Bio balls

[Saltwater Stu]

I know there are mixed feelings about bio balls out there. I figure if they work great. My problem is I don't think I'm using them right. I have pretty much the whole last chamber of my 40g fuge stuffed with bio balls. This is where my return pump draws the water out of and the chamber is completely submersed. So my question is, are the bio balls doing any good being completely under water? or are they just creating a place for the detritus to get trapped and build up?

 

[mercenary-grunt]

we in salt tend to not use them. they collect detritus badly and you need to wash them. i my self have a area like you that i took the balls out of and filled it with rubble rock. (small liverock) the live rock does the same thing as bioballs by adding bacteria a place to grow. but it also gives areas for pods to grow

 

[Sean112280]

^+1 on the rubble

 

[Saltwater Stu]

Sweet, what I wanted to hear, got a bunch of rubble rock that needs to be cycle'd but will be perfect for it.

 

[Krish]

Be careful with the rubble as well. If the flow passing through your sump isn't sufficient enough, detritus can still accumulate in there. This is one of the reasons people don't put any sort of liverock in their sumps. It's just another place you will have to stay on top of cleaning to keep detritus accumulation down to a minimum. The rock you have in your tank is usually more than adequate to biologically filter your tank. I tried a few pieces of liverock in my sump one time and a week later after removing it, I couldn't believe how much detritus settled underneath it so I removed it all I never put it back.

Just a few thoughts.


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[mojoreef]

The reason bio balls are not really used for reef tanks is that they tend to produce nitrates. The concept of a bio ball is to create a surface area fro the growth of nitrifying bacteria, then you place them in an area where they receive highly oxygenated water, from here the bacteria convert ammonia to nitrite and then nitrite to nitrate, since reducing nitrate only occurs in a very low oxygenated area the process stops their. So if its bio balls or anything really that is in that highly oxygenated area your going to get the same thing.

So in your case if they are in an area where the water is not so highly oxygenated they you might be getting a better condition for a reef style tank. If you are looking to have an area for pod production they they will work fine but as mentioned above the area will collect detritus, but so will rock rubble. One advantage you could say with the ball over the rubble is that it would be a simple job to remove them and clean them and the area with out worrying about have to worry about die off that you would get in the rubble concept.

Mike

 

[mercenary-grunt]

i could try removing the rubble from my system and see how it fares.

 

[Saltwater Stu]

The reason bio balls are not really used for reef tanks is that they tend to produce nitrates. The concept of a bio ball is to create a surface area fro the growth of nitrifying bacteria, then you place them in an area where they receive highly oxygenated water, from here the bacteria convert ammonia to nitrite and then nitrite to nitrate, since reducing nitrate only occurs in a very low oxygenated area the process stops their. So if its bio balls or anything really that is in that highly oxygenated area your going to get the same thing.

Probably why I couldn't control the nitrates when I first switched the tank over!

 

[Saltwater Stu]

So in your case if they are in an area where the water is not so highly oxygenated they you might be getting a better condition for a reef style tank.

Can you clarify why this is good for a reef style setup? I thought I had a good understanding of the nitrogen cycle, but now I'm a little confused.

 

[Saltwater Stu]

So thought about it, the bio balls may be good because they are just easier to clean without the mini cycle and die off with live rock....more stable for the reef enviroment. Is that what I should take from that?

 

[mojoreef]

Hey Stu a good reef setup can be a long list so here is a quick and dirty. When you keep a reef you are looking for stability, so a system that holds it parameters very steady and unwavering, so no big swings in PH, nitrates, salinity temp and so on and so on. Unlike fish only most corals dont like big changes and thats the cause of most deaths in a reef system. So the best advice I can give anyone is to be a keeper of water, focus all you do on keeping your water parameter stable and steady, if you can do that the corals will grow no problem.

So in following the above concept you analyze what you are attempting to do. What are you trying to get from your bioballs?? and will that screw around with the prime directive?? lol


Mojo

 

[mercenary-grunt]

Makes sense

 

[Krish]

Can you clarify why this is good for a reef style setup? I thought I had a good understanding of the nitrogen cycle, but now I'm a little confused.

To add to what Mojo posted, the nitrogen cycle takes place in our tanks all the time. When you hear of someone starting out and cycling their tank, really what they are doing is building up the necessary aerobic bacteria in the tank to convert toxic ammonia produced by waste/detritus etc into a less toxic firm called nitrite and then into even a less toxic form called nitrate. Once your tank reads zero ammonia and nitrite and remains there, then you have completed your initial cycle where fish are safe to be added in slowly. Corals on the other hand shouldn't be as most are sensitive to the presence of nitrates. This is where you aim at finding that "balance" in your tank which usually comes with maturity as you try to reduce your nitrate levels to zero and have them remain there. This is accomplished through a few processes like denitrification carried out by anaerobic bacteria which are those that populate your tank in areas void of oxygen as well as through dilution through water changes etc. So this is where the issue with bio-balls comes into play...

Being in an area highly oxygenated, it results in nitrates being the end product of the nitrogen cycle because there are no areas void of oxygen for denitrifying bacteria to grow and convert the nitrates, so you end up with an accumulation of nitrates over time. You skip the bio-balls (or whatever you decide to use in the wet/dry environment) and just stick to using live rock and even a deep sand bed, and what you now have is an environment perfectly suited for the nitrogen cycle to run its course full circle as the surface and top layers of the live rock and sand bed will provide you with the aerobic regions for the necessary aerobic bacteria to grow and then deep within the rock and sand bed where oxygen is void, the necessary anaerobic bacteria can grow which anything in a "wet/dry" environment won't provide.

Just a few additional thoughts. I'll jump on a pc real quick to send you link to some diagrams on the nitrogen cycle.


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[Krish]

Here's a write up Mojo and Kirk did on the nitrogen cycle http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/f124/cycling-recycling-your-tank-61672/#post631125

And a few diagrams of te nitrogen cycle are found here in post 2 http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/f14/submit-your-sketches-diys-how-tos-61726/

 

[Saltwater Stu]

Thanks guys. Tank ran so steady for so many years I feel like I may be out of touch with how the fine details work together. I'm really anxious to get the corals out of the qt tank and back into the dt but am scared everything isn't quite ready. I'll keep ya posted.
thanks again

 

[TJL]

In this setup I utilized the Bio-Balls fully submerged in a high flow cryptic zone, so though they were part of the nitrogen cycle thier primary use was as a substrate for sponges, tunicates and other non-photo organisms to thrive. There was very little detritus even after two years since it was downstream of large macro-algae fuge zone which filtered out nearly all particulates. My new system now has a similar cryptic zone in which I placed these Bio-Balls into already. IMHO Bio-Balls if used in a pre-filtered water setup either submerged or wet/dry can be an excellent substrate for non-photo and aerobic bacterial growth without being the so called "Nitrate Factory"


Cheers, Todd

 

[Will]

Exactly, \
Bio Balls can be used very succesfully for an indetermined ammount of time in a reef setup, without any detritus or nitrate problems,with proper water change schedule and exact consistency.