I am having issues reducing Nitrates. The tank is a little over a month old, 13.5 evo.
Lighting: AI Prime 16HD
Filtration: bio media, chamber 2 basket with chemipure elite, floss and more media. I ran the Fluval PS2 skimmer for about a month but tuning it got ridiculous and I figure I can achieve the same thing by keeping up with water changes on this small of a tank.
Livestock: 2 baby clowns, 1 duncan, 1 frogspawn, 6 head zoa, 1 head blasto, xenias, 1 LTA 6-8" in diameter (i know)
Temp always remains between 77.5 and 78.5 depending on my AC's cycle.
I have embedded my parameter history, all measurements taken with Salifert tests. WCs are typically around 30%. Also included a FTS with dirty glass.
The tank was set up with Carribsea "Liferock" and CarribSea "live sand". All livestock is flourishing, corals are extended to the max during the day. LTA has found a spot and is colorful, expanded, and exhibits a vicious feeding response. I do still have diatoms, which I presume is due to the high no3/po4 and silicates from the sand. They seem to be on their way out though. I do not have any algae besides that.
I feed the clowns a little pinch of flakes twice a day (its all they will eat). I target feed the corals and nem with brine/mysis every few days, lets say 1.5 times a week. I remove the nem poop when I see it.
Am I overfeeding the corals/nem? Will this level of NO3 affect my livestock's quality of life? Am I missing some place that no3 is being generated?
Should I even be worried about this?
Edit: water is RODI generated with RO Buddie from municipal tap water. Always tests 0 TDS but I have never tested fresh RODI for nitrates, I figured that it included in TDS. Salt is fluval sea salt. Those frag plugs at the front of the tank were left there because I figure at this time the tank demands biodiversity.
Lighting: AI Prime 16HD
Filtration: bio media, chamber 2 basket with chemipure elite, floss and more media. I ran the Fluval PS2 skimmer for about a month but tuning it got ridiculous and I figure I can achieve the same thing by keeping up with water changes on this small of a tank.
Livestock: 2 baby clowns, 1 duncan, 1 frogspawn, 6 head zoa, 1 head blasto, xenias, 1 LTA 6-8" in diameter (i know)
Temp always remains between 77.5 and 78.5 depending on my AC's cycle.
I have embedded my parameter history, all measurements taken with Salifert tests. WCs are typically around 30%. Also included a FTS with dirty glass.
The tank was set up with Carribsea "Liferock" and CarribSea "live sand". All livestock is flourishing, corals are extended to the max during the day. LTA has found a spot and is colorful, expanded, and exhibits a vicious feeding response. I do still have diatoms, which I presume is due to the high no3/po4 and silicates from the sand. They seem to be on their way out though. I do not have any algae besides that.
I feed the clowns a little pinch of flakes twice a day (its all they will eat). I target feed the corals and nem with brine/mysis every few days, lets say 1.5 times a week. I remove the nem poop when I see it.
Am I overfeeding the corals/nem? Will this level of NO3 affect my livestock's quality of life? Am I missing some place that no3 is being generated?
Should I even be worried about this?
Edit: water is RODI generated with RO Buddie from municipal tap water. Always tests 0 TDS but I have never tested fresh RODI for nitrates, I figured that it included in TDS. Salt is fluval sea salt. Those frag plugs at the front of the tank were left there because I figure at this time the tank demands biodiversity.
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