0 Nitrate

[X-37B]

My 15 aio nano, last I checked was no3 zero and po4 .028. Tanks 5 months. Just feed more before trying no3 dosing. It works for me in all 4 systems. Alot of reefers under feed their systems, imo.
I just checked alk today and it was 6.2. I run 7-7.5 so adjusted doser to get back to 7.5. No growth issues with normal sea level alk, 6.5, in any of my systems
You will get plenty of growth with low levels if you feed the system properly.

 

[RoanokeReef]

My Nitrates are 0 and I dose ammonia and even with doubling the dose it stayed at 0. I have to clean the glass daily, alk and cal need to be dosed along with corals looking good. Given up trying to get about 0 as the tank is humming along.

 

[jadedog]

Thanks for all the advice I started my first dose of neonitro today. My tank is young and I wanna play it safe for my corals. I'll be tracking with my hannah checker starting tomorrow.

 

[nessig]

My tank is about 3months old and my nitrates are 0 with a hannah checker. So I took an entire week to heavily feed and it did absolutely nothing hannah still reading 0. I guess I will be manually dosing nitrates I also ordered a hannah phoshate checker which will come in soon. Is there anything else I should do? All my corals look good expect my torch. My zoa actually grew two new heads this month. Im pretty worried about my nitrates situation but the nitrate booster comes on Tuesday so hopefully it helps.

Is there a lot of alage giving you a false reading

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

for example I use Hanna LR for no3. The HR Hanna would never register a reading of no3 in my tank, always 0, same with Salifert clear or 0. That is no where near actual zero no3 and it completely ignores all the other sources of nitrogen in the tank that I know without question are adequate. I’m putting food in the aquarium and need to clean the glass, that is all the evidence I need that N is adequate. J. Sprung told me one time that his open top aquarium was difficult to control po4 because of dust…yes he said dust!

Pictured is my LR, the HR would probably need 1000% more no3 to even register…
Hanna says this about their own HR Checker:
‘The HI782 was designed to quickly and easily measure nitrate levels for aquarists with higher-than-average nutrient levels. This includes saltwater aquariums that are fish-only or have corals that can tolerate elevated levels of nitrate at 30 ppm or more.’



I think above is reasonable to understand my position, regardless of your position.

I would just interject that “some” nitrate may not be enough N, anymore than some alkalinity is enough.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Is there a lot of alage giving you a false reading

Why would algae give a false reading any more than corals doing the exact same thing? Are all readings false just because something is taking up N?

 

[CountDigi]

Why would algae give a false reading any more than corals doing the exact same thing? Are all readings false just because something is taking up N?

I was recently told the same thing about GHA potentially giving me a false reading or sucking up all of my nitrates.
Nitrate bottomed out to 0.2ppm (Hanna) following a chemiclean to rid me of cyano, dinos soon followed, the minimal GHA on my back wall exploded in growth and on rocks. Po4 steady at 0.05ppm +-0.02.
TEST: I vacuumed up as much of the GHA as possible and tested nitrate the following 4 days, it was still bottomed out, so no false reading.
DOSE: dosing nitrate to get levels up slowly (already feed 4 times a day).
notes: Dosing iodine and fluoride as per my ICP. Also dosing silicates for dino treatment.

 

[painter1982]

I use brightwell neonitro and neophos in my 6 month old reef. Otherwise it’ll go to zero. Been working good.

How often?

I dose daily otherwise it’ll try to go to zero. I add it in my top off water and adjust in the evening if needed also. My 60 uses about 4 to 6ml of each daily.

 

[painter1982]

I use brightwell neonitro and neophos in my 6 month old reef. Otherwise it’ll go to zero. Been working good.

How often?

Daily. 4 to 6ml in 60g. Sps dominate.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I was recently told the same thing about GHA potentially giving me a false reading or sucking up all of my nitrates.
Nitrate bottomed out to 0.2ppm (Hanna) following a chemiclean to rid me of cyano, dinos soon followed, the minimal GHA on my back wall exploded in growth and on rocks. Po4 steady at 0.05ppm +-0.02.
TEST: I vacuumed up as much of the GHA as possible and tested nitrate the following 4 days, it was still bottomed out, so no false reading.
DOSE: dosing nitrate to get levels up slowly (already feed 4 times a day).
notes: Dosing iodine and fluoride as per my ICP. Also dosing silicates for dino treatment.

People do say it. But it makes no sense. :)

 

[CHSUB]

I was recently told the same thing about GHA potentially giving me a false reading or sucking up all of my nitrates.
Nitrate bottomed out to 0.2ppm (Hanna) following a chemiclean to rid me of cyano, dinos soon followed, the minimal GHA on my back wall exploded in growth and on rocks. Po4 steady at 0.05ppm +-0.02.
TEST: I vacuumed up as much of the GHA as possible and tested nitrate the following 4 days, it was still bottomed out, so no false reading.
DOSE: dosing nitrate to get levels up slowly (already feed 4 times a day).
notes: Dosing iodine and fluoride as per my ICP. Also dosing silicates for dino treatment.

Imo, the message “false reading” is not that the test kit somehow malfunction, but the levels in the water column are below the resolution of an inaccurate hobby test kit? Guessing you are using the High Range Hanna, which Hanna themselves says is not accurate and more for fish only systems.

Regardless, let’s discuss the facts. You used Chemclean to kill Cyano which imo is effective. The killed Cyano’s sequenced nutrients are released back into the water column to fuel algae growth including GHA, diatoms, dinoflagellate, others. Nutrients still below hobby test kit readings, however sufficient enough to grow algae because life can’t survive without nutrients (example: Moon). Continue dosing nitrate to fuel more algae. Also adding silicates which may be beneficial to diatoms, which dinoflagellates commonly found in aquariums consume.

My take; following hobby myth hype, looking for “quick” fixes, and not following sound establishment reef principles.

 

[BriDroid]

for example I use Hanna LR for no3. The HR Hanna would never register a reading of no3 in my tank, always 0, same with Salifert clear or 0. That is no where near actual zero no3 and it completely ignores all the other sources of nitrogen in the tank that I know without question are adequate. I’m putting food in the aquarium and need to clean the glass, that is all the evidence I need that N is adequate. J. Sprung told me one time that his open top aquarium was difficult to control po4 because of dust…yes he said dust!

Pictured is my LR, the HR would probably need 1000% more no3 to even register…
Hanna says this about their own HR Checker:
‘The HI782 was designed to quickly and easily measure nitrate levels for aquarists with higher-than-average nutrient levels. This includes saltwater aquariums that are fish-only or have corals that can tolerate elevated levels of nitrate at 30 ppm or more.’



I think above is reasonable to understand my position, regardless of your position.

I agree with this. My HR checker would say 0ppm, but the solution would be tinted pink, so I knew there was something there. I bought a LR checker and would test it (a real pain to use honestly) but it would always show a value, like above.

I have since went back to dosing an aluminum bicarbonate/urea solution and been keeping my NO3 around 5-6ppm and my PO4 around 0.15-0.2ppm, and honestly my tank looks great. I'm barely having to scrape algae off the glass, maybe once a week. There are multiple ways to run a reef, some like ULNS and some don't. I tried, and seem to do better with some N and P.

 

[CountDigi]

I was recently told the same thing about GHA potentially giving me a false reading or sucking up all of my nitrates.
Nitrate bottomed out to 0.2ppm (Hanna) following a chemiclean to rid me of cyano, dinos soon followed, the minimal GHA on my back wall exploded in growth and on rocks. Po4 steady at 0.05ppm +-0.02.
TEST: I vacuumed up as much of the GHA as possible and tested nitrate the following 4 days, it was still bottomed out, so no false reading.
DOSE: dosing nitrate to get levels up slowly (already feed 4 times a day).
notes: Dosing iodine and fluoride as per my ICP. Also dosing silicates for dino treatment.

Imo, the message “false reading” is not that the test kit somehow malfunction, but the levels in the water column are below the resolution of an inaccurate hobby test kit? Guessing you are using the High Range Hanna, which Hanna themselves says is not accurate and more for fish only systems.

Regardless, let’s discuss the facts. You used Chemclean to kill Cyano which imo is effective. The killed Cyano’s sequenced nutrients are released back into the water column to fuel algae growth including GHA, diatoms, dinoflagellate, others. Nutrients still below hobby test kit readings, however sufficient enough to grow algae because life can’t survive without nutrients (example: Moon). Continue dosing nitrate to fuel more algae. Also adding silicates which may be beneficial to diatoms, which dinoflagellates commonly found in aquariums consume.

My take; following hobby myth hype, looking for “quick” fixes, and not following sound establishment reef principles.

Yes, i am using hanna high range. I do belive there are nitrates present as there is GHA growth. Do you think salifert test kit would give a more accurate reading at such low levels?

I agree that the chemiclean had the intended effect, and was intended as a quick fix. Which i now regret. However, i belive my micro biome was deficient and gave way for the dinoflagellates. If levels and biome were good, then using the chamoclean would not have been a problem.
I have never read that dinoflagellates consume diatoms. Can you please reference that for my own educational purposes.

I have had dinoflagellates several times over the years and silicate dosing is by no means a quick fix. It usual takes months to establish a strong diatom bloom and re establish a good micro biome to then clear the dinos. There is no quick fix to this mess.

 

[CHSUB]

Yes, i am using hanna high range. I do belive there are nitrates present as there is GHA growth. Do you think salifert test kit would give a more accurate reading at such low levels?

I agree that the chemiclean had the intended effect, and was intended as a quick fix. Which i now regret. However, i belive my micro biome was deficient and gave way for the dinoflagellates. If levels and biome were good, then using the chamoclean would not have been a problem.
I have never read that dinoflagellates consume diatoms. Can you please reference that for my own educational purposes.

I have had dinoflagellates several times over the years and silicate dosing is by no means a quick fix. It usual takes months to establish a strong diatom bloom and re establish a good micro biome to then clear the dinos. There is no quick fix to this mess.

Yes I used chemiclean(Red Slime Remover) once back in 2001 and regretted it soon after, iirc. I since learned what algae’s true purpose is and how to control it. I think Salifert is better than Hanna HR but don’t believe one even needs to test no3 that much and 0 is the most ideal reading on Salifert, an opinion that some will disagree with.

Dinoflagellate are very resilient and prey on numerous sources. I have read some prey on up to 13 different organisms, this is how they survive when others perish.

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s12601-010-0007-2.pdf