High nitrates, but low undectable phosphates help

[Brew12]

I have utility water, but i also have dual stage di, think I should have my RODI water tested ?

My utility posts how they treat there water on a website.
Chloramines can make it through a RODI filter without showing high conductivity.
A cheap pool test kit like this will will show if you have chloramine getting by your RODI filter causing chlorine issues.
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Poolmas...pa-Water-Test-Strips-50-Count-22211/205074049

 

[vdubreefer]

My utility posts how they treat there water on a website.
Chloramines can make it through a RODI filter without showing high conductivity.
A cheap pool test kit like this will will show if you have chloramine getting by your RODI filter causing chlorine issues.
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Poolmas...pa-Water-Test-Strips-50-Count-22211/205074049

I think I have a set of those at home I'll test my tap water, I also use a water softener

 

[Rick.45cal]

Thank you so much Rick I really appreciate all your advice, I feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now, now the next thing I'll probably need help with is that is just use a 5 g lowes bucket on the side of my tank for my ATO how can I find out how much my tank evaporates during a day and how much to dose po4 to my ato res.

You can figure this out pretty easily. Keep track of how many days it takes for the bucket to be half empty. (Lets say 4 days to use 2.5 gallons, that means your bucket (5 gallons) will last you 8 days.) So to add your phosphates, take the daily dosage you have been doing to get 0.03ppm multiply that times 8 and add it to your bucket. Then when the bucket is half empty again top it off and add 4 days worth of NeoPhos. (Hopefully that makes sense).

 

[Rick.45cal]

It's a bio media that supports the growth of bacteria that reduce ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. While I'm sure it is a good product, I don't think that is the route you want to go.

As far as how much you tank evaporates in a day, fill your ATO bucket and mark it with a line. Fill a couple 1 gallon water jugs with RODI and wait 24 hours. After 24 hours, see how much water it takes to fill your bucket back up to the fill line.

If you know how much you have to dose every day to get your tank to 0.03-0.05 ppm PO4, and you know how much water your tank evaporates in a day, just take 5 gallons/daily evaporation and multiply that by how much you would dose every day. Put that amount in the ATO bucket.

For example, it it take 3 ml of PO4 to dose your tank, and your tank evaporate 1.5 gallons a day, 5/1.5=3.333. Multiply that by the 3ml dose and you get 9.999 or 10 ml of PO4 in the ATO bucket. After 2 days, fill the ATO bucket and add another 6 ml of PO4. Test your tank like [USER=63221]@Rick.45cal said and if your tank needs more or less PO4, adjust your dosage.[/USER]

You nailed it!

 

[vdubreefer]

It's a bio media that supports the growth of bacteria that reduce ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. While I'm sure it is a good product, I don't think that is the route you want to go.

As far as how much you tank evaporates in a day, fill your ATO bucket and mark it with a line. Fill a couple 1 gallon water jugs with RODI and wait 24 hours. After 24 hours, see how much water it takes to fill your bucket back up to the fill line.

If you know how much you have to dose every day to get your tank to 0.03-0.05 ppm PO4, and you know how much water your tank evaporates in a day, just take 5 gallons/daily evaporation and multiply that by how much you would dose every day. Put that amount in the ATO bucket.

For example, it it take 3 ml of PO4 to dose your tank, and your tank evaporate 1.5 gallons a day, 5/1.5=3.333. Multiply that by the 3ml dose and you get 9.999 or 10 ml of PO4 in the ATO bucket. After 2 days, fill the ATO bucket and add another 6 ml of PO4. Test your tank like [USER=63221]@Rick.45cal said and if your tank needs more or less PO4, adjust your dosage.[/USER]

Thank you sooo much this is soo helpful because I had a much more complicated procedure in my mind to measure all of that, I tend to complicate things more then needs be ! You guys are great thank you so much!

 

[vdubreefer]

I will definitely keep everyone posted on my results because nothing is more frustrating then searching for a thread that fits your problem your having and nobody posts if it fixes the problem or not,

 

[vdubreefer]

Hey everyone while everybody is here, is there anything as far as clean up crews or invertebrates that I can add that would help with detritus control ? Is it even worth it to add anything right now, ? Because I have nearly no clean up crew, I've only got 2 scarlet crabs? What's every bodies opinion

 

[Ashley Kekua]

why not just feed frozen foods, much contain many phosphate in it to preserve hydration wetness in this food prevention of frezer burns. Many shrimps contain those phosphates.

 

[Brew12]

Hey everyone while everybody is here, is there anything as far as clean up crews or invertebrates that I can add that would help with detritus control ? Is it even worth it to add anything right now, ? Because I have nearly no clean up crew, I've only got 2 scarlet crabs? What's every bodies opinion

Hopefully you will need to add one very soon but without anything for them to eat I don't see the point. We need to get your system growing stuff, first. Then you need to add stuff to eat the stuff you don't want that is growing.

 

[vdubreefer]

Hopefully you will need to add one very soon but without anything for them to eat I don't see the point. We need to get your system growing stuff, first. Then you need to add stuff to eat the stuff you don't want that is growing.

Ten 4, thanks a bunch,

 

[vdubreefer]

why not just feed frozen foods, much contain many phosphate in it to preserve hydration wetness in this food prevention of frezer burns. Many shrimps contain those phosphates.

That's actually what I've been feeding for the last year frozen mysis and such from Petco, and recently switched to LRS nano frenzy

 

[vdubreefer]

Hey everyone. I performed about a 15% wc yesterday, I've got 20g of fresh saltwater left, havent tested levels yet, but i have dosed po4 to my ato, and I'm also thinking of switching one of my neptune dõs' over to start doing auto water changes will make my life a heck of alot easier

 

[Rick.45cal]

Hey everyone. I performed about a 15% wc yesterday, I've got 20g of fresh saltwater left, havent tested levels yet, but i have dosed po4 to my ato, and I'm also thinking of switching one of my neptune dõs' over to start doing auto water changes will make my life a heck of alot easier

I’ve been using a DOS to change water for a couple years now and I have no regrets at all.

 

[vdubreefer]

Hey everybody just a lil bit of an update, it definitely looks like my cheato has grown or has started to want to grown, my skimmate has gotten darker, and the algea in my sump looks like its receding, it doesn't have the bubbles it used to have and its starting to turn from a dino look to a cynao purple looking algea, I feel like I'm on the right track thanks you guys soo much were gettin there [emoji1696]
A few of the corals seem a lil ticked still but that's ok , I just want to get through this problem,

I got some pictures

 

[IslandLifeReef]

That's great news!

 

[vdubreefer]

Hey everyone, so last week I mixed up about 30g of new saltwater, and did a 15g manual water change on Monday, and on Wednesday night I setup my dõs to do manual water changes I set it up to do basically 3 2gallon water changes in 24 hours, that run Thursday and Friday, Sunday I mixed up another 40 gallons of new saltwater. And I've had it on the same 3 2g water changes a day, it did it today (Monday 2/11) I tested water tonight and it looks like nitrate hasnt budged still at 30 - 60 ppm, I've been dosing po4 to my ato and my new saltwater and when I tested tonight it was between 0.01 and 0.02 on my red sea test kit so its maintaining po4, its low but maintaining, so I keep on what my daily WC schedule, or should I start changing out bigger amounts I could probably do 40-50gallons every 2- 4 days if I thought it would absolutely help ???

 

[TX_Punisher]

You’ll be waiting a while at 2-3g per day via DOS for nitrates to fall. I’d perform the weekly 25 percent changes with matched values and in between changes let the DOS change 2-3g per day. Make sure your salinity matches by the way as mine got odd when I first stared with the DOS.

 

[vdubreefer]

You’ll be waiting a while at 2-3g per day via DOS for nitrates to fall. I’d perform the weekly 25 percent changes with matched values and in between changes let the DOS change 2-3g per day. Make sure your salinity matches by the way as mine got odd when I first stared with the DOS.

Its actually 6 gallons a day, 2 gallons 3 times a day, I can also setup.my dos to do.manual changes for greater volumes of water, watch the salinity of the tank water because the heads don't remove and replace the same amount of water??

 

[Rick.45cal]

You don’t really want things to happen quickly so just take your time. It probably took a long time to get where you are. There’s no rush.
It ok if it takes awhile to reduce your nitrate. It’s likely to take several months. The important part is to make sure you don’t run out of phosphates during the process so keep testing and checking them.

Even if you start dosing NOPOx the reality is it will take the bacteria population time to become effective.

 

[vdubreefer]

You don’t really want things to happen quickly so just take your time. It probably took a long time to get where you are. There’s no rush.
It ok if it takes awhile to reduce your nitrate. It’s likely to take several months. The important part is to make sure you don’t run out of phosphates during the process so keep testing and checking them.

Even if you start dosing NOPOx the reality is it will take the bacteria population time to become effective.

I know, I just thought by doing daily WCs it would make a dent in my no3, I've been really good about scraping off detritus from the tanks even the back glass. However, I havent cleaned my sump. It's looking pretty nasty. I wonder if I clean that out and do a 40 or 50% wc with the dõs if it will make a dent in no3 and for how long, ya know.
@Rick.45cal do you think I should continue the daily water changes, or should I move to doing bigger water changes every couple of days? B/c I look at it like I had a mini cycle when I dropped my other rock structure in the tank alot of decaying organics and things dying and coming back, and it's been a full year, like because of the decaying organics and phosphorus from the decay is what helped feed my tank early on, because I have a few acros that were encrusting, slowly, but showing growth, and that stopped around October, which is likely meaning all the die off has happened and the rocks are now cured, which means my nitrite and nitrate should stop rising so I should carry out a few big WCs to bring them down again, I know we've talked about this already, but this is what makes the most sense in my mind, I'm on the verge of losing 3 corals right now 2 montis and one bonsai acro. The rest have pulled through surprisingly, and in the last week have started to look better since doing the AWCs daily.