Natural sea water parameters question?

ReefRusty

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So been down to local to pick up 120L of water. This is in Perth WESTERN AUSTRALIA.

Did a test after I ran it through my 5 micron sock and I have been wondering why my phosphate and nitrates have always been on the higher side in my tank.

SO natural sea water parameters for my past 2 batches (300L)

Nitrate 5-7
Alk 7.1
Cal 430
Mag 1320
Phosphate 0.066 now ran this test 3 times and was 0.081 0.057 and 0.061 this is using my phosphorus URL

I normally do a 15-20% weekly water change and a 50% once a month
My Nitrates always sit at 10-15 and phosphate is never lower than 0.04 normally its at 0.06 and up to 0.1 when feeding reef roids.

Have a skimmer running also to help reduce this and lower nitrates.

Now wondering if having these parameters will it effect the corals? Its 100% natural water from the ocean. All my corals are looking extremely healthy besides my ultra yellow goniopora.
 

Zer0

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What parameters are you shooting for? Because those nitrate and phosphate levels are very ideal imo. Not too low, not too high.
 
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ReefRusty

ReefRusty

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What parameters are you shooting for? Because those nitrate and phosphate levels are very ideal imo. Not too low, not too high.
Good point. Well as NSW has all this within it contents then I guess phosphate would be between 0.05 -0.1 and nitrates 10-15 weirdly enough I don't have any algae issues
Touch wood!
 

Timfish

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What are your particulate levels and what are your dissolved organic levels? You've filtered a lot of it out and particualtes I'm guessing won't show up immediately and we can't test for dissolved organic nitrogen or phosphorus. What happens to your aqwuarium levels if you don't run the NSW through a 5 micron filter? What happens if you do smaller water changes? Or shut off your skimmer?
 

Joedubyk

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if everything is looking good ***DO NOT CHANGE****... I have an acro dominated tank and conventional wisdom says po4 should be .1 or lower... Every time I go below that i lose color AND growth on half of my acros. Ive had to learn this lesson more than once, keep your reef STABLE. That's it. As boring as possible, that's what they'll thrive on.
 
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ReefRusty

ReefRusty

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What are your particulate levels and what are your dissolved organic levels? You've filtered a lot of it out and particualtes I'm guessing won't show up immediately and we can't test for dissolved organic nitrogen or phosphorus. What happens to your aqwuarium levels if you don't run the NSW through a 5 micron filter? What happens if you do smaller water changes? Or shut off your skimmer?
Have yet to try switching skimmer off, no doubt my Nitrates and phosphates would increase. I would think its maintaining the levels, not rising nor lowering. Appears to be steady when testing. Only reason I run it through a 5 micron sock is to remove any matter within the water. Floating shells, sand seaweed. And potentially critters swimming, good and or bad.. personally dont want to risk it. I could do 10% weekly changes obviously won't do much to my levels and or replenish them. As i am maintaining them with dosing mag alk cal ect...
 
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ReefRusty

ReefRusty

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if everything is looking good ***DO NOT CHANGE****... I have an acro dominated tank and conventional wisdom says po4 should be .1 or lower... Every time I go below that i lose color AND growth on half of my acros. Ive had to learn this lesson more than once, keep your reef STABLE. That's it. As boring as possible, that's what they'll thrive on.
Yeah everything looking stable, but have always wondered what I could do better or help.. would lower nitrates and phosphates increase better growt, I dont know as I can't get my levels low enough without going to artificial saltwater and making my own woth 0 phos and 0 Nitrate.
 

Rjramos

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I collect my own NSW in south Florida through a 120 micron sieve. NO3 and PO4 are always undetectable when I test it. I used to collect without the sieve years ago and never got any reading on PO4 or NO3.
 

Joedubyk

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Yeah everything looking stable, but have always wondered what I could do better or help.. would lower nitrates and phosphates increase better growt, I dont know as I can't get my levels low enough without going to artificial saltwater and making my own woth 0 phos and 0 Nitrate.

That is the DEATH KNELL of a tank... the second you change something, even if you think it's for the better is almost always going to make something worse.
 

Staghorn

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Just curious. Are you collecting the water from the sea or maybe collecting from the mouth or near the mouth of the swan river. I know sometimes during certain tides river mouths can have elevated nutrients and sediment. In either case allot of the sps tanks running undetectable levels of nitrate and super low phosphate are typically feeding the corals heavily ( in some cases without knowing it) or the nutrient levels are that low because the corals are uptaking most of the nutrients themselves. “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it”
 

ReefGeezer

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If you are collecting near an estuary or other areas where runoff occurs, phosphate will be elevated. However, I'd agree with those above. if t isn't broke, don't fix it! Watch it to see if it continues to rise, but don't change anything based on one data point.

Also, check the vials you use to do your tests. If they are hazy, etched, or scratched it will cause a faulty elevated reading. I buy new vials and change them out regularly. They're cheap.
 
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ReefRusty

ReefRusty

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100% if it ain't broke dont fix it.

I collect from the north side of hillarys, this is also where the LFS collect their water from and onsell for $0.20c/l


I guess I should collect on high tide, just normally take my young boy during the day.

Its no where near the mouth of the river where the orange X is.
 

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