Bio balls poll

Discussion in '3reef Site Polls' started by steve wright, Mar 27, 2010.

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Bio balls - whats your opinion

Poll closed Apr 26, 2010.
  1. Used them and have no issues

    33 vote(s)
    35.1%
  2. Stayed away from them due to opinions of others

    42 vote(s)
    44.7%
  3. Used them, had issues, made changes

    16 vote(s)
    17.0%
  4. I dont care - stop bothering me with trivia

    3 vote(s)
    3.2%
  1. blackraven1425

    blackraven1425 Giant Squid

    Joined:
    Mar 1, 2010
    Messages:
    4,780
    Give me some of your GHA! I have a tang and many snails and hermits that need to be fed!
     
    1 person likes this.
  2. Click Here!

  3. Triplemom

    Triplemom Pajama Cardinal

    Joined:
    Nov 4, 2008
    Messages:
    1,410
    Location:
    Tennessee
    EDIT: Let it be known that this is =Jwin= :)

    We had them, they were great until they got dirty, then poooo. So as inwall and others said, keep a prefilter such as a sponge or filter sock in front of them and keep them clean, and you'll have no troubles. However, we ditched ours and switched to base rock rubble and converted the bioball chamber into a fuge. Much much much better. I'm probably never going to use them again simply because I think rock and algae make much better (and much more natural) filtration. But like I said, keep them clean, and they'll be great for your tank. Allow them to get detritus on them and get icky, and they could be a nightmare. Our algae and nitrates went away once we ditched our dirty bioballs.

    Crap...my mom left her account logged in and I'm too lazy to delete this and post it myself.

    Just keep in mind that this is =Jwin= speaking :D
     
  4. Powerman

    Powerman Giant Squid

    Joined:
    Oct 3, 2008
    Messages:
    3,460
    Location:
    Colorado
    Hummmm... not really sure now that you ask. So in the live rock, waste is deposited, ate by a brittle star, deposited again, broke down by nitrite producing bacteria and then broke down to N2 by bacteria deeper is.... in that sense it was never in the water column and available to the macro.

    The macro in the fuge, probably collects some waste, as with any other waste in the tank produces nitrates released to the water column and then is taken up by the Macro.

    Sort of different areas.... regardless how slow, my macro does grow, and my nitrates were zero before I had it with no nuisance algae.

    Mirco algae will bloom no matter what. Marco algae just out competes it because we give it better lighting suited for plant growth in the fuge for longer time. My halides are only on for 7 hours, then it is actinics for 5 more. My fuge gets a lot of 6500K light 14 hours a day. So we hope macro algae in the fuge out competes micro in the tank for nutrients because we give the macro more favorable conditions.