Phosphate, where did you go!?!

[anygiven60]

After setting up my T5/LED hybrid light my nitrate and phosphate bottomed out completely. Was running dual xr15s only prior to adding the t5 hybrid. Nitrates went from an average 5ppm to 1ppm and Phos went from .12 ppm to 0 on the Hanna ULR and stayed at those levels for a couple of weeks. I fed frozen mysis and brine three times a day for weeks with no raise on either level. Tried heavy feedings of oyster feast and reef roids and again no raise in either level. Skimmer set to skim very very very dry. Even left the drain plug out to let it drip back in. At one point I couldn't have a sock last more than 15-18 hours without overflowing. I started to dose NeoNitro and NeoPhos. I did that for over a week based on their calculations and saw no positive results. I doubled the dose of NeoNitro and have managed to get my nitrates up to 10ppm which I am thrilled about over the course of a couple of weeks. However, I tried double dosing NeoPhos with no results, I even tripled dosed and was surprised when I saw detectable phosphate in the system! Here lies the issue. I can triple dose and get my phos to test at .046ppm after 24 hours, triple dose again and 24 hours later, it reads 0! I am at a lost with this witch craft. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

65gal
1.026
77-78 at all times
nitrates now at 10 whooohooo
Phos scares me with it's penn and teller act
cal 450
mag 1450

kole tang
pair of mocha storm clowns
six line
royal gamma
5 torches which have done surprising well through all of this
a few zoa frags which dont want to open most of the time
sps taken out and re-homed after the drop due to alk burn.

 

[sandfan85]

Watching from behind the wizards curtain.

I’m having the same exact issues. I’ve removed my ATS, filter socks, skim is super wet and dumping back in to sump. I virtually have no algae growing (battling dinos), and still my phosphates are playing hide-n-go seek.

 

[taricha]

Watching from behind the wizards curtain.

I’m having the same exact issues. I’ve removed my ATS, filter socks, skim is super wet and dumping back in to sump. I virtually have no algae growing (battling dinos), and still my phosphates are playing hide-n-go seek.

People with dinos have a really hard time elevating PO4. Dinos can apparently lock up a large amount of it.

 

[anygiven60]

Quick update.

Nitrates are holding rock solid at 10ppm without any dosing for 3 days straight.
Phosphates however went from 15ppb, dosed again, tested next night at 7ppb, dosed again and tonight 0!

There is ooooobviously witchcraft at play here. Also to note, I do not have dinos. Only noticeable algae is very slight film algae on the glass that is removed after three days.

Any help or advice would be very much appreciated!

 

[anygiven60]

bump

 

[wareagle]

I have to dose .3ml neophos everyday, if I miss a day, any film algae on the glass starts to turn white and I get 0 on my hanna. Why not just dose everyday and not let any algae grow?
I've noticed in my tank that the film algae can actually consume a good bit of phosphate. I was originally letting it grow on the back panel because it's black and you can't see any algae on it, I was dosing 1 ml of neophos at that time when I decided to completely clean it off and then my phosphates spiked. Now I'm cleaning all the glass EOD and using much less neophos. You may want to see if there's a relationship between your algae and phosphates, you said you're cleaning the algae every three days and getting a zero on your 3rd day of testing. Growing algae is consuming nutrients, just like growing corals will use more alk and calcium.

 

[anygiven60]

I was dosing 12ml of neophos and getting little to no results with it. I stopped dosing two days ago, wasn't getting any where with it.

 

[wareagle]

I was dosing 12ml of neophos and getting little to no results with it. I stopped dosing two days ago, wasn't getting any where with it.

I know they've changed the strength of it at least once, and there were some complaints on here, maybe you got a bad bottle. Have you tried dosing 1ml into a fresh gallon of saltwater to see what you get? I think seachem also makes a phosphate supplement, but I don't have any experience with it.
This thread has a link to food grade phosphate and some calculators to use them, and some of them were having the same problem with neophos as you.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/neophos-dosing.342044/

 

[anygiven60]

Oddly enough this is one of those "new extra concentrated bottles" haha. It hasn't done much of anything for my tank at all. My nitrates are up and holding so I am fine with that. Going to stop dosing completely and see what happens.

 

[PatW]

I have had a similar experience. I have a low bio load, a big tank (300 gallon) and vigorous export: 500 gallon rated skimmer, filter socks cleaned twice per week, chaeto in refugium and water changes about 5% per week.

i dose both nitrates and phosphates. Nitrates drift between 1 ppm and 2 ppm. So nitrates stay pretty stable. Test is Red Sea Pro.

Phosphates swing between undetectable to .05 ppm with most of the results between 0 and .03 ppm. Test is Hanna ULR.

I believe that if the algae, corals etc decide to slurp up phosphates, they can do so and rapidly deplete the store in the water. I figure as long as the corals and other things see available phosphates daily, they are probably OK.

 

[MabuyaQ]

Phosphates precipitate on/in calciumcarbonate structures/surfaces and most reeftanks have plenty of those.
So besides the algae your liferock and or sand may be using the PO4 you dose. Stick to it untill the precipitation stops.

 

[funkmuffin]

Sounds like my story... short version: Dino outbreak, phos 0, nitrate 0, fading then extreme browning in all my SPS but one stick.

Pulled my chaeto reactor, downsized-then-stopped skimming. Nitrates came up to ~12ppm, phosphates were still 0.
Started dosing NeoPhos about 5 weeks ago, and it took until just the other day for my phosphates to hold steady. I dosed ~20-30ml of NeoPhos each day (clearly my bottles were the lower concentration version...) and it took 5 weeks in 45 gallons of water to get back to something resembling balance. Some of my corals are starting, very slowly, to bounce back and I'm seeing more competitors for P and N popping up in the tank.

My advice is to stick it out, keep testing, keep up the dosing on a schedule, and the levels should get to a balance point as the tank adjusts.

Note: I went through two bottles of NeoPhos getting things back to balance - and haven't had to dose for the last three days. Seems feeding alone is supplying enough P now that I got supply and demand in better balance. Also have my skimmer back online and levels are holding even with continuous skimming.

 

[johnalicia]

Feed more. If live stock is happy why chase numbers.

 

[anygiven60]

Sounds like my story... short version: Dino outbreak, phos 0, nitrate 0, fading then extreme browning in all my SPS but one stick.

Pulled my chaeto reactor, downsized-then-stopped skimming. Nitrates came up to ~12ppm, phosphates were still 0.
Started dosing NeoPhos about 5 weeks ago, and it took until just the other day for my phosphates to hold steady. I dosed ~20-30ml of NeoPhos each day (clearly my bottles were the lower concentration version...) and it took 5 weeks in 45 gallons of water to get back to something resembling balance. Some of my corals are starting, very slowly, to bounce back and I'm seeing more competitors for P and N popping up in the tank.

My advice is to stick it out, keep testing, keep up the dosing on a schedule, and the levels should get to a balance point as the tank adjusts.

Note: I went through two bottles of NeoPhos getting things back to balance - and haven't had to dose for the last three days. Seems feeding alone is supplying enough P now that I got supply and demand in better balance. Also have my skimmer back online and levels are holding even with continuous skimming.

Thankfully I was able to get some nitrates up and stable before dino kicked in. However my phos has been what it is, there then not there. I'm contributing it to what some others have suggestion, it being pulled in by other things. My pink coralline is still exploding and possibly the reason. It was slow going when it was just LEDs, and adding the T5 hybrid may have kick started it.

Feed more. If live stock is happy why chase numbers.

Livestock is very well fed. Get one cube of brine and one cube of mysis three times a day. They are more than happy, my SPS and zoas on the other hand are not. Oddly my 5 torches have been completely unaffected.