Leather Help, Pls

[Neil Cohen]

My leather isn’t looking so hot. I’m used to it going through shedding phases but this one looks different

This time it looks like the algae growing on it is getting “fuzzy”. And my GSP isn’t opening, but everything else looks really happy, even the other giant toadstool

Alk 10.2
Ph 8.3
Nitrates 39 - down from being over 75 for a while, big swing in the last week but it never suffered when the nitrates were sky high for months
Phos 0 - just bottomed and bring it back up
Sal 1.025
Temp 78.2

everything is stable except nitrates as it’s been a battle. Turf scrubber and Donavans Nitrate Destroyer finally having an impact.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[SlugSnorter]

do you use tap water? if not, the issue is prob that sky high nitrates and the swings. Do you do WCs? Do you have a fuge? chemicals are just gonna be a temp solution.

 

[Smirkish]

What kind of flow is on it as well?

 

[sixty_reefer]

You will need to keep your phosphates at 0.1 or higher wile using the DND the bacteria that is being encouraged in the reactor will use a lot of N and P if Phosphorus are being limited in your tank the reactor won’t work as it should and all that excess Organic Carbon you dosing can leak into the main display and be utilised by other things like Cyanobacteria and Dinoflagellates.
Increasing Phosphorus would be my first priority in this situation.
It’s probably worth to add some P straight in to the reactor as it will take some time to raise overhaul phosphates in the tank as some will be absorbed by rock and substrate raising the phosphates equilibrium may be difficult now that it it zero.

 

[Neil Cohen]

What would you dose to cause phosphate?

to answer the other questions:

flow is solid and hasn’t changed, leather is at the end of the tank opposite wave maker and under the returns.

Water is all rodi. Don’t do regular water changes but do them periodically.

dose Randy’s diy nopox in the reactor and the main display, but now that the reactor is working, will stop in the DT. Had a bacterial bloom the last couple of days. Just cloudy.

sump has a turf scrubber, protein skimmer and the export plate. Planned on using the main sump area for frags, once nitrates are stable

no swings, outside of dropping nitrates. Alk, ph, temp, Sal, phos, all stable. Phos was low but steady and just went to zero (prob bc I stopped feeding pellets). Reef roids will surely bring it up but will look I to dosing.

Mag and calcium steady too.

 

[Neil Cohen]

Update, guessing bacterial bloom and rapid drop in nitrates. Was over 75 a week ago and now it’s 9.5. Ordered food grade TSP to dose phosphates. Skimmer has been pulling copious amounts of dry, sulfurous foam. Liquid is rank.

Cleaned the wave makers and ordered a new power head.

going to stop nopox in DT and give it a few days to see how the DND works

GSP is angry but the hammer is joyous.

 

[Grsfish]

Try to add some more flow if possible to help it shed. Also try not to keep changing everything and patience and it should recover. I have had a toadstool close for 2+ months when everything else was happy and then it went back to normal

 

[Neil Cohen]

Upped the flow and have a new power head on the way.

i generally change nothing, working on stability not chasing numbers.

seems like the efforts to control nitrate caused a rapid drop in nitrates and phos. Simultaneously there was a bacterial bloom, which I attribute to dosing MB7 to get the DND online.

Backing off carbon dosing, as expected with the nitrates dropping. Actually cut my nopox dose in half, to avoid more dramatic swings in anything.

happy to report that the tank isn’t cloudy and the GSP is opening. The leather had me concerned but the GSP was my real concern. Nothing seems to kill it, so I was concerned the rest of the tank was going to follow.