swimfest
Community Member
My nitrates are at 5ppm according to the api test kit. I have a ton of macro growing and a big skimmer. Are these levels okay? If not, will trimming the macro promote more growth decreasing the nitrates?
Nitrates and SPS
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PVREEFER
Community Member
Some will say 0 is best others will say you are fine where you are at. I have seen some awesome.sps tanks with 5-10 nitrates and some ugly ones at zero and vice versa
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I don't think 5 ppm is an issue, but would suggest using a more accurate test kit than API to make sure it is truely 5 and not 20-40.
I agree with PVREEFER's comments as well... big skimmers and other methods of extracting nutrients are great if you look at it as an opportunity to feed more while keeping the nutrients low. If you have perfect levels, but never feed your tank your corals will still look bad.
Lighting, Waterflow, ALk, Cal, Mag and other things can also greatly affect SPS and from my experience are usually where I look when having SPS issues vs nitrates. Nitrates really shouldn't be an issue in an established reef tank with todays skimmers etc.
Brandon
I agree with PVREEFER's comments as well... big skimmers and other methods of extracting nutrients are great if you look at it as an opportunity to feed more while keeping the nutrients low. If you have perfect levels, but never feed your tank your corals will still look bad.
Lighting, Waterflow, ALk, Cal, Mag and other things can also greatly affect SPS and from my experience are usually where I look when having SPS issues vs nitrates. Nitrates really shouldn't be an issue in an established reef tank with todays skimmers etc.
Brandon
ronnie
Acro addict
I prefer my nitrates around 5 or lower. I've had them to 10 before and haven't really seen any bad side effects.
I'd recommend checking your alkalinity and your phosphates if you RTN'ed all your SPS. What probably happened was your phosphates crept up and stunted the growth, which caused your alkalinity to spike since you likely kept dosing the same amount. This happened to me a little over a year ago. Nearly crashed the entire tank.
Get a phosban reactor and put some GFO in it. Start slow and start or continue 20 % water changes at least every 15 days until your levels are acceptable again.
And get your phosphates measured with a hanna handheld meter. The test kits just don't read a low enough resolution to be accurate.
I'd recommend checking your alkalinity and your phosphates if you RTN'ed all your SPS. What probably happened was your phosphates crept up and stunted the growth, which caused your alkalinity to spike since you likely kept dosing the same amount. This happened to me a little over a year ago. Nearly crashed the entire tank.
Get a phosban reactor and put some GFO in it. Start slow and start or continue 20 % water changes at least every 15 days until your levels are acceptable again.
And get your phosphates measured with a hanna handheld meter. The test kits just don't read a low enough resolution to be accurate.
I use to worry about nitrates. Than I saw a beautiful acro filled tank with beautiful colored corals. This tank had nitrates from 10-50ppm. The fellow reefer said his corals look pale if he let his nitrates get below 5ppm. So I stop worrying and testing so much.
i haven't tested for nitrates in either of my tanks for at least 6 months. They seem to range between 0-10ppm and haven't really noticed a difference. The most important readings in my experience are keeping phosphates low, Ca, Mg, and Alk stable. I just added a Phosban reactor with Chemipure Elite last week and noticed a huge difference with color and polyp extension in all of my sps. I thought my water was clear before, but Chemi-pure Elite makes my water shimmer. It's clearer than my tap water now:) What's your water testing right now? Also, how old is your tank? I noticed that at the 18 month to 2 year mark my water params stablized because the tank is more established and settled. That'll help us figure out how to help.
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