Nitrate over 100ppm, Phosphate 5ppm yikes!

[1979fishgeek]

My tank needed serious tlc, I never realised that my 8 inch trigger jumped over the weir and died causing a huge nutrient spike. I also found part of him in my sump rotting away. I cleaned out the sump, as it was in need anyway as it was so full out detritus, mulm, aiptasia and rotting trigger also her remains from inside the weir....and pipework.

My nitrates have of course sky rocketed, I’ve done a series of water changes but for some reason the nitrate still keeps rising, I’m guessing his death has caused a imbalance or nuked the tank enough to cause further die off. Plus my tanks coming up to six years and has a lot of areas where flow is hindered by old live rock.

I'm dosing Quantum HR nitrate reducer (have been for months only needing 6 ml a day) and after speaking to Quantum who are awesome by the way, their customer service mind blowingly good. They recommended based on my tank size increasing the dose to 42ml and adding some media where denitrifying bacteria can thrive. So I’ve purchased 4kg Maxspect nano spheres and add.
I also purchased Quantum Phosphate remover, which has worked too well reducing PO4 to 0.5 in a single dose.
Im worried that the now low PO4 -vs- no3 over 100ppm is going to effect the nitrates dropping.
Should I reduce or stop the phosphate remover till the no3 starts coming down?

Considering the nutrients being so high, luckily the tanks actually not to bad, lost a couple of sps to tissue necrosis....but hopefully they will grow back.

 

[CoralBuddy]

Wherever you do to reduce it, do it slowly. Your tank probably took some time to get to this level of po4 and no3, so you should go slow on reducing it, as your live stock will have to adapt to lower concentrations.

When comes to trusting the vendor or recommended dosage, I'd go with half of it. I am just too skeptical of following recommendations for aquarium products, specially those that if you run out, you immediately need to buy more.

Good luck!

 

[1979fishgeek]

Wherever you do to reduce it, do it slowly. Your tank probably took some time to get to this level of po4 and no3, so you should go slow on reducing it, as your live stock will have to adapt to lower concentrations.

When comes to trusting the vendor or recommended dosage, I'd go with half of it. I am just too skeptical of following recommendations for aquarium products, specially those that if you run out, you immediately need to buy more.

Good luck!

Thanks. Good call going slow,I hope I can get it back on track again soon!

 

[Florida Sunshine]

Water changes and cleaning are your friend. While you are taking the old tank water out, vacuum out anything you can see that could possibly be rotting and producing more nitrates.
Remember the way dilution works. You will remove more nitrates in one big water change than you will with the same amount of water changed out over time. So one 50% water change reduces your nitrates more than two 25% changes.
I would remove the phosphate remover. That is a huge jump all at once. I would be working on the nitrates at this point.