Carbon dosing

[Dbrown4183]

I have been away from the hobby for a little while and was trying to find out the current thinking on vodka/Carbon dosing. I have nitrates hovering around 40 and it is driving me nuts. Protein skimming, algae scrubbing, water changes with ro/di water and reduced feeding have not reduced the nitrates to where I want them to be. Just trying to get them low enough for soft corals and shrimp

 

[florida joe]

There are many many publications on vodka dosing on line,check them out i have dosed with vodka and it works

 

[Dbrown4183]

There are many many publications on vodka dosing on line,check them out i have dosed with vodka and it works

Thank you, I have seen and read quite a few of the online articles. Most were dated a number of years back so I just wanted to make sure there wasn't any new information that there was long term issues. Thank you so much for your quick reply.

 

[florida joe]

hopefully you have read this one, its a great place to start. If you are going to dose start slow keep a good log and double check your dosage amount before putting it in your tank
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2008-08/nftt/index.php

 

[beaslbob]

If the only thing you're trying to do is get nitrates down but otherwise fish and corals are fine, I would not carbon dose. But then I don't recommend it anyway.

What could be happening is the algae is consuming ammonia directly for nitrogen and foregoing nitrates. Once the tank builds up more aerobic bacteria the algae will consume nitrates for nitrogen because the bacteria is consuming the ammonia.

my .02