Need some advice for chronic nitrates and carbon dosing.

[Murraydar]

Hi guys, I think I need some opinions before I continue on with my carbon dosing.

So here's the deal. I have a chronic nitrate problem. Nitrates sitting around 30, phosphate is generally between .02 and .05 or so. I've been trying a few different methods of carbon dosing for around a year now to get my nitrates down, including biopellets, commercial products (nopox), and diy carbon. I'll discuss my current dosing regiment.

I dose a mixture of vodka and vinegar, 60% vinegar and 40% vodka, kinda like a diy nopox. My tank has a total of 91 gallons of water including sump. Its been about two months of dosing. I started low, and increased the dosage a bit everyday to where im at now. Im currently dosing a total of about 24ml of this mixture everyday, which in my opinion, is getting pretty high.

I know about the redfield ratio and made sure it's not impeding anything. In fact I dosed seachem phosphorus a while back because I had a fear I may have had bottomed out on po4. This wasn't the case. What happens is the carbon dosing actually reduces the po4 to proper levels. No issues there.

However, my nitrates isn't budging. I've done basically everything I could to try and get them down. Tried multiple bacteria additives per forum recommendations. I have a reef octopus 150 int skimmer, which should be plenty big for my setup. I clean it about once a day. I've been blowing out detritus from all the nooks and crannys. Tried with and without filter socks. All my other parameters are fine, fish seems healthy.

Do I keep upping my carbon dosing until something happens? Even at this high of a dose I have yet to see the 'bacteria bloom' that happens to alot of people. Don't know what else to do. Thanks for reading

 

[sk8]

Following as I have a similar issue

 

[aeras1131]

What is your NO3 and PO4 at currently?

 

[Murraydar]

What is your NO3 and PO4 at currently?

Tested it tonight. Po4 at. 02 on my hannah checker. No3 was around 30ppm, checked with salifert and api tests.

 

[reeferfoxx]

How big is the system and how many fish do you have?

 

[aeras1131]

I would start dosing PO4 to increase your Anaerobic bacteria population. They are currently running out of PO4 to complete the nitrifying process.

 

[Murraydar]

How big is the system and how many fish do you have?

93 gallon system. Nothing excessive. Yellow tang. Couple chromis, coris wrasse, few blennies a clown gobies. I feed about a cupe of frozen and half sheet of nori per day.

 

[Murraydar]

I would start dosing PO4 to increase your Anaerobic bacteria population. They are currently running out of PO4 to complete the nitrifying process.

I can try it again. Last time I dosed po4 it didn't touch the nitrates. Po4 skyrocketed and came down, nitrates didn't move.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

IMO, 30 ppm nitrate is not a huge problem, but I see no reason to not up the vodka/vinegar carbon dosing a bit and see what happens. IMO, here is plenty of phosphate at 0.02 ppm phosphate (if accurate)..

 

[Murraydar]

I had issues with my sps a while back. I figured I should get my parameters in check before I try again. Otherwise the tank is in great shape. Happy fish, happy soft corals, etc.

I feel like I feed enough to keep my po4 up. Even grabbed some flake food to keep it up a tad higher. I suppose I'll keep increasing my carbon dosing to see what happens.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

FWIW, I don't think 30 ppm nitrate causes issues with SPS, except perhaps browning from increased zoox.

Check this tank with 47 ppm nitrate:

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/my-home-tank.296635/page-4#post-4167870

 

[Murraydar]

FWIW, I don't think 30 ppm nitrate causes issues with SPS, except perhaps browning from increased zoox.

Check this tank with 47 ppm nitrate:

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/my-home-tank.296635/page-4#post-4167870

I've looked into the 'dirty' sps tanks, cool stuff. Im fairly confident at this point that my nitrates were not the actual cause of my sps deaths. However, I would still like to get them down to around 5ppm. Just a good baseline to start over with I guess.

 

[reeferfoxx]

Do you have a refugium or any bio media like matrix?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I've looked into the 'dirty' sps tanks, cool stuff. Im fairly confident at this point that my nitrates were not the actual cause of my sps deaths. However, I would still like to get them down to around 5ppm. Just a good baseline to start over with I guess.

That's certainly a fine plan.

 

[Murraydar]

FWIW, I don't think 30 ppm nitrate causes issues with SPS, except perhaps browning from increased zoox.

Check this tank with 47 ppm nitrate:

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/my-home-tank.296635/page-4#post-4167870

While I got you here, I may as well ask. How is that tank you posted possible? From what I've read elevated no3 and PO4 levels can inhibit growth to corals and cause excess algae issues. I've even heard that no3 can actually cause death to sps. Is it false that we need to keep our nutrients to ultra low levels?

I'll admit I tried the dirty method before I returned to carbon dosing. I had zero luck, algae became a nuisance and I had had rtn on my sps.

 

[Murraydar]

Do you have a refugium or any bio media like matrix?

Not at the moment. Before carbon dosing I used chaeto. I bought a 50 watt grow light for it in my sump, it's incredibly powerful. Grew chaeto like a champ. But even with regular harvesting it didn't dent my nitrates.

No biomedia besides a large amount of live rock in the display.

 

[reeferfoxx]

Which nitrate test are you using?

 

[Lasse]

Have you tested your nitrite?

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

While I got you here, I may as well ask. How is that tank you posted possible? From what I've read elevated no3 and PO4 levels can inhibit growth to corals and cause excess algae issues. I've even heard that no3 can actually cause death to sps. Is it false that we need to keep our nutrients to ultra low levels?

I'll admit I tried the dirty method before I returned to carbon dosing. I had zero luck, algae became a nuisance and I had had rtn on my sps.

We all, including the owner of that tank, have speculated on the lack of algae in such tanks. I suspect the lack relates to some trace element such as iron limiting its growth. That is the case in some parts of the ocean as well.

The presence of adequate herbivores also keeps algae down, as Lasse notes, but wouldn't likely prevent it from coating the glass quickly if algae had everything it needed.

 

[Murraydar]

Which nitrate test are you using?

Salifert and api. Use them both just to make sure the readings are correct. Regents aren't expired.