Insane nitrate problem

[Garoux]

hello everybody ! So for the pass 2 or 3 months I've been having a nitrate issue 160ppm on api. I've done everything water changes from large to small. Multiple times a week to bi to monthly. Carbon dosing with Red Sea no pox and brightwell reef fuel or bio fuel. I haven't had no change at all when I was running two canisters no issue like this.

Now have a sump to be more stable and only run a canister with sponges and a poly filter type sponge. Nothing else just for flow and seems to keep everything good and clear have
Chato in my sump and dragon breath Algae don't think it's growing either had a pink led on it and t5 ho and the basic 6500k bulb.

So haven't done a water change in 2 or 3 months now besides today like a very small one on my 40 breeder and don't know what else to do.
I think I lost my zoas to this they aren't opening at all or maybe from my Kole tang keeps picking at it maybe it sees something.
Any help would be nice and if want any other info on my tang all other levels are good phosphate etc.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

You should just go ahead and do some water changes.
And give the canister a deep clean.

 

[jason2459]

Koles generally wouldn't pick at corals as they are more of a film algae type eater. But if they are picking at the corals then yes the corals will not do well.

Do you have any other visually noticeable issues besides the closed up zoas? Algae? Other corals doing ok? If so, you may just have high nitrates and not necessarily a nitrate issue.

 

[Garoux]

I've done water changes when it was that high 3 or so months ago and did it for a month or two heavy and nothing at all and I do my canister maybe bi weekly or monthly

 

[Garoux]

Just recently lost a torch head and gave it to my friend and my spiny cup coral ( for got the name) is starting to go bad with bone showing and turning brown on it algae on the glass green spots and flim on the screen that needs to be wiped daily and a small patch of hair algae on a rock that I have under control to feed my urchin and good for the tangs as well.

Other corals doing fine Xenia going new heads and branches everyday and clams doing fine

 

[jason2459]

Then I wouldn't look to quickly bring down the nitrates.

What I would do...

1. start doing some small consistent water changes weekly to start and move to monthly if desired later. Or look to setup an automatic water change system which is what I do and change out around 1% daily
2. Carbon dosing with out the reef fuel. I'd personally just switch to straight Vinegar and dose up to around 16ml a day. Preferably during the daylight hours. I spread my dosage out as well over the daylight hours
3. I wouldn't be dosing any kind of "fuel". Just some basic feedings daily
4. Add some rock or something to provide more surface area. Could be added to display or sump
5. Check PO4 and Alkalinity Levels and report back on here.

 

[Garoux]

Any thread on vinegar dosing and which one? I'm alkalinity was low yesterday around 6 drops on Api. And po4 at 0 on api as well and feeding isn't a issue got a bit of live stock to feed anyways lol. I'll probably do the weekly water changes since today was the start I'll do next Monday and keep it going I mean something must be going right if my two clams are alive even though it's considered "easy" because I know they can die overnight

 

[jason2459]

Make sure the API alk color change is complete and fully changed colors. A nice bright yellow. There will be a color change before that to like an orange but keep going. Usually one or two more drops away from the bright yellow.

For PO4 the API kit is not a very good test at all. For that I would go with the Elos Pro Phosphate kit or Hanna ULR phosphorus checker.

 

[clownsrcool]

Your tank sounds like it's Phosphate deficient as mine was also. I had the exact same issue as you and struggled with it for well over a year. My nitrate level was not that high but was at 50 and I couldn't get it to move for anything. I dosed everything I could think and had a large Refugium full of chaeto. My tank was that way from the initial startup and would never change.

I dosed vinegar, biodigiest, aquaforest pro bio s & np pro, vsv, etc. I was running gfo and doing weekly 20% water changes. Occasionally I would do a few large ones every couple of months.

Nothing was working. My PO4 was 0 but I couldn't get my nitrates to budge. Most of the filtration methods listed above can easily and rapidly knock out any PO4 in the tank but are not as effective as quickly with your nitrates.

I finally ended up going to a very experienced local reefer for help. He explained to me that my lack of any detectable PO4 was actually inhibiting the reduction of my nitrates. Nitrates/PO4 have a relationship in a way that is similar to Alk/Ca. If one is very low while the other is high it inhibits the ability of the low parameter to be raised and vice versa. There needs to be a very diverse population of all different kinds of bacteria in your tank. Not all of them tackle the same problems. There are some that primarily reduce PO4 and others that go for Nitrates. Back then I had a very skewed bacterial population that was heavily geared towards PO4 consumption and the lack of that element in my system was stunting the growth of the rest of my bacteria population needed for nitrate reduction. You are in this same boat.

The plan we came up with for me that I am sure will work for you is this.
1)Remove all excess filtration methods that work primarily on PO4 reduction like GFO, macro algae carbon dosing, etc.
2) dose a product like phytofeast to actually elevate your PO4 and keep it elevated. Shoot for a PO4 level of 0.05-0.10. Figure out how much phytofeast you need to dose daily to remain in that range. Start by dosing ~ 3ml of that per day until you start to get a reading on your PO4 test kits. Adjust your dosing as needed to keep you in that range.
3)at same time dose biodigiest. For first 3 days dose it daily at 2-3x th e recommended value for your tank size. This has the best blend of the bacteria you are deficient in. After your first 3 doses scale back to recommended doses daily.
4) it took me about 3-4 weeks of keeping my PO4 elevated in this range before I saw some results. Your results may be sooner or a little after but you will all of a sudden... seemingly overnight see a significant drop in your nitrates once you get that bacteria population established. Mine went from 50 to 25 to 10 to ~8 within a matter of a week and a half.
5) you will need to keep dosing the phytofeast to keep your PO4 elevated for a while after your nitrate levels drop or else you run the risk of starving off the bacteria you just worked so hard to grow but you can cut your biodigiest doses to once every other week- per month.

You are looking to get your rocks to absorb some of that PO4 so it can slowly leach it back into the water over time. At that point your daily feedings and bioload will account for the remainder of the PO4 needed and you can stop dosing phytofeast all together.

Your rocks act as a sponge for PO4. They absorbs the excess in the water column and as you lower your free amounts in your water column it will start to leach it back out in your water until it balances out with the levels in your water column. Once something like gfo reduces the amount in your water column, then the rocks leach more out until equilibrium is reached again and so on and so on.

Most people in this hobby fight the opposite scenario. They have so much PO4 bound in their rocks that they play the equilibrium game I mentioned until finally the levels within the rocks are depleted to the point that the final equilibrium amount between the rock and water is at the range they were shooting for.

You will experience some Dino's or algae along the way but that will go away on its own as you correct your problem.

Hope this helps and good luck to you.

 

[Martinnn]

I was battling with nitrates for like a year doing everything I read everywhere finally I tried Red sea an believe me for me works perfectly my nitrates are 0 ppm now ...