Skimming questions

Do you have a link to the article that shows iodine being skimmed out first? I have never heard of this so I am interested in how it gets skimmed out before the other trace elements.

 

I was always told that it evaporates out of the tank in like 3 days. I have always dosed iodine myself.

 

I did a quick search and I still couldn't find anything to support skimming removes iodine from our tanks. RHF article states that it is not neccessary to dose it in our tanks.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-05/rhf/index.php


Iodine

I do not presently dose iodine to my aquarium, and do not recommend that others necessarily do so either. Iodine dosing is much more complicated than dosing other ions due to its substantial number of different naturally existing forms, the number of different forms that aquarists actually dose, the fact that all of these forms can interconvert in reef aquaria, and the fact that the available test kits detect only a subset of the total forms present. This complexity, coupled with the fact that no commonly kept reef aquarium species are known to require significant iodine, suggests that dosing is unnecessary and problematic.

For these reasons, I advise aquarists to NOT try to maintain a specific iodine concentration using supplementation and test kits.

Iodine in the ocean exists in a wide variety of forms, both organic and inorganic, and the iodine cycles between these various compounds are very complex and are still an area of active research. The nature of inorganic iodine in the oceans has been generally known for decades. The two predominate forms are iodate (IO3-) and iodide (I-). Together these two iodine species usually add up to about 0.06 ppm total iodine, but the reported values vary by a factor of about two. In surface seawater, iodate usually dominates, with typical values in the range of 0.04 to 0.06 ppm iodine. Likewise, iodide is usually present at lower concentrations, typically 0.01 to 0.02 ppm iodine.

Organic forms of iodine are any in which the iodine atom is covalently attached to a carbon atom, such as methyl iodide, CH3I. The concentrations of these organic forms (of which there are many different molecules) are only now becoming recognized by oceanographers. In some coastal areas, organic forms can comprise up to 40% of the total iodine, so many previous reports of negligible levels of organoiodine compounds may be incorrect.

The primary organisms in reef aquaria that "use" iodine, at least as far as are known in the scientific literature, are algae (both micro and macro). My experiments with Caulerpa racemosa and Chaetomorpha sp. suggest that iodide additions do not increase the growth rate of these macroalgae, which are commonly used in refugia.

Finally, for those interested in dosing iodine, I suggest that iodide is the most appropriate form for dosing. Iodide is more readily used by some organisms than is iodate, and it is detected by both currently available iodine test kits (Seachem and Salifert).

 

I personally would not dose anything that I am not testing for. That being said I test about everything, and never have added iodine. Just stay on top of water changes and everything falls in place.

 

But if u have soecial crabs like horseshoe or arrow they need it to grow and u have to supplement it or they wont mulch

 

Regular water changes with a good quality salt mix will replenish your iodine

 

I agree

There’s really no need to dose anything other than alk, ca and maybe mag if you testing for it. Regular water changes will take care of everything else. Water changes of 10% weekly will replenish any of the minor trace elements. Reef crystals salt is about the cheapest (currently only $45 for a 200gal box at marine depot with their price match+ /DesktopModules/ActiveForums/themes/_default/emoticons/smile.gif) and is used by most major aquaculture centers in the U.S. so it proven as well. The main reason all those supplements are marketed so much is that they are huge money makers for the manufactures that sell them.