Not sure what to do now.

[Pico_Reefs]

I'm struggling with ULN right now. I can't for the life of me keep my Nitrates and Phosphates stable.

I have a 40b running on a canister filter "nitrate factory," so they say. I can't keep nitrate in the system. I was dosing 8ml a day for about a month, then I backed off because it got to around 8. I tried, but I couldn't hold it there. I'd lose 2-4ppm a day, then try to dose to bring it back up, and just got stuck chasing the number. Same thing with PO4 got to .08 once, and I was dumping so much food in the tank, rods frozen, TDO pellets, reef roids, ab+, Oyster feast, all nearly daily. I still feed what I would consider very heavy, and I'm only at about .03 now.


I have been doing weekly water changes, and I know that's not helping me. I've tried to keep them small, under 10%. Over the summer, I left and didn't change the prefilter or do a water change for over a month and the tank was running amazingly, but for some reason, I thought something might go bad if I don't change the water and I did, and its been a rollercoaster ever since.

The only mechanical filtration I have is the prefilter in the BioMaster, which I haven't cleaned in a month.

I'm currently dosing:
4ml of Red Sea Alk
1ml of neo nitro (just so there is something)
1 tbsp per gallon Kalkwasser - dripping at 1ml per minute

When I didn't do the water changes, I was running AFR+Kalk. Should I just go back to that and stop doing water changes until PO4 and NO3 stable out? I'm not sure what to do, and I'm just tired of chasing these two.

 

[rishma]

Do you have any dosing pumps you can use? I dose daily to maintain my target nutrients levels. Here is a good summary thread

Have low nutrients? Here’s how you can dose them

This will be a simple glossary for the dosing options we have to raise nutrients Dosing N (nitrate, ammonia, urea, etc) If you need something available immediately, you can purchase Brightwell NeoNitro. It is more expensive and diluted, but it raises nitrate and many LFS carry it. Sodium...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[NanoSteam]

I had the same problem on last 3 tanks. Had to put the NeoNitro on a dosing pump to keep up and I couldn't figure out where it was all going. There wasn't a refugium or anything special to uptake that much. Somehow phosphates weren't an issue.

 

[bubbgee]

Need more information such as rocks you have in the display or anything that can soak up phosphates. You can also try turning off kalk for a few days as dosing kalk can precipitate phosphates. What kind of media do you have in the canister? Some media can be too effective in removing nitrates as well.

 

[Mongo1.0]

I'm struggling with ULN right now. I can't for the life of me keep my Nitrates and Phosphates stable.

I have a 40b running on a canister filter "nitrate factory," so they say. I can't keep nitrate in the system. I was dosing 8ml a day for about a month, then I backed off because it got to around 8. I tried, but I couldn't hold it there. I'd lose 2-4ppm a day, then try to dose to bring it back up, and just got stuck chasing the number. Same thing with PO4 got to .08 once, and I was dumping so much food in the tank, rods frozen, TDO pellets, reef roids, ab+, Oyster feast, all nearly daily. I still feed what I would consider very heavy, and I'm only at about .03 now.


I have been doing weekly water changes, and I know that's not helping me. I've tried to keep them small, under 10%. Over the summer, I left and didn't change the prefilter or do a water change for over a month and the tank was running amazingly, but for some reason, I thought something might go bad if I don't change the water and I did, and its been a rollercoaster ever since.

The only mechanical filtration I have is the prefilter in the BioMaster, which I haven't cleaned in a month.

I'm currently dosing:
4ml of Red Sea Alk
1ml of neo nitro (just so there is something)
1 tbsp per gallon Kalkwasser - dripping at 1ml per minute

When I didn't do the water changes, I was running AFR+Kalk. Should I just go back to that and stop doing water changes until PO4 and NO3 stable out? I'm not sure what to do, and I'm just tired of chasing these two.

I have 75gal with a canister filter. I was dosing Neonitro and Neophos to keep them in spec. Not seeing an end in site, I started feeding pellets in the mornings and frozen food at night. Both are much higher than I thought I needed to. Finally got the nitrates up to 8 and phosphates up to .1. Tank and everything in it look great. Might have to put all the inhabitants on a diet soon, . But, everything is good now.