not saying that what you're seeing is fake or anything, but corals have alot better coloration in top down shots...itd be better to get two of the same angles that way we can see the clear difference. btw i see that you have a bit of algae, how is the growth of the algae along with the brightwell coral amino?

I'll try to get a front shot to match the one from earlier. I actually had the algae before and it's slowly starting to go away now. While dosing it I noticed that it was receding at the same pace. The only other thing I noticed was a ph drop over the weekend. It's possibly my ph probe and I ordered a new once just to make sure.

i noticed my sps doing a lot better with that stuff. polyps all the way out.

im using reef plus which is worst then brightwell

Ok i updated my pictures. I put up the wrong one as my initial photo anyways. The lighting is a little different cause I don't remember what I had on when I took the first one. You can see the growth difference from the pictures though.

thanks. I definately see the tips turning more purple and the green starting to show

Just finished my first bottle of the BCA and have two more bottles on order. I'm waiting for my lights to turn on to take some pics, but the outcome has been awesome. I started Dec. 12th and have been dosing 10 drops per day since, so the bottle has lasted me for about 4 months. I usually dose first thing in the morning when I'm feeding my corals. Here are a list of the pros and cons.

Pros: Excellent color increase and polyp extension in all of my corals.

My SPS have colored up nicely and I bought a 3 wild caught acro colonies over the last few months, along with some ORA acros, monti's, etc. The wild caught corals morphed and some of their colors are amazing. One was a nice white and brown base with bright yellow polyps, when I bought it. Now it's tips are a beautiful blue and purple and the white polyps are popping. I bought a dulled out Sunset Monti on a frag plug for $10 and in about two months it's almost fully encrusted the plug and his colored up to a bright orange and green polyps.

My LPS has colored up as well. The tissue of my acans have colored up nicely and my candy canes went from 15-20 heads when I bought it to over 80 heads. It went on a growth spurt the last few months. I just fragged up the colony to make room for more corals. I received a few bleached out corals from other reefers and all of them have colored up and are healthy.

My zoas and Palys also colored up and went on a growth spurt as well. I had these Tubs Blues with 6 polyps that I've had for over 6 months and they didn't grow. Now, I believe there are at least 20 on the frag plug. My Aztec palys went from a colony of 3 polyps to 36 polyps in 4 months.

Cons: There has been additional algae growth, but it almost only grows on my powerheads. I have noticed that the glass gets a little more algae daily, but no reason not to dose. I just use a toothbrush and clean the powerheads when I do my water changes and use my magfloat once a day. My water quality remains perfect

I'll get some pics for you guys because they speak louder than words. Downside is that I just fragged a bunch of stuff yesterday, so the pics won't have an exact comparison in how much the corals grew.

I am about 3 weeks in and I have noticed that everything looks amazing. I did have a few other variables as mentioned above, but the coloration and growth of my corals can't be attributed alone to the other changes I made. My sps is looking great and seems to be growing daily. I also do notice an increase in algea and I dose less than the suggested amount. I am about 1/6th of the way through the bottle and I am excited to see if this trend continues.

i bought a bottle because of this thread

not impressed

looks like the best way for this is to have a ULNS. I may want to try this after my tank transfer and let the chaeto choke off any kind of algae growth after adding this

Didnt do crap for me either, i think im having other problems that may be cancelling out the good it does. Maybe i will try again after my upgrade.

I've been using Brigtwells AA for a month and I have seen some improvements. Here is a before and after of what I believe is a tri-color acro. Before dosing there was NO polyp extension for 3-4 months. The second pic you can see some PE and slight coloring up on the tips. I have also been dosing Reef Biofuel for two weeks, so I can't say it is singularly the AA coloring up my acro. I have also noticed increased growth in my Monti Cap.

Acro is in bottom left of first pic...

Here is my Monti first pic taken 2/12 second this morning

Getting noticable growth weekly since I started dosing

Well, I guess my corals are addicted.
I ran out a week ago and some of my sps are already turning brown.
That is the only thing I can think of that is different as far as parameters.
PO4 is still non-detectable and no signs of unwanted algae.
Even my zoanthids have lost a little color it seems.

I guess I better got some more ordered.

Crazy addiction though.

I have noticed ALL my corals looking better. I will keep you informed on the growth since I am only a few weeks in.

ok i am going to order some of this later tonite, been hearing good things about it and i wanna give it a try....

any idea how much to dose in a 14 gallon biocube?

thanks!!!

I got it due to this thread. I have been using it for 2 weeks, and not notable difference besides overall my corals seem "happier". Only time will tell as far as color and growth. IMO worth the money just for the extra polyp extension and health.

I just hope my corals make it. Probably won't get it till the end of the week if not a bit later. I think they were all conspiring against me.

When I walked into the room all the corals looked normal and in their proper places, but I have a feeling they were all out of the tank and may have put something in my Long Island Ice Tea.
I saw some water on the floor near the tank.
Can't trust addicts you know.

I paid 16 dollars for it from Premium Aquatics not sure how big the bottle is though.The small bottle. I would dose 4-5 drops a day in a biocube 14. I forgot to mention that I have noticed alot more algea on the glass but just the glass.

I will have a beast skimmer coming on on my biocube 29, and run a phosban reactor. I think this product was meant to be used in conjunction with a good skimmer. Once it sets in, I'm going to give my acros around a month to settle in with their color. Then I'll start dosing this and see how it goes...

Not saying all are turning. Seems the ones closest tot he light.
This has coma along way. I found it about a month ago from under the rock. The pistol shrimp had pushed it out in the open. It had fallen down between the rock probably a month before I was able to recover it.
About the time I started using the BCA it looked like this

and now this

thanks lawnman.

algae on the glass doesnt bother me, i have that now...lol...

i think my zoas and hammer and frogspawn will thank me ...lol

I feel that a lot of the user reports are coincidental. If you have a healthy tank, new or damaged corals will heal, grow, and recover.
bird, if you ran out and your SPS are turning brown, I don't think the lack of brightwell that is the cause. AA if anything will turn your acros brown from adding too much.

Just going by what I am seeing.
Nothing else has changed except running out of it a week ago and before that for about a week cut way back because about to run out.
Calcium, temp., alk., mag., salinity, PO4, lighting are the same.
Well, we will find out soon enough. I hope to be restarting the BCA soon.

Im thinking its more anecdotal rather than coincidental Pod, I was hesitant to post my observations on using AA but I have seen real improvement in my acro and monti. I guess the best thing to do is take everything with a grain of salt.

The instructions say to turn off the skimmer, mechanical filter when dosing. I cannot see using something that will be taken up by a skimmer.
Seems it would be a waste.
I don't think AAs work along the same principals as carbon dosing, if that is what you are thinking. I could be wrong, but I believe the AAs are to be taken up by the corals.
Carbon dosing, from what I understand, that is the by-product rather, bacterias that consume PO4 and are still in the water column, are removed by a efficient skimming. Some of the bacterias are consumed by corals, at least from my understanding.
But, hey, I don't believe in the end being Dec 2012 so what does what I understand matter? The way I keep ####### off the ol' Lady, it will probably be sooner for me.

Find out if this stuff is really responsible or not.
To recap, been off of it for 1 full week and only a few days of use the week before from daily use. Here are some pics of trouble sps. Gone and going brown.
I will start to re-dose the BCA hopefully this weekend and take new pics of these same a week and 2 weeks later. I will make no other changes to the tank so this should at least tell me whether the product lives up to its claim or not.

I started adding this stuff last night. I have a tri-color acro turning brown and an unhealthy strawberry shortcake frag that I want to revive. Everything else looks great except these two. I'll share my results after a couple of weeks. Btw, does anybody know how much to dose for a 120g tank? From my calculations from the instructions, I should be dosing 2.4ml a day. Is that correct?

It says on the bottle not to sound like a jerk.It also says not to add more than so many mils the first week or month or something.I started with half the recommended dosage and then the next week bumped it up.

I do 10 drops a day for my 24 gallon, so 40-50 drops should be fine. Not sure what that comes out to ml's..

Did you even read my whole post? I know it says it on the instructions. I'm just trying to confirm it. Instructions says 1ml per 50g and not to add more than 5ml per 50g. So from my calculations it's 2.4 ml. I'm just asking if it's correct. All you had to do is say yes or no.




Thanks. I actually didn't have a measuring cup the first night so I just added about 20 drops since I remembered you saying you put 10 drops in. I didn't want to put too much. I just found an extra measuring cup from my B-ionic that I have not used so I used that last night.

Just got mine in the mail today so I will be starting it again.

guia x, that is about what I figure the dosage also.
I will be using 10 drops per 25gls for the first week and then maybe increase if no algae problems.
Since I had run out before i noticed that the small amount of cyano that would pop up here and there had gone away entirely so I will be watching close now.

[quote name='guia x' date='Mar 13 2010, 02:31 PM' post='2739917']
Did you even read my whole post? I know it says it on the instructions. I'm just trying to confirm it. Instructions says 1ml per 50g and not to add more than 5ml per 50g. So from my calculations it's 2.4 ml. I'm just asking if it's correct. All you had to do is say yes or no.


Yes I read your whole post. But I did not have the bottle in front of me to do the calculationsI read the bottle to make sure your dosage per gallon was correct. As soon as I got home I rushed in the door and went to get my calculator to do the simple math for you.So YES

Bird, what are your water parameters? How many fish? How heavy feeding? What equipment?

Well, it has been just over three weeks and I am satisfied with the product. I do notice that some nuisance algae has been popping up where it was not before. I have kept my dosage at an easy and simple 10 drops per day in my 37 display w/10 gallon sump. As I stated before, there are many variables to the health of my corals but I feel this product has contributed a good amount. I need to dig through some pictures to get some before and afters.

I just picked up a bottle and started dosing this in my pico, we'll see what happens. My ato reservoir lasts about 5 days and I put 5 drops of coralamino in there yesterday.

I'm curious if the people who are reporting success are running chemipure or any other kind of carbon in their tank though, amino acids are organic compounds and activated carbon will remove them quite effectively. I'm running chemipure elite and am considering removing it for the time being...

Instructions say to stop skimmer and filtration for 15 minutes. I am sure that applies to carbon and the like.
You would probably be wasting the product if you left the carbon in place/filtration activated unless you overdosed, but what would be the amount you would need to overdose to achieve the same results as just turning off skimmer/removing media would be any ones guess.



Pretty much all that is in my build thread link in my signature

i did notice a lot of algae growth on my tank after dosing this stuff, im almost done with the bottle in my 100gal system.

as for growth and color, i cant really tell from my sps. they all look the same to me. nothing really changed much. but then, i havent been dosing everyday, since i dont have the time to.

right now the algae in my tank has to go, so after this bottle ill stop and start doing something about the algae.

None of my business really but maybe take care of the algae now before it gets any more out of hand.
With a reef you HAVE to make time for it or one day it will sneak up on you and you will find it more of a nightmare than a pleasure. This happens to many pple. It takes time, patience and lots of scrutinizing, research and work to maintain a top notch reef tank, especially a nano size.
Basically, you are going to get out of it what you put into it.
You probably already know this though. You just need a good whoopin to get you back in line.


Looking at your tank build though, you may be exaggerating a bit about an algae problem. Doesn't look too bad at all. A few spots here and there.

pictures are from a month ago, ill take some update pics sometime tonight or this week to show how much the algae grew.

So do you guys turn your skimmers and take out your carbon when doseing...if so how long do you leave it out..

The directions state to turn off skimmer for 15 minutes and discontinue any mechanical filtration prior to dosing.

Thanks. I have some spots of cyano mostly in spots that don't have much flow and in between the glass and sand but that has been there before I started to dose. I hope it does not get worse. I have been doing more regular water changes so hopefully it starts going away.




I still can't tell if you're being a jerk but thanks.




I turn off my skimmer, return pump, BRS reactor holding Seachem Matrix, and my Phosban reactor holding Biopellets for an hour.

Anyway, going for five days and have not noticed too much changes. I have been monitoring only a couple corals. My Tricolor that browned out and a strawberry shortcake frag that I ordered that's a little bleached and lost its color. The Tricolor seems like it's getting a tiny hint of it's color back and the strawberry shortcake is showing a little more polyp extension. It could just be my mind being too optimistic.

Here are some updated pics of my 24 AP. I've been dosing 10 drops per day since Dec. 15th of last year. I don't really have any pics of any before dosing, but I've been really happy with the outcome. My sps, acans, zoa's, virtually every coral has colored up nicely and are growing like weeds. Including the xenia, which I've had to completely pull out of my tank because it's like steriods for them. The only lighting I have is a Sunpod 150 watt 14k Aquamaxx bulb. I would say that it took about 4 weeks before I saw any real noticable results.

I have had more algae growth on my powerheads, which is a little weird because it really hasn't increased elsewhere. I'm not running a skimmer and have a bag of carbon and phosban sitting on my two filter pads. I do daily to every other day 1-2 gallon water changes and a 4 gallon weekly water change. Yes, people think I'm crazy:) That's pretty much it. I do feed arctipods, oyster, phyto, and roti feast daily in small quanities about an hour before my water changes. Mysis is fed to my LPS and palys every other day. The fish get what ever's left over.

Sorry about the messy pics. I took them after I fragged a bunch of corals a few weeks ago.

http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n.../IMG_1267-1.jpg
http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/IMG_1273.jpg
http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/IMG_1261.jpg

Chris

I was dosing about 8 drops per day in my 28g, but I was getting some algae issues, so I've dropped down to about 5 drops 3x a week. Algae on glass has decreased markedly, and cyano has gone away. However, I can't be sure it was the Aminos, because the tank is only 2 months old (and thus prone to algae), I upgraded my skimmer to a Deltec, added a phosban reactor and started using Purigen and phosban, plus I have reduced my rotifer feedings to 2x a week, and mysis to 4x a week from 4x and 7x respectively. Sooo...it could be a lot of things lol

i turn off the skimmer as per instructions, but left my carbon in the tank. the bottle didnt tell me to, its just dosing some amino acid in the tank, its nothing chemical or medication, so i dont see the point of removing carbon

Amino acids definitely are chemical compounds. AFAIK activated carbon removes all organic compounds and will remove amino acids very effectively. I'm not sure why it says nothing on the bottle, I suspect it has something to do with Brightwell selling carbon though...

anyone know how it affects nuisance pests like aiptasia and colonial hydroids?

I used this product for around 3 weeks and I noticed more hydroids. However, without a controlled test I can't say for sure that this product spurred the growth.

been a week today since I started redosing.
I can't really say for sure, but they might be stating to gain some color back

Still love those Sunny D's...Got my Aztecs growing out some more, so give me a few weeks.. I just got a ORA Miami Orchid, ORA Pearlberry, and ORA Roscoe frag in a trade. All three are browned out, but have good polyp extension. I'll try to get some pics now and give them a few weeks to see what they do in my tank. So far every bleached out and browned out coral I've gotten before has colored up nicely. I'll keep you guys updated.