well thought I would share my experience with you guys, in case anyone else goes through the same problems I was having. I guess u could say I was over thinking the problem, really it wasn't the pellets fault, it was user error. (which is always the problem with pellets)
i ran pellets on my 180g mixed reef tank for 2+ years and had great results! after i setup my new tank, i filled my bio pellet reactor and let it start doing its thing. this is where i made the mistake, i never measured how many pellets i put in. when i started running bio pellets on my 180, the tank was already established. so i started really slow and worked my way up to the correct amount. since i started pellets from day 1 with my new tank, i just filled the reactor with a decent amount of pellets, but i never knew how many were in there... now that my tank had been running for 8 months or so, things just weren't looking like they did when i had my 180. this was mostly because i had been neglecting the tank, and not running gfo or doing water changes... i suspect my nitrates were pretty low and my phosphates were getting up there..decided i had enough, and started running gfo and doing a few 50g water changes. after about 2 months, things weren't improving. decided i was gunna remove some pellets. i assumed i had too many pellets, and that extra bacteria was fueling the cyano. well i was WAY wrong. after a week of removing some of the pellets, cyano started taking over. my whole tank was covered in cyano algae. it was all over my rocks, sand, pumps etc etc. again i started doing water changes and running more gfo...still nothing helped....
started doing some research online and found ONE THREAD where a guy was having similar problems. apparently he had been running pellets for months with no issues, then slowy cyano started showing up, and it got worse and worse....come to find out, his pellets had started to shrink after months of tumbling, and that somehow threw off the balance in his tank...after another member offered him some advice, he topped off his reactor with pellets and BOOOM problem solved...cyano disappeared
so i did the same thing. measured out 250ml of pellets, threw them in my reactor and crossed my fingers...literally 24 hours later 60% of the cyano had disappeared. after a week, i would say about 80% is gone. i haven't been running gfo, cuz i was worried it might strip too much too fast. gunna keep up on my 50g water changes, and start running gfo again..im gunna add another 50-100ml of pellets to see if that will clear up the last bit of cyano...
i never thought removing pellets would cause an algae outbreak, but i guess it makes sense..less pellets= more phosphates...anyways that's my story
i ran pellets on my 180g mixed reef tank for 2+ years and had great results! after i setup my new tank, i filled my bio pellet reactor and let it start doing its thing. this is where i made the mistake, i never measured how many pellets i put in. when i started running bio pellets on my 180, the tank was already established. so i started really slow and worked my way up to the correct amount. since i started pellets from day 1 with my new tank, i just filled the reactor with a decent amount of pellets, but i never knew how many were in there... now that my tank had been running for 8 months or so, things just weren't looking like they did when i had my 180. this was mostly because i had been neglecting the tank, and not running gfo or doing water changes... i suspect my nitrates were pretty low and my phosphates were getting up there..decided i had enough, and started running gfo and doing a few 50g water changes. after about 2 months, things weren't improving. decided i was gunna remove some pellets. i assumed i had too many pellets, and that extra bacteria was fueling the cyano. well i was WAY wrong. after a week of removing some of the pellets, cyano started taking over. my whole tank was covered in cyano algae. it was all over my rocks, sand, pumps etc etc. again i started doing water changes and running more gfo...still nothing helped....
started doing some research online and found ONE THREAD where a guy was having similar problems. apparently he had been running pellets for months with no issues, then slowy cyano started showing up, and it got worse and worse....come to find out, his pellets had started to shrink after months of tumbling, and that somehow threw off the balance in his tank...after another member offered him some advice, he topped off his reactor with pellets and BOOOM problem solved...cyano disappeared
so i did the same thing. measured out 250ml of pellets, threw them in my reactor and crossed my fingers...literally 24 hours later 60% of the cyano had disappeared. after a week, i would say about 80% is gone. i haven't been running gfo, cuz i was worried it might strip too much too fast. gunna keep up on my 50g water changes, and start running gfo again..im gunna add another 50-100ml of pellets to see if that will clear up the last bit of cyano...
i never thought removing pellets would cause an algae outbreak, but i guess it makes sense..less pellets= more phosphates...anyways that's my story