Nutrients and your tank

[joseserrano]

Saw this video last night, I thought the guy did a great job of explaining things, easy to grasp. Check it out.

 

[Crustaceon]

It’s funny because it still confirms zero nitrates and phosphates are bad. It basically says “I’m pumping an absurd amount of food through my ultra low nutrient system and sucking out what isn’t being absorbed each day before it breaks down into n&p” which is fine. It’s like running a zeovit system. Where people fail with zero n&p is when they don’t follow the high import and export routine. You can’t just feed your fish a single cube of mysis once per day and expect that much poo to feed your ULNS acro system. There are typically a few more spoonfuls or squirts that get added to the tank and specifically for the coral to consume.

 

[joseserrano]

It’s funny because it still confirms zero nitrates and phosphates are bad. It basically says “I’m pumping an absurd amount of food through my ultra low nutrient system and sucking out what isn’t being absorbed each day before it breaks down into n&p” which is fine. It’s like running a zeovit system. Where people fail with zero n&p is when they don’t follow the high import and export routine. You can’t just feed your fish a single cube of mysis once per day and expect that much poo to feed your ULNS acro system. There are typically a few more spoonfuls or squirts that get added to the tank and specifically for the coral to consume.

For me it breaks down the importance of understanding your tank and not just ball parking x n&p which I see constantly recommended. Food/nutrient availability is different than just having x N&P

 

[Crustaceon]

For me it breaks down the importance of understanding your tank and not just ball parking x n&p which I see constantly recommended. Food/nutrient availability is different than just having x N&P

Either way it’s still “ballparking” it. Either you’re adding just enough food for your corals without increasing n&p which is something that takes time to develop and detect or those corals are stn’ing from not getting enough food. It’s a very old school way of doing things back when reefers were really good at stripping a tank bare of nutrients and the only way they could keep things like acropora alive was to dose aminos, etc. There were far more tank crashes back then because it’s a razor’s edge way of doing things. It can of course produce great results, but I would consider it a far more labor-intensive and unforgiving way of doing things.

 

[joseserrano]

Either way it’s still “ballparking” it. Either you’re adding just enough food for your corals without increasing n&p which is something that takes time to develop and detect or those corals are stn’ing from not getting enough food. It’s a very old school way of doing things back when reefers were really good at stripping a tank bare of nutrients and the only way they could keep things like acropora alive was to dose aminos, etc. There were far more tank crashes back then because it’s a razor’s edge way of doing things. It can of course produce great results, but I would consider it a far more labor-intensive and unforgiving way of doing things.

Just to clarify, corals won't STN from low nutrients. They will pale out and die off slowly, but not rtn. If ppl were trying to run zeo tanks yes, far more crashes for sure (very difficult to do, razor-thin lin indeed). I feel that technology/better equipment and people mostly buying aquaculture stuff has more to contribute than the new trend to have high N&P. People would be buying wild maricultues and colonies years back, which even experienced hobbyists will still have trouble with. We have to remember that corals make most of their food from light, not nutrients in the water.

 

[Crustaceon]

You listed that corals will not stn from a lack of nutrients and seemed to lump it together with rtn, which are two different things. Slow tissue necrosis can absolutely happen as a result of coral starvation, specifically from a lack of phosphates. RTN can also happen due to starvation, but typically stn, paling, etc. will be present before the coral “lets go” and rtn’s. In most cases rtn is due to a rapid shock such as an alk swing. I also get the mariculture point, but it doesn’t explain the overall difficulty in keeping sps when aquaculture frags were introduced. Reefers only recently started acknowledging that nitrates and phosphates weren’t necessarily bad things. This came after the “fragging” movement though and while people were still into ULNS. Aquacultured coral was expensive because it was seen (is still seen) as hardier and due to the fact that a lot more people were having less success trying to duplicate ULNS with mariculture coral. Unfortunately many reefers had the same difficulties with aquaculture coral and here we are with a universal “ball park” way of making things easier.

 

[joseserrano]

You listed that corals will not stn from a lack of nutrients and seemed to lump it together with rtn, which are two different things. Slow tissue necrosis can absolutely happen as a result of coral starvation, specifically from a lack of phosphates. RTN can also happen due to starvation, but typically stn, paling, etc. will be present before the coral “lets go” and rtn’s. In most cases rtn is due to a rapid shock such as an alk swing. I also get the mariculture point, but it doesn’t explain the overall difficulty in keeping sps when aquaculture frags were introduced. Reefers only recently started acknowledging that nitrates and phosphates weren’t necessarily bad things. This came after the “fragging” movement though and while people were still into ULNS. Aquacultured coral was expensive because it was seen (is still seen) as hardier and due to the fact that a lot more people were having less success trying to duplicate ULNS with mariculture coral. Unfortunately many reefers had the same difficulties with aquaculture coral and here we are with a universal “ball park” way of making things easier.

I am aware of the differences but I'm still sticking to my viewpoints. I guess it goes with the saying of there are a 100 ways to skin a cat.

 

[Crustaceon]

There are. Whatever works best for you and produces the desired results is fine.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Helpful video. Thanks for sharing @joseserrano!

 

[Mark Bradley]

Interesting watching. I am, as we speak, trying to get the balance between feeding and phosphate levels. I run a pellet reactor but it seems I’m not feeding enough to encourage the bacteria to break the pellets down as my phosphate is at 1.17ppm. I can’t use test kits as seem colour blind so I have Hanna checkers. I’ve also been told my skimmer isn’t great as if it were doing its job properly I would be getting the readings I am on nitrates and phosphates - the reactor and the skimmer working together should give me the desired outcome. Still learning!

 

[Hans-Werner]

Very beautiful tank and excellent explanation. Especially the explanation of the dynamic equilibrium is good.

The only thing that could be added is, that the macroalgae mainly export nitrate while corals need mainly phosphate for their growth. In my eyes this is the reason why macroalgae make it easier to keep corals. Their nutrient needs are complementary. Macroalgae take away excessive nitrate and in this way shift the nutrient balance to phosphate for good coral growth.

 

[mattzang]

coral euphoria does great videos on acros, i've definitely learned a lot from his videos. can't say the same for most of the youtube crowd

 

[Mickeyt1reef]

Saw this video last night, I thought the guy did a great job of explaining things, easy to grasp. Check it out.

I like Abe. Videos are informative and entertaining. I’ve also ordered from him. Nicely packed great size frags!

 

[Mandrake]

i am also a fan of Abe and I have ordered stuff from him , very nice coral frags and professionally delivered.

 

[Alistairn1]

Saw this video last night, I thought the guy did a great job of explaining things, easy to grasp. Check it out.

What a great video and has certainly answered a few questions of what I was thinking myself

 

[esther]

Love his videos!

 

[Marc2952]

as someone that is going through dinos, i will never run my tank that way.

 

[Irongolem411]

I never got acropora to grow before I started the heavy feeding regiment. My export consists of Skimmer and Algae scrubber. BigE turned me on to this approach.