How to lower nitatres?

LilysDad

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Im doing moonshiners at the moment for 6 months now and all my parameters are stable even minors and take is thriving in growth I use to struggle keeping nitrates (1-2ppm) and phosphates (0.01-0.03) up. I run gfo and carbon here and there to maintain phosphates down between 0.04 to 0.1 and recently my nitrates been rising just received my icp and I’m at 20ppm they were between 5-10ppm 2 months ago I run socks change every 3 days skimmer in between wet and dry skimming and cheato every month I take some out. What would yall recommend me to do besides a water change haven’t done one since I started moonshiners. And things are looking great if they go higher I’ll do one but what could I possibly do to lower my nitrates?
 

Reef.

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Feed less if you overfeed, not really something I think is fair to the fish, change socks sooner, not sure I would be rushing to do much myself, if the tank is looking good, 20 is not high, if I really wanted it lower I would do a water change.

If your home test is still showing a lower reading than icp, I would exclude the icp test and just go by your home test, icp literally includes everything in the water, a little detritus will register on your icp test. Does it really matter is your nitrates are 10 or 20 as long as you don’t see any negative affects.
 

Mr. Mojo Rising

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If you run gfo and struggle to keep phosphates up, just remove the gfo.

Nitrates going up from 10 to 20 in 2 months is pretty good, nothing wrong with 20 nitrates, its not high at all.

Sorry if I misunderstand.
 
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LilysDad

LilysDad

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Feed less if you overfeed, not really something I think is fair to the fish, change socks sooner, not sure I would be rushing to do much myself, if the tank is looking good, 20 is not high, if I really wanted it lower I would do a water change.

If your home test is still showing a lower reading than icp, I would exclude the icp test and just go by your home test, icp literally includes everything in the water, a little detritus will register on your icp test. Does it really matter is your nitrates are 10 or 20 as long as you don’t see any negative affects.
Icp and Hanna are 2ppm difference Farley close
 
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LilysDad

LilysDad

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If you run gfo and struggle to keep phosphates up, just remove the gfo.

Nitrates going up from 10 to 20 in 2 months is pretty good, nothing wrong with 20 nitrates, its not high at all.

Sorry if I misunderstand.
I can manage phosphates. nitrates are getting higher
 

tuscani

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I am in a similar situation.. my nitrates are higher but some other elements low. Obviously water changes makes sense but that will also lower other nutrients I am trying to increase like CAL and MAG. So I will have to do some dosing it looks like.
 

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