Problems With Nutrients at 0

pedro2003

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Hello. I currently have a 28 gallon and having both nitrate and phosphate at 0. Tested more than one time. I'm using a hang on with built in skimmer and running (filter and skimmer) all the time and with purigen inside it. My tank has ~6 to 8 months. Should i just feed more? Is purigen removing nutrients from the water?


28 gallon
Salinity 1.025
Alk 8
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0
Ph




20240905_161837.jpg
 

Ironic_Water

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I just went through a 0 nutrient event (no detectable nitrate and phosphate) and have a big ugly dino bloom. I also carbon dosed, which no doubt caused the lack of nutrients and fed the dinos with carbon.

So, you may be safe from dinos, but who knows.

What I did was took my filter offline (kept the skimmer going to oxygenate the water and help my pH) to start getting some detectable nutrients - which helped my phosphate become detectable, but not nitrate. I've been dosing Nyos Nitrate+ as of today.

You may be starving your tank. I'd remove your purigen as well.
 

Red_Beard

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Been there brother. Nice tank!
As mentioned above, you can dose up your phosphate and nitrate levels. ammonia dosing is what i would recommend for nitrate should you go that route. Randy has an awesome how to here. And neophos for phosphate.
When mine hit about 5 months it bottomed out, got dinos and was sad. It took me a full bottle and a half to have detectable phos levels over about 2 months. But, then the dinos went away. I would also recommend removing the purigen. It is pulling organics. You may want to start using it after a few months when you get back in the grove, but right now it is not helping. The other recommendation is feed more and filter less. Get your fish good n chunky.
 

Razorbacks

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My tank is very similar to yours. It's a 20 long and my nutrients are always low and I get dinos every time I accidentally let them bottom out for too long. Luckily I have the kind that break up at night so UV has successfully eliminated them each time.

I used to aim for phosphate that just barely registered but realized that I get better results and faster growing corals if I aim for .05 phosphate or above. I think .02 or below is just too close to the error rate of the Hannah checker and depending on how often you test even a true reading of .02 could still be bottoming out between tests.

Personally I broadcast feed coral food to keep my nutrients up. I found dosing nitrate and phosphate directly works but is more of a hassle and I'd get cyano if I accidentally did too much as once. Feeding fish more and more just created health issues in my fish and still didn't get me where I needed to be.

Good luck!
 
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pedro2003

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Thanks for all suggestions! I'm removing the purigen and start to feed more frequently (with caution). I will try to find products for nit and phos dosing here. Should i also reduce skimming time?
 

Red_Beard

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Thanks for all suggestions! I'm removing the purigen and start to feed more frequently (with caution). I will try to find products for nit and phos dosing here. Should i also reduce skimming time?
You can, or if you like the oxygenation you can adjust it down. Kinda sucks, as it gets a sludge build up, but you get to keep it online and drastically reduce what it pulls out. That is what i did anyways. Or other people would recommend just pulling off the collection cup and letting it overflow, but that makes too big a mess with salt creep for my taste.
 

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