Red Sea Potassium & Sodium Nitrate OR Potassium Nitrate?

[Js.Aqua.Project]

Good afternoon, hoping to get some experienced opinions on which to go with to dose my 240gal.

First the issue(s):

I have consistently had low-to-no Nitrates the entire 4 years this tank has been running, recently some of my newly acquired SPS have started to pale about a month after having them get in there.

I know this can be due to high lighting while having low nutrients, this can also be due to trace elements not being in range.

I use a Geo's Reef 16x2 calcium reactor with Seachem Reactor Medium and have already noticed that I have consistently low Iron levels and starting dosing that two months ago with Red Sea's Iron+. I have a Salifert Potassium test kit arriving today and anticipate that being low.

So on to my question:

Should I dose the Potassium and Nitrate independently with separate products via Red Sea Potassium+ and Sodium Nitrate? Or would going with Potassium Nitrate be a better solution?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Potassium nitrate is a bad choice unless you know you need a lot of potassium. Potassium will quickly rise too much.

Sodium or calcium nitrate, or ammonium chloride or ammonium bicarbonate are better choices to boost N.

 

[Borat]

I have both potassium and nitrate deficiency (potassium because I have a fuge and lots of plating montipora - approx potassium consumption per month is 30ppm).. it would however be unlikely that I can dose both of them in a balanced way without having one of them to accumulate..

Therefore I dose potassium chloride and sodium nitrate separately.. Generally, it seems, I dose more potassium than nitrate.

 

[Js.Aqua.Project]

Thanks @Randy Holmes-Farley & @Borat I will order them as separate additives.

It also was making sense in my brain to be able to control their levels independently of each other verse having to add them in whatever ratio the additive is.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

FWIW, I never had any depletion of potassium in my tank. It's not something that one should assume depletes since foods bring it in.

 

[Js.Aqua.Project]

FWIW, I never had any depletion of potassium in my tank. It's not something that one should assume depletes since foods bring it in.

I did not know that.

I used the Salifert kit tonight and I am sitting at 440ppm so I guess I am just going to order some Sodium Nitrate.

The tank has always been stable with Alk, Ca, and Mg with the reactor so I would prefer a source that let me dose as close to Nitrate only as possible.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

The tank has always been stable with Alk, Ca, and Mg with the reactor so I would prefer a source that let me dose as close to Nitrate only as possible.

The only issue is that nitrate dosing slowly adds alk. Calcium nitrate adds alk and calcium in a balanced way, but still adds them.

If that becomes an issue, dosing ammonium bicarbonate is a net alk neutral way to boost N and nitrate.

DIY Ammonia dosing for low nitrate systems

Some reef aquaria have chronic low nitrogen availability. One indicator is very low nitrate. Nitrate dosing is a fine remedy, but it is possible that ammonia dosing may be more beneficial for some organisms since ammonia can be energetically easier to assimilate than is nitrate. For this...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Js.Aqua.Project]

The only issue is that nitrate dosing slowly adds alk. Calcium nitrate adds alk and calcium in a balanced way, but still adds them.

If that becomes an issue, dosing ammonium bicarbonate is a net alk neutral way to boost N and nitrate.

DIY Ammonia dosing for low nitrate systems

Some reef aquaria have chronic low nitrogen availability. One indicator is very low nitrate. Nitrate dosing is a fine remedy, but it is possible that ammonia dosing may be more beneficial for some organisms since ammonia can be energetically easier to assimilate than is nitrate. For this...

www.reef2reef.com

Thank you again, I've bookmarked that article for reference.

I like that the ammonium bicarbonate is net Alk neutral so it won't have an impact on what's going on with my calcium reactor is doing.