Need some experienced advice on phosphates dosing.

[Stuckita]

Thanks in advance, I know I've been posting a lot.

My phosphates were bottomed out and my soft coral all closed up and began to die, algae at the time wasn’t too bad, the hammer and Duncan’s looked good. I began to dose phosphates, I had to dose a lot to get to a detectable range.

Zoas came back but the hammers looked really bad, Duncan was fine. After getting phosphates up to around 0.10 the hammers looked really awful, totally deflated - I’m likely losing one. At the same time the green hair and other algae came on strong. The lower I let my phosphates get the better the hammers look.

Right now I’m getting a 0.00 reading (hanna) but I only have the low range and there is a +/- 4 margin of error. I know I should dose but every time I add phosphates the hammers deflate and I’d like to save the other. But at the same time I’m worried of bottoming out again and hurting the zoas/run the risk of Dino’s. I also know once the algae goes away the drain on the phosphates would stop.

So, should I still be dosing?

 

[SPS2020]

I cannot answer your question exactly, but I dose PO4 in both my tanks via a ReefDose4, the levels stay consistent and everything seems happy (all Acros).

You didn't mention whether you were dosing manually or automated. Perhaps getting PO4 to something low initially (say .01) and letting that stabilize for a month or so, watch the corals, then try increasing a very small amount (.02), let it go for a while, test again, rinse and repeat. I didn't worry about dosing a lot to get the levels up initially...just dose a small amount and watch your tank and keep testing.

 

[Stuckita]

I cannot answer your question exactly, but I dose PO4 in both my tanks via a ReefDose4, the levels stay consistent and everything seems happy (all Acros).

You didn't mention whether you were dosing manually or automated. Perhaps getting PO4 to something low initially (say .01) and letting that stabilize for a month or so, watch the corals, then try increasing a very small amount (.02), let it go for a while, test again, rinse and repeat. I didn't worry about dosing a lot to get the levels up initially...just dose a small amount and watch your tank and keep testing.

I'm currently dosing manually, and testing twice a day. I originally was dosing a ton to save all the zoas, I think I managed to do that but lost one of the hammers - I tried dipping the hammer in revive in case it was something else causing the stress, but I am pretty sure I made it much worse (originally skin above the skeleton/stalk was purple and now it has peeled back and is showing white, but so far I believe it's still alive).

If I just dose low amounts, say 0.01 in the morning and night, and my hanna checker still reads 0.00 (presumably due to the algae consuming it) or my corals still safe/no chances of dinos?

Thanks for the help!

 

[Snoopy 67]

Reef Roids will bring up the phosphates.

 

[Miami Reef]

What phosphate product are you dosing?

 

[APlusAquatics]

We have to dose phosphate in our sps system and what I like to do is over the course of 3-5 days get po4 to the desired level then test at the same exact time two days in a row. However much it drops is how much you should dose daily then check once a week at the same time to make any adjustments.

When it comes to your hammer coral. I would get your levels within a good range and not concentrate on one specific coral especially if everything else is doing fine.

Also if your hanna checker is coming back zero I would be aiming to see at least .05 when you check. Our tank shows negative signs when p04 is anywhere below .03 and looks great around the .08-.10 range.

PS we keep po4 up using neophos and feeding reef roids occasionally.

 

[Stuckita]

Reef Roids will bring up the phosphates.

I’m using aqua forest po4+

 

[Stuckita]

What phosphate product are you dosing?

Aqua forest p04+, LFS stocks it

 

[Stuckita]

We have to dose phosphate in our sps system and what I like to do is over the course of 3-5 days get po4 to the desired level then test at the same exact time two days in a row. However much it drops is how much you should dose daily then check once a week at the same time to make any adjustments.

When it comes to your hammer coral. I would get your levels within a good range and not concentrate on one specific coral especially if everything else is doing fine.

Also if your hanna checker is coming back zero I would be aiming to see at least .05 when you check. Our tank shows negative signs when p04 is anywhere below .03 and looks great around the .08-.10 range.

PS we keep po4 up using neophos and feeding reef roids occasionally.

Thanks for the help! Yes I came to a similar conclusion of shooting for 0.05, however trying to avoid the negative LPS reactions of 0.06ml per dose. I dosed last night 0.01, this morning 0.01, and another 0.005 at lunch. Going to test again tonight and possibly up the dose a touch if I’m still reading zero..

I believe in order to keep a reading I’ll need to dose almost 0.10 daily if not more which feels pretty crazy.

 

[APlusAquatics]

@Stuckita any update on getting your phosphates under control?

 

[Stuckita]

@Stuckita any update on getting your phosphates under control?

Hey there, happy new year. Yea everything is under control and thriving. I ended up dosing phosphates up and also feeding reef roids about twice a week, this dropped my need for dosing multiple times a day down to once or no dosing per day. I’m still testing daily. The biggest thing though was getting a UV sterilizer to help fight the bacterial bloom.. I believe it was consuming a large amount of oxygen and nutrients starving everything else out. Water is crystal clear and everything came back to life. Algae growth has slowed a ton now as well, some manual removal once a week and glass scraping every 2-3 days but that’s just because I like to keep it clean! Thanks for checking in.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I still do not see why dosing phosphate would have any negative impact (it typically does not), but I do not know exactly what is in that product.

Were you monitoring nitrate at the same time? Adding phosphate may have created a low nitrate situation.

 

[Stuckita]

I still do not see why dosing phosphate would have any negative impact (it typically does not), but I do not know exactly what is in that product.

Were you monitoring nitrate at the same time? Adding phosphate may have created a low nitrate situation.

I was monitoring yes, here’s what I think was happening (far from an expert as you know). Every time I would dose, it would fuel the fire for the bacterial bloom consuming more oxygen/nitrate/phosphate. After getting a UV sterilizer in there everything came back and nutrients went down and future phosphate dosing didn’t have the same effect.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I was monitoring yes, here’s what I think was happening (far from an expert as you know). Every time I would dose, it would fuel the fire for the bacterial bloom consuming more oxygen/nitrate/phosphate. After getting a UV sterilizer in there everything came back and nutrients went down and future phosphate dosing didn’t have the same effect.

That's possible, but I don't think you would normally get a bacterial bloom in a reef tank by adding phosphate unless you were also adding substantial organic carbon, such as vodka or vinegar.

 

[Stuckita]

That's possible, but I don't think you would normally get a bacterial bloom in a reef tank by adding phosphate unless you were also adding substantial organic carbon, such as vodka or vinegar.

Bacterial bloom was pre-existing and getting significantly worse with my attempts to bring up phosphates.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Bacterial bloom was pre-existing and getting significantly worse with my attempts to bring up phosphates.

OK, I can believe that the existing bloom used up available phosphate and was limited by it.