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Tom@HaslettMI
08-17-2012, 11:12 PM
Anybody out there dosing iron (Fe) in their tanks?

My macroalgae (C. taxifolia) has been doing poorly lately. It gets bright yellow splotches on it, which spread, and eventually the whole "leaf" bleaches and turns clear. My understanding is that Fe will increase macroalgae growth. According to Reef Aquarium Vol 3. Fe will also benefit the zooxanthellae in corals.

So, I'm thinking about giving it a try. However, I would first like to hear of others experience using Fe in their reef. And before anyone says it (as I'm sure some one will). I do not believe that you should "only dose what you can test".

Lastly, is there a DIY recipe for a reef Fe supplement?

Thanks for any input,
Tom
MizTanks
08-17-2012, 11:36 PM
Yo slapshot where you at? I know he does Tom :)
dputt88
08-18-2012, 07:37 AM
hey there,
i would hold of on dosing iron for right now. please tell me about your nitrate and phosphate levels. reason being when my caulerpa (cactus) begin doing what you listed i usually dose a calcium nitrate solution that i make. i have a 30 gal cube that is entirely macro algaes and i dont believe i have any stuggle with iron.

some salts have appropriate levels of iron in them. but if you do decide to dose what you want is iron chelate in a dry form. from there you can dissolve an appropriate solution into a gallon if water and drip it into your tank.

iron will aid macroaglae growth, but im assuming you have a sandbed. metal accumulation in the sand bed can lead to old tank syndrome and shorten the life of your tank. i would assume that this would only happen if you were to over dose though.

this is the site i use to buy fertilizers and live plants for my macroalgae tank, i reccomend them very strongly as their prices are not only the best, the quality is too.

http://live-plants.com/plantfood.htm

enjoy
jimsflies
08-18-2012, 08:26 AM
Yo SlapShot where you at? I know he does Tom :)

Jamie- You can make sure they know you are talking about them by putting an @ symbol in front of their user name ... like this slapshot.
slapshot
08-18-2012, 10:35 AM
Jamie- You can make sure they know you are talking about them by putting an @ symbol in front of their user name ... like this slapshot.

Sorry all must have missed this. Yes I dose iron. I believe it is more important to Cheato but all my macros grow better after I dose. It doesn't seem to affect anything else. So I dose about 5 ml directly into the sump once a month. Now I have 350 gallons of water so the actual amount is quite small. As for making your own it's not that expensive to buy so I just do that. Hope that helps.
Tom@HaslettMI
08-18-2012, 02:35 PM
hey there,
i would hold of on dosing iron for right now. please tell me about your nitrate and phosphate levels. reason being when my caulerpa (cactus) begin doing what you listed i usually dose a calcium nitrate solution that i make. i have a 30 gal cube that is entirely macro algaes and i dont believe i have any stuggle with iron.

some salts have appropriate levels of iron in them. but if you do decide to dose what you want is iron chelate in a dry form. from there you can dissolve an appropriate solution into a gallon if water and drip it into your tank.

iron will aid macroaglae growth, but im assuming you have a sandbed. metal accumulation in the sand bed can lead to old tank syndrome and shorten the life of your tank. i would assume that this would only happen if you were to over dose though.

this is the site i use to buy fertilizers and live plants for my macroalgae tank, i reccomend them very strongly as their prices are not only the best, the quality is too.

<head> <title>Macro Algae : Your Source For Quality Marine Plants and Macroalgae (http://live-plants.com/plantfood.htm)

enjoy

My last nitrate test was 3 or 4 weeks ago and was 30 ppm... two weeks prior to that it was 100 ppm (that's another story)! I have not tested phosphates in a long time. I stopped because they were always at the bottom of the scale or undetectable.

That's a good call on looking at my salt mix... I hadn't thought of that.

My tank has been running for ~18 years so the time for old tank syndrome (if you believe is such a thing) has come and gone.

Thanks for the link.

I appreciate the input.

Tom

---------- Post added at 03:35 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:33 PM ----------


Sorry all must have missed this. Yes I dose iron. I believe it is more important to Cheato but all my macros grow better after I dose. It doesn't seem to affect anything else. So I dose about 5 ml directly into the sump once a month. Now I have 350 gallons of water so the actual amount is quite small. As for making your own it's not that expensive to buy so I just do that. Hope that helps.

Thanks for the reply. What brand are you using?

Tom
slapshot
08-18-2012, 02:46 PM
I use Flourish
Seph
08-18-2012, 07:26 PM
Hey Slapshot, do you have any problems with cyano when dosing iron?
slapshot
08-18-2012, 07:28 PM
Nope, none.
Seph
08-18-2012, 07:32 PM
Tom I don't know if you remember, but you posted when I asked a question about iron and a theory about it possibly feeding cyano. It was on another forum ( that I won't mention) a few years ago. I would be interested in your findings if you do start dosing Iron.
Seph
08-18-2012, 07:37 PM
Nope, none.

Thats good to hear. I've always had problems with cyano, even with low nutient levels. Like I said in a reply to Tom. I had posted a few years back a qoute out of the Coral Mag. It was a theory about cyano using iron in low nutrient systems. Heres the qoute.

Nitrogen Fixation
Nitrogen is an important nutrient and one of the essential building blocks of any living organism. It is used in proteins and DNA, among other substances. Because a healthy coral reef has only a very limited amount of dissolved nitrogen compounds, there must be organisms that introduce nitrogen into the reef system. Only very few are able to bind the dissolved nitrogen and make it available to the nutrient cycle (Sorokin 1995), among them cyanobacteria - or "slime algae," as some of them are referred to in the saltwater aquarium hobby. This process is called nitrogen fixation and uses a protein complex that has the nitrogenase enzyme at its center - and again, iron is the active ingredient in this enzyme (Rees et al. 2005), making iron essential for nitrogen fixation. Because cyanobacteria are able to satisfy their nitrogen needs from gaseous molecular nitrogen dissolved in water, it doesn't seem farfetched to hypothesize that cyanobacteria infestations in tanks with low nutrient levels (low Nitrate level) may be caused by surplus iron. It would be interesting to conduct a series of experiments to prove or disprove this theory.
Tom@HaslettMI
08-18-2012, 08:45 PM
Tom I don't know if you remember, but you posted when I asked a question about iron and a theory about it possibly feeding cyano. It was on another forum ( that I won't mention) a few years ago. I would be interested in your findings if you do start dosing Iron.

Oh dear, I don't remember the post... I hope I didn't say something dumb! Never fear, if I decide to dose (and I'm leaning in that direction) I'll share my experience here on CR.

Tom
dputt88
08-18-2012, 10:04 PM
sorry to back trank on the salt. but what salt are you using. if you look at Salinity by aquavitro it does have a good ammount of iron. maybe not enough for a strictly macro tank but definitely enough for a mixed tank.
Tom@HaslettMI
08-18-2012, 10:49 PM
sorry to back trank on the salt. but what salt are you using. if you look at Salinity by aquavitro it does have a good ammount of iron. maybe not enough for a strictly macro tank but definitely enough for a mixed tank.

No worries about backtracking.

I use TropicMarin. I checked the bucket and all it says "We guarantee that this synthetic marine salt is manufactured from pharmaeutical grade salts with the following trace elements" with a whole list of elements including Fe. But there is no mention of how much of any of the elements are contained. disappointing.

A quick internet search found this link...Salt Mix Comparison (http://www.northcoastpets.com/salt_comparison.htm), which found TropicMarin to contains 4.8 times more Fe than NSW. I'm sure there's some variation between batches so the actual Fe may be more or less that the site claims.

Tom
dputt88
08-19-2012, 08:31 AM
thats what i like about salinty. on the bucket there is a sticker with actual numbers from that batch of salt. but anyways i forgot to mention, if you order ferts from that site i posted they come with very simple instructions on how much to dissolve in water to raise the nutrient X ppm.
slapshot
08-21-2012, 10:34 PM
Thats good to hear. I've always had problems with cyano, even with low nutient levels. Like I said in a reply to Tom. I had posted a few years back a qoute out of the Coral Mag. It was a theory about cyano using iron in low nutrient systems. Heres the qoute.

Nitrogen Fixation
Nitrogen is an important nutrient and one of the essential building blocks of any living organism. It is used in proteins and DNA, among other substances. Because a healthy coral reef has only a very limited amount of dissolved nitrogen compounds, there must be organisms that introduce nitrogen into the reef system. Only very few are able to bind the dissolved nitrogen and make it available to the nutrient cycle (Sorokin 1995), among them cyanobacteria - or "slime algae," as some of them are referred to in the saltwater aquarium hobby. This process is called nitrogen fixation and uses a protein complex that has the nitrogenase enzyme at its center - and again, iron is the active ingredient in this enzyme (Rees et al. 2005), making iron essential for nitrogen fixation. Because cyanobacteria are able to satisfy their nitrogen needs from gaseous molecular nitrogen dissolved in water, it doesn't seem farfetched to hypothesize that cyanobacteria infestations in tanks with low nutrient levels (low Nitrate level) may be caused by surplus iron. It would be interesting to conduct a series of experiments to prove or disprove this theory.


Hmmmm no problems for me. I would theorize that the macro uses it up faster than cyno can. In any case I've had cyno issues in the past but not since my macro grow strong. The macro algae grows way faster, darker and thicker the week after I dose.