Yes, I jumped on that band wagon, did a ton of research and before long started liquoring my tank up on a daily basis. Before I knew it I thought I was a pro when I would test my nitrates and see a 0 reading. After dealing with NO3 consistently over 40, it was a pleasant turn of events and I was officially a vodka doser. So much so that I even slapped it in my forum signature and claimed to know it all. What made of us "vodka dosers" failed to mention was the side effects associated with heavily dosing a carbon source, the main one being a nasty bacterial sludge that would build up on powerheads, the glass walls, in the plumbing, all over the sump etc etc. It was a small price to pay for such low nutrients, but still a royal PITA! Towards the end of my vodka dosing career I was pouring a little over 20ml of vodka in my 70G tank on a daily basis. True it may not seem like a lot, but I was trying to combat no NO3, but PO4 and it seemed no matter how much I added to the tank my PO4 levels never budged. I was convinced that all I had to go was slowly keep ramping up my dosage and surely one day the numbers would start to fall. Well I didn't give myself a chance to find out. Shortly after I began to read about a new product, a miracle pellet that was supposed to revolutionize carbon dosing and overall make my life that much easier.
It seemed everyone on the internet was talking about these new solid vodka pellets. It seems that NP was the first on the scene with their NP Biopellets, then came Vertex, and the product I decided to try was Warner Marine's EcoBak pellets. I'm sure the manufacturers would disagree, but overall they seem to accomplish the same task. I chose WM because they we're supposed to be less "sticky," require less flow in a reactor, and be more effective against PO4 as well as last a little longer than the competition. Of course these claims come mostly from the manufacturer and a few other hobbyists who had limited experience with the product. My point is i'm not trying to hype one brand over the other, I just wanted to mention particularily what I was using. It's not important but just before I started using the biopellets I also upgraded my aquarium to a 125G and upgraded my skimmer to a Euroreef RS-180. As with vodka, it's important to run a strong skimmer when using the biopellets because they work the same as carbon dosing dose whereas it fuels a bacteria that consumes the nutrients in the tank, then die off and the skimmer collects and removes them from the system. Only difference with biopellets is that its all contained in a reactor as opposed to all over the entire tank. It is strongly suggested that the outlet of the reactor be placed directly in front of the intake pump of the skimmer so as to collect as much bacterial die off as possible from the reactor before it has a chance to circulate through the system again.
At the time the product was not available through retailers so I called John Warner and purchased some of his product directly. I have to admit it was somewhat exciting getting just a regular ziplock bag full of this new wonder product. Made me feel like I was getting some sort of top secret chemical
I decided to use a PM reactor that I had laying around with a Maxijet 1200 pump. At first I didn't think this was enough flow because I had to blow air into the reactor to stir the pellets every couple of days. Turns out that is normal and after a month or so the pellets loosen up, although I still stir them up every once in a while. One modification I had to make to the reactor was to remove the sponges and replace them with a cross-stitching circular thing that I found at Michaels. They we're like 6 for a dollar or something ridiculously cheap and fit the reactor perfectly.
So from there it took maybe a month for the pellets to really kick in and start performing. My goal was to replace my vodka dosing routine completely and I did that slowly over the first month cutting my dosage in half weekly until finally I was down to 0. After I stopped the vodka dosing all together I would test for NO3 regularly. I was expecting to see a bit of a spike while the pellets started working their magic and really at that point I was curious to whether or not they would work at all. For the first month I noticed no changes what so over. I should mention that another reason I wanted so desperately to find a product that would eliminate both NO3 and PO4 was because I have never really been able to maintain what I consider excellent coral coloration in my tank. Everything seemed to turn some shade of brown. I hoped that the biopellets would eliminate the need for me to start running GFO.
After a month my skimmer started pulling out some nasty gunk. It reminded me of when I first started using vodka. This was obviously a good sign. Then the bacteria on the walls and in the plumbing started disappearing. Soon after that my corals started coloring up and leaves me to where I am today.
I have been using the EcoBak bio-pellets for about 2 months now and I no longer have to dose vodka into my system daily, the bacteria all of my tank walls and plumbing has disappeared and yet to return, and although my coral is not back to its original colors yet they are about half way there and continue to improve on a daily basis. I've come to the conclusion that bio-pellets are an acceptable replacement to a carbon source. Not only that, but they are more effective and the benefits far outweigh the negative aspects of carbon dosing. So far I have absolutely no complaints about the product and I will even dare to say that I believe they may change the hobby as we know it. For instance, I believe refugiums are an ancient art that we will start to see disappearing in the hobby. Of course the product is still very new and no one has a lot of long term research yet. I'm proud to be on the starting line of this new product and so far its been one of the most exciting products i've ever purchased (aside from my vortechs of course). The benefits include:
- NO3 and PO4 removal even in a highly fed system like my own
- Compact (they run in a reactor just like you would carbon or GFO)
- Affordable (WM sells 500ml of the product for $35) it was suggested that on my 125G system I use 500ml
- No cyano or bacterial side effects
- Impossible to overdose and cause a bacterial bloom because the bacteria only uses what it needs
- Simple to use...you set up the reactor and aside from sitrring a bit every once in a while you don't have to think about it. The manufacturer claims that the biopellets should last about a year and will dissolve just like media in a calcium reactor does over time.
If you are struggling with nutrients in your tank, consider adding bio-pellets to your list of equipment. They are simple, set and forget, and affordable to get into. My only complaint is that I have nothing to do every morning when I would normally be adding my daily dose of vodka to the tank.
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