Phosphates Stuck at Zero

SteveL99 · Nov 19, 2021

I have 3 tanks and all are running low on Phosphates. My first tank now has dinos and I'm battling those. Second and third tank are stuck at 0.00 Phosphates. I've been dosing NeoPhos in large amounts (gradually). I test every day using ALL of the following: Red Sea Phosphate Pro, Hanna ULR Phosphate and the Milwaukee ULR Phosphate tester (using all 3 temporarily until I decide which one I trust/like the most). No matter how much NeoPhos I pour in, the level still reads 0.00 on all 3 kits. The NeoPhos bottle suggests I may be "carbon-limited" and suggests carbon dosing. I associate carbon dosing with LOWERING nutrient levels so I sent a support ticket to Brightwell asking about this. I'm feeding 4 cubes of PE Mysis and some nori every day (8 fish).

Any ideas why I wouldn't be able to raise my PO4?

KrisReef · Nov 19, 2021

Perhaps these test kits don't react with the phosporus molecules bound up in the neoPhos product so that they can determine the amount in the tank? Or you got a bad bottle of NeoPhos? Three kits is a lot of redundancy to find zero if there is some present. Can you test another reefers tank to compare?

zoaprince · Nov 19, 2021

Same thing happened to me. I would dose and test the next day and nothing. So I tossed it and bought https://mecoral.com/product/me-phosphate-concentrate/

I don't know the science as to why neophos was not working for me, but it just wasn't

HB AL · Nov 19, 2021

Add some large poopers and your problems will go away naturally.

ingchr1 · Nov 19, 2021

My tank has been up for a few years and I also had a hard time keeping detectable levels of Phosphate and Nitrate. Dosing Neophos, NeoNitro and NH4CL did not seam to work. So I decided to try Tropic Marin carbon dosing products. I started with Plus-NP, then once levels got up moved to Bacto-Balance. I only dosed the products for a few weeks as I started to see high algae and bacteria growth. Since stopping all dosing, about a month ago, Phosphate and Nitrate have maintained on thier own. Phosphate 0.10 to 0.15 and Nitrate 3 to 5. Something I have never seen with my tank in the past. I attribute it to the carbon dosing. Not sure if I'll start up the dosing again, or try it on a periodic basis. Currently ramping up my lighting duration. Will see where nutrients land when done. I also have an algae scrubber that I have not been running, so I think I'll get that up and running first.

Spare time · Nov 19, 2021

Just keep dosing it. Ignore the carbon limited thing that is nonsense when it comes to raising phosphate (I believe they are refering to raising phosphate to lower nitrate and then adding carbon dosing to get both down to where you want them).

merkmerk73 · Feb 1, 2023

Spare time said:
Just keep dosing it. Ignore the carbon limited thing that is nonsense when it comes to raising phosphate (I believe they are refering to raising phosphate to lower nitrate and then adding carbon dosing to get both down to where you want them).

This - I know this is an older message, but I ran into the same problem.

I , too, followed the stupid directions saying you're "carbon locked" - that's just boiler plate nonsense related to trying to lower nutrients.

Spare time · Feb 1, 2023

merkmerk73 said:
This - I know this is an older message, but I ran into the same problem.

I , too, followed the stupid directions saying you're "carbon locked" - that's just boiler plate nonsense related to trying to lower nutrients.

Brightwell assumes you are dosing their phosphate product to lower nitrate via some means and wants you to carbon dose their product to better lower nitrate and some phosphate.