters

Frozen Aquarium Foods
1 pkg frozen sea urchin
1 pkg frozen fish roe
225 gm decapsulated Artemia nauplii

Dried Seaweeds
1/2 cup

Sea Greens/antioxidants
10 gm aguagreens, or other

Dried Aquarium Foods
Marine Flake
pellet premium food


Liquid Vitamins
Selco, Super Selco, or other vitamin/amino acid supplements

These items are mixed and "liquefied" in a blender or food processor.

Borneman recommended 20 ml in 300 gal. (as opposed to Pappone 7.5 ml in 300 gal per week). He also recommended experimentation based on tank variances and water quality.

It appears that Borneman's coral feed adds a few more things than the Pappone method but does include vitamins and amino acids. As mentioned above it does not include sugar.

It appears to me that the sugar is the "missing" ingredient from Borneman's coral feed. I suspect that careful aquarists, including Borneman, had excellent results without sugar. With limited experience I am a believer in sugar/other carbon sources lowering PO4 and Nitrates. The addition of sugar to the Pappone coral feed is a measure of insurance in my opinion. Maybe it should be called the Poppins feed...just a spoon full of sugar keeps the phosphates down... the nitrates down...

[marsh]

“Pappone” Recipe – Italian Coral Food (Updated 1/14/2007)

Materials:
5 Oysters
5 Mussels
5 Clams
5 Shrimp (NOT cocktail shrimp, the big scampi type w/o the head and the shell)
1 Tablespoon of Sugar (not corn syrup, etc.)
200 mL of RO/DI water
10 g of Red Algae (Palmaria palmata; Bisck uses Julian Sprung's brand)
and/or 10 g of Spirulina, 10 g of Nori (spirulina is what Bisck prefers)

Methods: Make SURE that all ingredients are the freshest possible and DO NOT use frozen foods (unless it is impossible for you). Make sure everything "live" is rinsed and cleaned before putting it into the blender. Put all the ingredients into the blender and blend for 5 min, wait 2 min for it to cool, 5 more min blending, 2 min of waiting again, then finally another 5 min of blending (the pausing is so that the solution doesn't get too hot and "cook" from the heat of the blender/blades). Pour into cube forms (approx 10 mL each). Then freeze it all—you want to minimize how long everything is at room temperature.

Procedure: One hour prior to turning off your lights, you have the option of adding Amino acids to the tank*. (For example, 11pm Halides off, add AA’s, 12am, actinics off, then add pappone). Take off the cup of your skimmer, but leave the skimmer running (so you don’t have a massive drop in O2 levels overnight). After the lights are off, start with only a ¼ of a cube per WEEK for every 400 L of tank water (approx 100 gallons). Be sure to measure NO3 and PO4 the next morning so that these parameters don't spike after feeding. You can reduce the amount fed if you are having nutrient problems. Also don’t forget to put the skimmer cup back on the next morning before the lights go back on.

*If everything is going well. It is good to wait and see how the tank is doing for awhile before trying this. The whole point here is that you don't want to change anything too fast, because nothing good happens quickly in this hobby. (Another method to grind up amino acid pills in the next batch of food; however Bisck found that it sometimes causes diatom outbreaks in his tank).

from "Aquarium Corals" Eric H. Borneman T.F.H. Publications 2004 pg 64-65

Fresh seafood
6 whole fresh/thawed shrimp
12 fresh mussels
12 fresh clams
12 fresh oysters

Frozen Aquarium Foods
1 pkg frozen sea urchin
1 pkg frozen fish roe
225 gm decapsulated Artemia nauplii

Dried Seaweeds
1/2 cup

Sea Greens/antioxidants
10 gm aguagreens, or other

Dried Aquarium Foods
Marine Flake
pellet premium food


Liquid Vitamins
Selco, Super Selco, or other vitamin/amino acid supplements

These items are mixed and "liquefied" in a blender or food processor.

Borneman recommended 20 ml in 300 gal. (as opposed to Pappone 7.5 ml in 300 gal per week). He also recommended experimentation based on tank variances and water quality.

It appears that Borneman's coral feed adds a few more things than the Pappone method but does include vitamins and amino acids. As mentioned above it does not include sugar.

It appears to me that the sugar is the "missing" ingredient from Borneman's coral feed. I suspect that careful aquarists, including Borneman, had excellent results without sugar. With limited experience I am a believer in sugar/other carbon sources lowering PO4 and Nitrates. The addition of sugar to the Pappone coral feed is a measure of insurance in my opinion. Maybe it should be called the Poppins feed...just a spoon full of sugar keeps the phosphates down... the nitrates down...

[mmotown]

Originally posted by GraviT
I used a small amount of Pappone once a week for 3 weeks and ended up with a lovely mat of cyano and dino on my sandbed. No more for me.

I used the SeaChem Reef Plus for an AA suppliment, but had been using it for almost a month before I started the pappone. I'm not sure where the heck the dino came from, maybe it was in the gut of some of the seafood.

My corals grew from the pappone but I have never had a cyano problem on my sand bed and now I do. Hate to discontinue the use of pappone but I have to. Also noticed a few corals RTN'ing never had that problem before.

[antonsemrad]

Originally posted by antonsemrad
OK.. Whatever.....

Originally posted by RichConley
Anton, theres a reason I'm insistent that there needs to be sugar in Pappone for you to call it Pappone.

1) Its the active ingredient, IE the one that makes a difference.

2) If we have people adding different variations of the recipe, and reporting back, then we dont have anything. If all the people using sugar are seeing improvements, and none of hte people not using it are, and everyone is calling it Pappone, then we'll get back a 50/50 on whether or not the stuff is working, when thats not really the case.

In order to have this thread actually tell us anything, there needs to be some consistency. We can't have people dosing totally different foods, and their results to the same pool of information.

Sugar is the main ingredient here that makes this different from most other foods. It balances out the phosphate, and makes it much more removable.

Rich: Thank you for the reply. I apologize for the tone of my post. You bring up a good point.

If we have people adding different variations of the recipe, and reporting back, then we dont have anything

I disagree. If different people give different variations, that would tell more. I suspect that nitrogen is the active ingredient.

I could be wrong. (It wouldn't be the first time, nor the last.)

There has been a lot of discussion about AA's, but if people don't say if they are useing it or not we will never know how useful they are.

The same is true for organic carbon.
Just fish goo might work I think. Why not? Please, do tell, did it not work for you?

The sugar is for nutrients,. no? so... if when you add the goo and your nutrients go up, are there not less risky options? Is is always a givin that they will go up? Will sugar make sure that they don't?

IMO organic carbon is one option among many. Heck, we still don't understand what role bactieria play in our own digestive systems (prilosec anyone?), let alone in our reef tanks. Just because it worked for you dosen't mean that it will work for everyone.

The recipe calls for one tablespoon, but, it doesn't talk at all about the different factors that may play a role in what the bactieria will do in a reef tank. How big of a bioload do you have? How many fish? Sandbed? How deep? How many corals? How much mucus do they shed? Skimmer? How big? How much of this are you feeding? Can you add more with less sugar over time? Or is more sugar needed? Do you have any sponges? Do you have a Algae filter? The list goes on...

Of course it is possible that there isn't enough carbon in the recipe to do much. But, it just seems irresponsible to me to not address any of these issues, and just follow a recipe without thinking about whats in it, what it does and what you expect it to do in your reef system.

For example;

One tank that is a BB reef with only a few fish, and a few small frags that is only a few months old.

VS

Another tank that is grown in with a sandbed, with lots of fish, and 8 years old.

Would you add the same amount of sugar to each?

What if you reversed the sandbed factor?

Then what?

I still say skip the sugar, and then decide what to do after observations.

JMO, Anton

[Saldarya]

For those of you using the SeaChem AA, how much are you dosing prior to adding the food? How much per say 100G.

[geoxman]

I use OJ instead of RO.

[fishfanatic06]

Originally posted by Saldarya
For those of you using the SeaChem AA, how much are you dosing prior to adding the food? How much per say 100G.

Assuming you are using Seachem's Reefplus, I do the reccomended dosage on the bottle. 1 capful per 20 gallons of water before the pappone. So 5 capfuls should be that. Just double check the reccomended dosage on the bottle in case I am wrong.

[fishfanatic06]

I found a clever way for freezing the pappone. I remembered that when I would get injured during running I put water in dixie cups and would freeze it. When it was frozen, I then would rip the paper off that was attached to the ice and it would come off like butter. It made icing sore tendons and muscles a breeze. I thought that it would work similarly if I put 10ml of pappone in each dixie cup and freezed it. I tried it out and it worked great. I ripped the dixie cup apart and had perfect circles. Than I could cut them accordingly based on how much I needed to dose. I would then put all the cut up pieces into ziplock bags and leave it in the freezer.
BTW, I used the really small minaiture shot size dixie cups.

[SueT]

like jello shot size?? J/K....lol.

[fishfanatic06]

lol

[REEF-DADDY]

Originally posted by GraviT
I used a small amount of Pappone once a week for 3 weeks and ended up with a lovely mat of cyano and dino on my sandbed. No more for me.

I used the SeaChem Reef Plus for an AA suppliment, but had been using it for almost a month before I started the pappone. I'm not sure where the heck the dino came from, maybe it was in the gut of some of the seafood.

You could farm cyano with this stuff!

[SueT]

thats interesting as I have had nothing but the clearest tank water I've ever had before. My tank looks like a tank with no water and corals sitting on rock. It's that clear.

[fishfanatic06]

I agree, my water has only gotten clearer. I think you must have pretty decent protein skimming when using this stuff. The skimming removes all of the left over pappone so cyano and algae are not a huge problem.

[JRod]

Are both of you following suit with turning off the skimmer and starting in the am?

Have the AA on order and as soon as that walks through the door, its off to the fish market I go.

[SueT]

Yeah, I take my collection cup off right before I add the pappone. I do not turn the skimmer off, it's left running so oxygenation to the tank still is going. Then first thing the next morning while coffee is brewing I replace the cup.

[docwells]

I do not remove my skimmer cup. I just turn the water level down to the lowest setting and the skimmer does not collect any skimate. I have not gottten an algae bloom and I probably feed a little more pappone than needed for my tank. I also run oxzone on my tank and this probably helps. Is there anyone else running ozone with this method? I wonder if any of the reefers in Italy are using ozone with this method?

[Orochimaru]

Originally posted by docwells
I do not remove my skimmer cup. I just turn the water level down to the lowest setting and the skimmer does not collect any skimate. I have not gottten an algae bloom and I probably feed a little more pappone than needed for my tank. I also run oxzone on my tank and this probably helps. Is there anyone else running ozone with this method? I wonder if any of the reefers in Italy are using ozone with this method?

i've tried lowering my water to the lowest level and this stuff still drives my skimmer crazy. So I took a styrafoam cup, cut out the bottom and flip upside down on the skimmate output in the collection cup, and basically increase the height of the skimmer. That seems to help cause I am too lazy to take out the cup...no space and too much hassle to.

I do use ozone so I would like to know as well.

[fishfanatic06]

I turn off my skimmer for the night. I already have a ton of oxygenation from my overflow into the sump.

[bogg]

I've been doing the same as you ff, and I also put a powerhead in the sump to circulate the pappone while it's down there. Otherwise it seems to settle on the top. I am assuming these dark rich colors I am having are due to the feedings I really like it!. No more really light pastel colors.

[fishfanatic06]

Yeah, I like dark, rich colors in my sps over pastel. I use to use prodibio and the sps were way too light. Not my taste. Switched to this stuff and the colors are just how I like them to be
.

[bogg]

Yeah for the first time in a long time, I feel my current colors are closer to natural. Looks like pappone works great. I used to feed blended oysters but never had a great impact like I am now with this stuff. Thanks to the Italians.

[rawbomb]

i am using the seachem aminos and i had polyp retraction on all my sps instead of extension. Anyone have had this happen with the seachem? the amount is high since its 5ml per 20 and i have a 250 so it might have been to much.

[SueT]

Wow, I've never had that happen. I use the dosage on the bottle which is what your doing so thats weird to me. You do refrigerate the bottle after opening right??

[Green Thumb]

Originally posted by Flint&Eric
my c source is a little bit of this, and a little bit of that i'm still experimenting. The main sources are vodka, sugar, and vinegar and i've been adding some other sources and watching thier effect. I'd suggest start2. It's a great mixed c source and what I use to compare/contrast.

My next batch of pappone I will try adding fish roe and creatine to the blend. It's going to be a while as I have plenty still in my freezer

AA's can help darken colors, but honestly it seems they're most useful for one thing...increasing PE. I add an amino blend every now and then, but primarily only add them with pappone.

Try it out and see if you notice any differences. On my new set up I want to try doing a low dose amino solution with my top off unit so there is a constant supply. If for anything to get some nice PE 24/7.

Anyone try the new KZ snow product? I want to see if it lives up the claims people are making. It would be a great additiong to the BC method, if it truly does allow better abosrbtion of elements to the coral. With the pappone it could have some great results!

eric

Thanks for your responce. Ive never heard of start2. Who makes it?

Ill be honest, Im more inclined to using sugar for its availability

I do want to look into the start2 though..

A few years ago I had a source for FRESH off the boat shrimp,I used to squish the fresh shrimp eggs into the tank, fish went CRAZY and corals showed great PE during feeding. I would think fish roe is a VERY good idea...