Highl phosphate!!!

[DED65]

I am in a similar position with phos at .90 via a Hanna tester. Tank is 4 months old. My nitrates are high around 40ppm. Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0 and ph 8.0 I don't have test kits for the other minerals yet. I also have a skimmer that has been running for a week now. I started cutting back on the frozen foods yesterday and will do a water change either today or tomorrow. My question is will adding nitrifying bacteria help with Phos or the nitrate? I understand that right now my bacteria is able to handle the load from the tank since ammonia and nitrite is 0.

The nitrifying bacteria might help with nitrates. You will get more help if you start a new thread and list any issues you might be having !

 

[braaap]

How about because they like it. That’s a reason. So can’t be zero reasons. Geez, and here you said that there were zero reasons. Zero. Oh wait, perhaps there’s 2 reasons. Frozen food offers nutrients. OMG, a second reason. Holy smokes. From ZERO, to 2 reasons. Your world must be crumbling right now. 2 reasons, and not ZERO. Should we completely ruin your world and suggest a third??? Variety!!!!!!! Holy Fn crap, a third reason. 3 is so far from ZERO you must be contemplating your existence in this world. From ZERO to 3. Oh man, I’d hate to be you right now. 3 whole reasons. Jeez. Who would have thought we could have gotten to 3. THREE!

Enjoy your day captain zero! Haha just taking the p*SS my man. Point is, there are reasons. To say zero invites some ridicule.

It doesn’t invite any ridicule. There is zero reason to offer them anything but pellets. Just adding unnecessary nutrients especially in a tank suffering from phosphate issues with minimal coral.

 

[Ziggy17]

It doesn’t invite any ridicule. There is zero reason to offer them anything but pellets. Just adding unnecessary nutrients especially in a tank suffering from phosphate issues with minimal coral.

I hear what you’re saying. I’ll edit ridicule with sarcasm. Probably a better word to use.

 

[mazza]

I am in a similar position with phos at .90 via a Hanna tester. Tank is 4 months old. My nitrates are high around 40ppm. Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0 and ph 8.0 I don't have test kits for the other minerals yet. I also have a skimmer that has been running for a week now. I started cutting back on the frozen foods yesterday and will do a water change either today or tomorrow. My question is will adding nitrifying bacteria help with Phos or the nitrate? I understand that right now my bacteria is able to handle the load from the tank since ammonia and nitrite is 0.

As far as I’m aware if you use beneficial bacteria/stability it will help increasing your nitrate i bottomed out my nitrate and was told to add stability for a week and worked fine for me

 

[DED65]

NITRATES TOO HIGH!!

I just got a nitrate tester and my nitrates are at 75.0. How do I lower it?? Plz help ASAP

www.reef2reef.com

 

[vetteguy53081]

Some causes:
Foods high in phosphate (light rinse helps_
Water high in Phos before entered into tank (test water before you add it)
Overfeeding (fish will beg all day )- Easier to add small portions than to remove waste)
High level of organics (skimmer helps) or algae scrubber
Lack of maintenance

I use ChemiPure blue. . . Chemipure elite if very high which keep po4 in check

 

[Lionfish hunter]

Don’t just feed your clowns once a day with flake. If you have time to feed a little frozen, do so. Just cut back as they don’t need much. Vitalis soft pellets in the smallest size is also good to mix to their diet. A little will go a long way with just a couple clowns, so even if you buy a few different options, it won’t cost much over a year span.

I agree, in my opinion avoiding frozen is bad advice. The fish love it, it’s good to vary your food, these are living animals. And frozen is not that high in phosphate anyway. I also think people on this forum starve their fish to make things more convenient.

Are you doing water changes? You need some sort of a refugium or algae scrubber, or you need to do water changes. Not doing both will lead to high phosphates that will continue to rise forever.

If your phosphates continue to rise and rise, they are not going to stop until you do more water changes. If they test the same level over and over again, don’t worry about them. It’s the never ending rise over time that will end up being a huge problem.

 

[Dburr1014]

@Ziggy17 ^^^reason #4
It's really pellets and flake that are higher in phosphate compared to frozen.

 

[Ziggy17]

@Ziggy17 ^^^reason #4
It's really pellets and flake that are higher in phosphate compared to frozen.

Totally. When I stopped feeding the Vitalis pellets, my PO4 went from averaging .15-.2 down to .10-.13

 

[DED65]

Pellets and flake are extruded, heated to high temperatures killing everything, vitamins have to be added back in because the heat destroys them, preservatives are added and ingredients fish would never eat in the wild. In my opinion they are like potato chips for us. My fish eat a variety of frozen foods and they would not know what a pellet is. They eat at least twice a day, I don’t believe in starvation just to keep my numbers in check. We have other ways of dealing with nutrients in our tanks, give the fish the nutrition they need.

 

[Timfish]

I am in a similar position with phos at .90 via a Hanna tester. Tank is 4 months old. My nitrates are high around 40ppm. Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0 and ph 8.0 I don't have test kits for the other minerals yet. I also have a skimmer that has been running for a week now. I started cutting back on the frozen foods yesterday and will do a water change either today or tomorrow. My question is will adding nitrifying bacteria help with Phos or the nitrate? I understand that right now my bacteria is able to handle the load from the tank since ammonia and nitrite is 0.

I would focus on doing water changes and adding corals. You're correct, if you don't have any ammonia or nitrites showing up adding more nitrifying bacteria won't do anything. If you didn't use any maricultured live rock I would add some for the diversity (most microbial stuff on reefs can't be stuck in a bottle). I'd suggest testing pH, alkalinity, calcium and magnesium at least weekly and test PO4, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate at least a couple times a month if not more frequently for awhile until your system matures. It will give you an important benchmark forfuture refferences, often problems are attributed when one of these are "out of normal" but they really aren't the issue snf testing frequently during the maturng process you'll get an idea of how numbers may or may not correlate to how your corals look. Taking pictures helps too.

Here's two of my posts in similar threads if you want a coupel data bombs.

What is your N/P ratio?

I do not think it is desirable or even sensible for reefers to think of nutrient target levels as ratios. It just serves to lead to false conclusions. It is never wrong, and usually far more informative to discuss the absolute levels of each. For example, does it make any sense if N is very...

www.reef2reef.com

Will increasing nitrates help

So I’ve had high phosphates due to a faulty Red Sea test kit and now with a Hanna phosphorus checker I’ve been testing daily and changing rowaphos as it starts to go up and can keep It bewtween 12-20ppb. My nitrates have always been really low I use Red Sea and have had my lfs test and it’s...

www.reef2reef.com