overfeeding to maintain nutrients?

[jarviz]

So i have about 5ppm Nitrates and 0.08 phosphates in my 10 gallon (2 fish). I had to dose nitrates to even get it to 5ppm. This is probably due to my macro and corals absorbing it all. I've been also feeding pretty heavily to keep these numbers up. Corals are looking good an fish are active. Algae is minimal except for some minor GHA, brown dust coating on the glass, and some slight browning of the sand. I've even resorted to not siphoning out all the monster poop from my fish and turbo snail, and only changing my filter floss only a week.

I just want to make sure that these are the only nitrates and phosphates are the only two parameters i need to worry about and that there are no other long term side effects, when it comes to my feeding and cleaning routine right?

 

[Nano sapiens]

Many people do a 'heavy input/heavy output' routine. Feeding well is fine, but just remember to always remove the excess after the fish and corals have finished feeding.

IME, with small nano aquaria like my 12g nano (12+ yrs old), one can only let the sand bed go for so long without cleaning before eutrophication (nutrient enrichment) sets in to crash the party. Every system is different, but with one 2-1/2" fish that I feed well daily, and no mechanical or chemical filtration, I vacuum the sand bed weekly to remove waste. I clean out the back chambers of detritus monthly and the gunk under a base rock every 2-3 months (one base rock at a time, so five base rocks takes about a year to cycle through). This has what has worked for my system for a very long time now. This very mature system always runs 'undetectable' PO4 naturally and 2-3 ppm NO3.

You can check my tank link in my Sig to view the system.

 

[jarviz]

how long would it take for a overfeeding on one day for me to see the numbers on a test?

 

[Nano sapiens]

how long would it take for a overfeeding on one day for me to see the numbers on a test?

That depends on the bacteria types and quantity of bacteria in your system. For PO4, also depends on if your calcareous surfaces are already saturated with phosphate, or not.

The current feeding input seems to be working for you (happy fish and coral), so just find an export balance that keeps your PO4 and NO3 levels stable and where you want them to be.

 

[blasterman]

If it works dont change it.

Nitrate and phosphate levels are hyper critical in small tanks where there isn't much volume. I watch all these threads where reefers waste money on ICP tests when they need to focus on getting their basic nutrients right vs obsessing over their unubtanium and tri lithium crystal values.

After I got phosphate and nitrate levels locked on I have SPS growth that's ridiculous in both my 10 and 20 gallons. I can tell by looking at the growth nodes on my montipora and birdsnests how my phosphate levels are. I dont even have to test.

How you get those levels is of secondary concern. Feeding or dosing. Just be aware that when phosphate gets higher than .03 Ive found diatoms are a fact of life. Turbo snails take care of that.

Nitrate tends to be a much longer term indicator and can change slowly over a period of weeks or months as biology in your tank evolves.

In a larger tank with higher import and export those levels can be lower due to higher water volumes.