My nitrates are down wohoo!

[AydenLincoln]

My skimmer is so disgusting but does such a good job lol! After about a day of using it my nitrates are now down to 13 from like 40+, my pH is up, and my corals are much more open!

 

[Reefahholic]

My skimmer is so disgusting but does such a good job lol! After about a day of using it my nitrates are now down to 13 from like 40+, my pH is up, and my corals are much more open!

Good job, but I doubt that skimmer pulled it down 27+ ppm. Are you sure the test was accurate?

 

[AydenLincoln]

Good job, but I doubt that skimmer pulled it down 27+ ppm. Are you sure the test was accurate?

Yes…but I did start to feed less and do some other things that helped but the skimmer did really help especially because it’s a nano I mean they probably slowly went down from last week too due to other things like feeding less and less algae because I cut back on lighting. The skimmer did help the corals open up more I will say. The cup got dirty very quickly I’ve emptied a few times already and I know it has a break in period.

 

[sixty_reefer]

My skimmer is so disgusting but does such a good job lol! After about a day of using it my nitrates are now down to 13 from like 40+, my pH is up, and my corals are much more open!

That’s odd the increase in ph is expected although mechanical filtration doesn’t remove nitrates directly, it removes organic before they break down into nitrates and phosphates.

 

[Reefahholic]

Yes…but I did start to feed less and do some other things that helped but the skimmer did really help especially because it’s a nano I mean they probably slowly went down from last week too due to other things like feeding less and less algae because I cut back on lighting. The skimmer did help the corals open up more I will say. The cup got dirty very quickly I’ve emptied a few times already and I know it has a break in period.

Feeding less is the best thing you can do. In almost all cases high nitrates comes from what the reefer puts into the tank.

 

[AydenLincoln]

That’s odd the increase in ph is expected although mechanical filtration doesn’t remove nitrates directly, it removes organic before they break down into nitrates and phosphates.

Yeah but regardless I already see the positive results! I wish I would’ve just installed it first then maybe I wouldn’t have gotten that high to begin with causing algae and unhappy corals. I did cut back on feeding and lowered my lights but water changes alone weren’t helping.

 

[AydenLincoln]

Feeding less is the best thing you can do. In almost all cases high nitrates comes from what the reefer puts into the tank.

Yes also admittedly I’m a little overstocked too.

 

[Reefahholic]

Yes also admittedly I’m a little overstocked too.

You naughty reefer! Haha

 

[mdb_talon]

In almost all cases high nitrates comes from what the reefer puts into the tank.

Its a balance. I put a ton of food in my tank yet struggle to keep my nitrates above zero. In other words the opposite argument could be made that high nitrates are almost always caused by lack of nutrient export. Of course the reality is it is the intersection of the two that is the determining factor.

 

[reefz]

Well, of my knowledge, skimmers pull organics out of the water before it has a chance to breakdown into nitrates,phosphates,etc. But skimmers cannot pull pure nitrates out of the water column. Basically skimmers pull anything nasty out, but if an organic already has already broke down, it can only be removed by water changes, carbon dosing, living organisms feeding, and other medias… but again the skimmer will not. So It’s very unrealistic that your new protein skimmer pulled nitrates, let alone that many, out of the water in one day. Well anyway… if your test isn’t faulty, then congrats.

 

[Reefahholic]

Its a balance. I put a ton of food in my tank yet struggle to keep my nitrates above zero. In other words the opposite argument could be made that high nitrates are almost always caused by lack of nutrient export. Of course the reality is it is the intersection of the two that is the determining factor.

That is true in some cases.

Some reefers define a lot of food as 1-2 cubes while others think 10-15 cubes is starving their fish.

In most cases, reefers today have good export method’s. There’s more tanks starving today than ever before. The problem I see more than anything is that some reefers just can’t stop feeding. Not only that, but they blindly feed without measuring what’s going in. That’s fine, but they need to have nutrient management under control first.

Then you have the flip side of that. Joe Reefer has a starving tank. He says he’s dosing NO3 and PO4. You ask how much are you dosing? He says 10 mL of each. Then you ask…what does 10 mL’s equate to in your total volume. He says…that’s a great question. LOL.

10 mL’s could be .000000000001 ppm or 100 ppm. Depending on volume it could be drastically different in 10 gallons vs 500 gallons. As soon as they begin to talk in mL’s and not ppm with their total volume I’m thinking here we go again.

 

[sixty_reefer]

That is true in some cases.

Some reefers define a lot of food as 1-2 cubes while others think 10-15 cubes is starving their fish.

In most cases, reefers today have good export method’s. There’s more tanks starving today than ever before. The problem I see more than anything is that some reefers just can’t stop feeding. Not only that, but they blindly feed without measuring what’s going in. That’s fine, but they need to have nutrient management under control first.

Then you have the flip side of that. Joe Reefer has a starving tank. He says he’s dosing NO3 and PO4. You ask how much are you dosing? He says 10 mL of each. Then you ask…what does 10 mL’s equate to in your total volume. He says…that’s a great question. LOL.

10 mL’s could be .000000000001 ppm or 100 ppm. Depending on volume it could be drastically different in 10 gallons vs 500 gallons. As soon as they begin to talk in mL’s and not ppm with their total volume I’m thinking here we go again.

That is a really good point, volume plays a major factor in residual and ppm would always be the best way to determine a level of concentration

 

[Reefahholic]

That is a really good point, volume plays a major factor in residual and ppm would always be the best way to determine a level of concentration

I see a lot of residual in established tanks (3 yrs plus). To be quite honest I wish there was a way to measure total residual and then break that down to exactly what that is.

 

[mtraylor]

So what were the other things that were done to bring them down and what were your other parms? I only ask because you said your corals opened up more after all the changes. I'm assuming this means LPS and softies.

High nitrates are usually favorable for LPS and softies and in my tank sps get more color too. The downside is algae issues so you have to keep it manageable and allot lower. Just curious which corals enjoyed the lower nitrates.

I accidentally got mine up over 65 using a color test set that was bad. corals never looked better. Then the algae came. I bought a Hanna checker that revealed my other tester that was reading 20ppm was not correct. Took me several weeks to bring it down. Water changes was most effective.

 

[AydenLincoln]

So what were the other things that were done to bring them down and what were your other parms? I only ask because you said your corals opened up more after all the changes. I'm assuming this means LPS and softies.

High nitrates are usually favorable for LPS and softies and in my tank sps get more color too. The downside is algae issues so you have to keep it manageable and allot lower. Just curious which corals enjoyed the lower nitrates.

I accidentally got mine up over 65 using a color test set that was bad. corals never looked better. Then the algae came. I bought a Hanna checker that revealed my other tester that was reading 20ppm was not correct. Took me several weeks to bring it down. Water changes was most effective.

Green clove polyps and GSP. Feeding less and less lighting so less algae. My recent water test. I will need to test it again. I use Hanna Checkers too and can verify they went down significantly.

 

[mtraylor]

Oh ok. I like both of those. Explains opening up for the clove polyps. I really like those. yeah the hanna checkers are really nice. I was really shocked my color tester was so off.

How old is your aquarium?

So your new tests shows nitrate at 44. So it went back up? I noticed that you have a little bit of ammonia and that is why I'm asking age of aquarium. Is that reading for phosphates .08ppm or .8ppm?

I took some time for me to get my nitrates down as it would swing up like that when I was dosing trying to bring it down. I was using reef bio fuel and microbacter7. It took some time but the water changes were ultimately the game changer getting it down from the big numbers effectively. I ran my skimmer 24/7 for export.

 

[sixty_reefer]

I see a lot of residual in established tanks (3 yrs plus). To be quite honest I wish there was a way to measure total residual and then break that down to exactly what that is.

Theoretical we could calculate the total by converting ppm to mg/l and multiply by the volume in litres.

2ppm on a 100 litre system would be a total of 0.2 grams of available nitrates

2ppm on a 10 litres system would be 0.02 grams of available nitrates

I think, not sure if the maths are correct

 

[BZOFIQ]

Don't kid yourself, It's not the skimmer - it's this.

 

[MaxTremors]

I’d be far, far more concerned about phosphates being 0.8ppm than 40ppm nitrates. 0.8ppm of phosphates is 10x the absolute maximum I’d recommend and about 25x what would be ideal.

 

[AydenLincoln]

Oh ok. I like both of those. Explains opening up for the clove polyps. I really like those. yeah the hanna checkers are really nice. I was really shocked my color tester was so off.

How old is your aquarium?

So your new tests shows nitrate at 44. So it went back up? I noticed that you have a little bit of ammonia and that is why I'm asking age of aquarium. Is that reading for phosphates .08ppm or .8ppm?

I took some time for me to get my nitrates down as it would swing up like that when I was dosing trying to bring it down. I was using reef bio fuel and microbacter7. It took some time but the water changes were ultimately the game changer getting it down from the big numbers effectively. I ran my skimmer 24/7 for export.

No! This was the old test from last week an API Aquaspin but I verified with my checkers and the results were very similar. And the little bit of ammonia but that was probably because I had some dead hermit crabs I found and removed and 0.8 but I’m not overly concerned about phosphate especially now since everyone looks happy. 4 months and I have been on top of everything. I also recognize taking a little sample of water and driving it 30 minutes to the fish store will have varying results. Please also know these results were before adding a slimmer and sometime in the next few days I’ll be going to the fish store to get my water tested again.