Biopellets, yes or no?
 

So my biopellet reactor broke over the summer and I haven't had a chance to repair it until recently. But then I started to wonder if people were still using biopellets..

I sure am still using them! Not a sps tank at all but I do really notice when I am running low or there off line. They are going on the 300 for sure.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I run them on my FOWLR. They seem to do the trick as it is a fairly heavily fed tank yet nitrates are never registerable when tested.

However, I still run zeo of all things, on my reef. I am contemplating letting the additives run out however and at that point I might consider a switch to Prodibio (dose once every 2 weeks? Now there's a schedule I can buy into over daily this or twice a week that or twice a day jiggle this handle and so on). Or I just just see what happens if I stop altogether. Or I switch to pellets there too maybe. I have a few months yet before everything runs out so I don't know yet but my plan is to stop buying the little blue bottles.

The pellets seem to do a job. Clearly not necessary to run a tank but they at least do the job they advertise to do.

Love them, I'm also a big believer in the new recirculating reactors.

How bigs your reef. IMO. Prodibio use great but not cost effective on big tanks

ya, when I had both the 131g FOWLR and the 150g going at the same time (plumbed together) the biopellets definitely did the trick as I did have to feed the system more. Having said that, when I just had the 150g standalone I seemed to be doing alright without the biopellets as well. And yes, I've been hearing a lot about this prodibio business and that's part of why I threw up this poll, to see if everyone jumped ship from biopellets to a newer preferred method :-)

I use prodibio on my tank. I love the product. But do find arrange of 0-5 for nitrates. Though that could be a lack in cuc right now too

i use them on my tank. i don't have a reactor so i put a little bag in the
intake part of my hob refugium. seems to work well although i do dose
bacterias. barb

Im a believer...

I'm a non -believer :pp

I tried 1/4 of the recommended minimum amount, the flow wasn't directed straight into my skimmer and I lost several montipora and acropora colonies that I had had for years. I'll never touch them again and I won't recommend them to anyone.

The output of my bio pellet reactor goes to my return pump.... I dont think that was your problem.

I don't believe it was specifically that either. But thats the only thing I did outside of the recommended procedure so I thought I should mention it. I believe it was the biopellets in general that caused me to go from this to this.

http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...icture1922.jpg

http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...o/IMG_9104.jpg

http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...o/IMG_9099.jpg

I also set them up on mine and my son's tank and was a complete disaster. In my son's tank he lost most of his fish and all the corals and in mine I didn't lose anything but it took months to get things back to normal. I am a non believer as well.

I will say I was misinformed on the proper way to start them on a system and I also didn't do enough research on them. I will take a good part of the blame in my disasters but I'm still never putting them in anything again.

Well, I didn't mean for this to turn into yet another thread on the merits (or lack thereof) of the bioPellets. Was just looking for a head count LOL. We all know that there has been plenty of discussion on the subject. Yes, you can easily destroy your tank if you don't use these properly. However, the same can be said about ZeoVit, prodibio, vodka, LED lights, auto top off systems, calcium reactors, dosers etc.

I'm still on the biopellet bandwagon. Been using them in the 225 reef for well over a year but they did very little until I suffered a pseudo tank crash and ended up with some nitrates. After I had readable nitrates on a test kit, I could visibly see the pellet level dropping in the reactor every few weeks.

I also suffered a major bryopsis and turf algae outbreak immediately after firing up the biopellet reactor. However, the tank was fairly new at the time, being only a few months old and most of the problem algae seemed to be located on the Aquaroche man made live rock so this could also have been source of the problem. I took the biopellet reactor offline for a few months to see if this was perhaps the source of the outbreak and the algae problem persisted and possibly even got worse lending further credence to the biopellets not being the cause of the issue.

I've read about a few cases where biopellets caused a massive tank crash. I'm not certain what these systems nitrate and phosphate levels were prior to running biopellets but I'm assuming after the initial bacterial colonization of the biopellets, higher levels of nitrates and phosphates were fairly rapidly stripped from the system causing major RTN or color loss in predominantly SPS corals. Never heard of anyone losing any fish until this thread though.