HIGH PHOSPHATE (SALIFERT = 2), LOW NITRATES (SALIFER = 5PPM)

[Dinosaur]

Hi, my tank is new, around 2 week, i bought and pour nitrobacter and nitrosomonas 150times the recommended dose , (im an extrimist) on my 200L tank.
so the problem is my phosphate stuck at 2, but my nitrate is quite low around 5, i even put macroalgae on display tank and SUMP. here is the picture of my tank,
fish quite happy, but i am not, i want to plant SPS, no SPS =i consider myself fail. how to reduce phosphate. any input will be so appreciated. thanks

 

[brmreefer]

First, welcome to Reef 2 Reef.

One of the ways PO4 gets into a system is by food fed to inhabitants. With that in mind, heavy feeding will eventually achieve higher levels of PO4 within the system. Some potential recommendations are as follows:

• Reduced feeding, but be mindful that health risks could increase if fish are not fed enough, so balance this out.
• Use of PO4 absorbing media. Examples include:
  • Rowaphos
  • Aluminum Oxide (ex. Seachem Phosguard
  • Granular Ferric Oxide (GFO)(Choices include low capacity or high capacity)
• Introducing macroalgae, but it looks like that is already implemented in the system, just be sure to export excessive growth as needed.
• I'm sure there might be a few other methods, but can't think of any others at the moment. Maybe others will chime in.

Side Note: In regards to potentially failing at keeping SPS, unless there is prior experience with keeping a reef tank, I would recommend holding off on attempting to keep any SPS until the system is more established and there is more experience. If not already done, get into having a solid routine for overall parameter stability and take things a lot slower. Take your time.

There are plenty of reefers who have lost SPS, but took it as lessons learned to improve reef keeping abilities. It can be frustrating when losing livestock, but majority of the time we are the source of the issue (examples: inadequate tank husbandry, impatience, inexperience, etc). Just have to figure out the "Why?". Take it slow and try to enjoy.

 

[Dinosaur]

First, welcome to Reef 2 Reef.

One of the ways PO4 gets into a system is by food fed to inhabitants. With that in mind, heavy feeding will eventually achieve higher levels of PO4 within the system. Some potential recommendations are as follows:

• Reduced feeding, but be mindful that health risks could increase if fish are not fed enough, so balance this out.
• Use of PO4 absorbing media. Examples include:
  • Rowaphos
  • Aluminum Oxide (ex. Seachem Phosguard
  • Granular Ferric Oxide (GFO)(Choices include low capacity or high capacity)
• Introducing macroalgae, but it looks like that is already implemented in the system, just be sure to export excessive growth as needed.
• I'm sure there might be a few other methods, but can't think of any others at the moment. Maybe others will chime in.

Side Note: In regards to potentially failing at keeping SPS, unless there is prior experience with keeping a reef tank, I would recommend holding off on attempting to keep any SPS until the system is more established and there is more experience. If not already done, get into having a solid routine for overall parameter stability and take things a lot slower. Take your time.

There are plenty of reefers who have lost SPS, but took it as lessons learned to improve reef keeping abilities. It can be frustrating when losing livestock, but majority of the time we are the source of the issue (examples: inadequate tank husbandry, impatience, inexperience, etc). Just have to figure out the "Why?". Take it slow and try to enjoy.

thank you for your previous answer, Does letting diatom, dinos and GHA grows help reducing PO4 at this moment?i m not sure about scrapping them since i think it is similar how algae scrubber works when nuisance algaes bind PO4 to be dumped later.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

thank you for your previous answer, Does letting diatom, dinos and GHA grows help reducing PO4 at this moment?i m not sure about scrapping them since i think it is similar how algae scrubber works when nuisance algaes bind PO4 to be dumped later.

Any growing photosynthetic organism that is not eating organic foods will take up phosphate.