Reef tank vitamins

[John Bowers]

I was thinking about starting to dose my 240 gallon reef tank with vitamins, and I noticed that the common supplements are mainly B complex and C, the exact same vitamins in the drugstore that can be bought for a tiny fraction of the cost by buying human pills. Has anyone just tried dosing a large reef tank system with human B-complex +C vitamins pills.

It is not a big savings vs all of the other money thrown at the tank, but why not get a $6 bottle of vitamin supplements from Walmart instead of paying $20-40 for the same vitamins sold as an aquarium product?
I suspect at reasonable dosage none of the the vitamins should be toxic to anything living in the tank.

 

[John Bowers]

Based on my calculations, a one a day B complex supplement a single pill (100 mg B1, 100ug B7 100ugB12) is enough to provide the recommended vitamins to culture saltwater algae (Guillards F2 medium) for about 50 gallons, although it is about double the recipe for B1.

 

[ZapataInc]

What is dosing the vitamins supposed to do?

 

[John Bowers]

Corals, fish, inverts and algae do not make all of the needed vitamins (just like humans). Either they can get it from their diet or from a supplement. For corals, with clear water they may not be eating as much as they would in the wild and may have vitamin deficiencies. According to the various supplements sold commercially for reef tanks they increase coral growth rate and color, but they are exactly the same vitamins sold in a drugstore for humans. As a mass market item for humans the vitamin pills are dirt cheap, but as a specialty product the vitamin supplements for corals are expensive for a specialty market.

 

[ichthyoid]

Fwiw,
I am intrigued by the association of bacteria and other microbes with corals & what roles each may play. In the ocean no one is dosing vitamins. Below is just one research article covering this topic -

(PDF) Coral symbiotic complex: Hypothesis through vitamin B12 for a new evaluation

PDF | Historically, hermatypic corals are defined as a symbiotic system composed of an animal host, corals belonging to the taxa Cnidarian, and a... | Find, read and cite all the research you need on ResearchGate

www.researchgate.net

 

[civics14]

First I ever heard of dosing vitamins for a reef tank. I strongly believe in not dosing anything you can't measure/test for. It just seems like you're going to hurt yourself more than help yourself.

 

[Adam]

I've done some of the vitamin C from Brightwell.

Don't think I'd ever try crushing up store bought vitamins and dosing them.

 

[John Bowers]

I figure that the types and levels of bacteria in an aquarium are going to be vastly different from open ocean. Certainly the corals may be getting B12 and others from bacterial sources, but in most cases seawater is far more cloudy in the ocean even around reefs than would be acceptable in an aquarium. With the dose of over the counter vitamins, we are talking about a long way from anything being at toxic levels.

Also just because it may be one way in the ocean, that does not mean it is not limiting growth there. Just like adding fertilizer to your yard can make plants grow far faster than they would naturally without it, even though they may able to survive without a supplement. Most of us would like faster coral growth (at least with newer tanks that have not filled out).

I would not worry about overdosing most vitamins. Toxic levels are known for a wide range of species, and we are talking about far lower levels of essential substances. Also they do decay over time into simple biological products ending up as water, nitrate and CO2, and the nitrate amount is insignificant.



Brightwell vitamin C is $15.99 at BRS for about 15000 mg (250 ml bottle). I can buy 125,000 mg of vitamin C in 500 mg pills at Walmart for 7.71. Brightwell recommends a dose of 2 ml per 20 gallons per week. That is about 1500 mg vitamin c for a 250 gallon system or 3 of the Walmart pills. After 70 weeks I would go through either 7 bottles of the Brightwell product ($112) or a bottle of the Walmart pills for less than $8.
.

Also why crush them (except if you want less than a tablet). They will dissolve in a sump.

 

[timeconsumer]

For what it's worth a lot of prepared fish and coral foods have added vitamins in them already so it might not be necessary depending on your food source.

 

[John Bowers]

No doubt many of the fish foods do have necessary vitamins, but with many different species in the tank especially corals are all eating non-natural foods. Many corals may not be eating as much food as they would in the wild, even if they are directly fed. Some of the corals may be much more light dependent than naturally for their nutrients/energy in a reef tank, while others may not be getting food in the same way they would naturally. It is safe to say at least some coral species may not be getting enough food of the right type in an aquarium. Those corals may benefit from extra vitamins,

The vast majority of humans have a diet in the US that gives them plenty of the needed vitamins, but certainly many do not, either due to diet choices or individual metabolism. That is why the vitamin industry exists for humans. In a reef tank with potentially 100+ different species if you include everything, it is safe to say at least some of them may be limited in a highly artificial environment. Humans (and marine life) can live pretty long lives eating junk food, but even those of us that try to vary the diet for the aquarium are rotating between a small number of foods. Getting that extra bit of health (and coral growth) is the goal here, not merely keeping it alive.

 

[timeconsumer]

Yeah I guess what I'm saying is in a lot of frozen foods like lets say Hikari Coral Gumbo for example the ingredients include:

vitamin B12 supplement, pyridoxine hydrochloride (b6), L-ascorbyl-2-polyphosphate (stabilized vitamin C), carotene (a), riboflavin (b2), thiamine mononitrate (b1), biotin (b7), choline chloride, folic acid (b9), calcium pantothenate (b5), inositol, niacin (b3)

These same sort of supplements are added into many frozen food cubes, some frozen squid cubes I just bought as well, or LRS Reef Frenzy or any number of other foods.

All this is likely just added into the whole mix of food in a liquid base then frozen into the cubes, so it's going to go into the water column and might not require direct consumption by the coral. The way I see it, it's exactly like you describe, dosing vitamins into the water column. If corals have an efficient mechanism to uptake these sorts of things directly from the water (I have no clue), I would assume by feeding these sorts of foods, of which there are many, should provide enough in the water column. This form of dosing vitamins through normal reef foods without having to worry about whether additives in human vitamins like magnesium stearate or polyethylene glycol are reef safe.

Either way, it's your tank so do what you think is best. If you do it report back, I'll be interested to know.

 

[dball711]

Personally I would not does anything that I was unable to test for and especially if something is not broken. Not sure I understand what you’re trying to solve for, Is there a specific problem that you’re trying to resolve within your tank?