Bioballs

[scubacane]

I have had a 14 gallon biocube for the past 7 months- it is doing quite well, with some very healthy live rock, plenty of corralline algae- my fish- a yellow goby and a clown seem healthy- a BTA that looks great eating a bay scallop every 3 days, several different soft corals that have erupted from my live rock and spread nicely, some various copepods that come out at night, a few small snails, 1 large snail, an arrow crab, and a cleaning crew of 16 hermits. I change the water - agallon every 4 days- my algae growth is minimal- needs a quick wipe down on glass surfaces every 4 days or so. To be honest I havent been checking my parameters as closely as I used to since the tank appears so stable -I have never been able to get my nitrates totally to zero- they seem to hang out about at 5-10 although this doesnt appear to have hurt my inverts too much- lately I have read that bioballs are a source of nitrate producing bacteria and one local shop suggested that I get rid of them- they came standard with the tank- in addition to my live rock- about 8-9 pounds I have a live mid- size crushed coral substrate-2 inches- and the standard carbon filter that came with the tank which I change every 4 weeks. If my tank is stable on its current set up do I want to monkey around with it, taking the bioballs out? This local guy also suggested switching to a live sand substrate which would be technically difficult- any thoughts ?

[ccCapt]

You will hear different things about bio-balls, but I used them in my wet/dry for over 15 years and never had a nitrate problem. The only reason I really stopped using them was I had to reconfigure my sump to work with my skimmer and that meant removing the chamber where they were. I replaced them with lr rubble.
IMO, the crushed coral will cause more problems than the bio-balls.

[yote]

Capts right about the crushed coral.It likes to trap detritus and left over food.
I'm still running the bioballs that came with my wet/dry,but I wash them out every week when I do my water change.Their like anything else,you have to do some maintance on them.

[Bifferwine]

I agree with everyone else on the crushed coral. It does not have the buffering capacity of aragonite sand, so you may have pH problems. Because of it's big pieces, crap gets trapped in it and most cleaner crew animals will not dig around in it so that can lead to nitrate problems too. It is a pain to change out substrate, you would have to remove everything from your tank. It's up to you if you want to do that.

Bioballs can lead to nigh nitrates if you are not diligent about keeping them clean.