Hi all. After about a year of mixed reef keeping, I have started dosing red sea reef foundation, trace elements, reef energy plus and nopox. After 4 days of dosing, all parameters are in check, except nitrates which are sky rocketing from 10 before I started dosing to more than 50 today! What should I do? Continue to dose nopox and/or dose less energy plus? For my 500 liter tank, I am currently dosing 5 ml of nopox daily and 20 ml of reef energy plus
Reef Energy Plus and Nitrates?
- Thread starter Eleni18
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Big E
Valuable Member
What was your initial nitrate reading? 5mls per day of NOPOX is way below what you need to be dosing with your current levels above 10ppm per their instructions. You can ramp up if you like and maybe till your at least two thirds the dose of their instructions and monitor per nitrate tests if you want to go slower.
Double check to make sure your nitrates test kit is accurate.
Stop the Reef Energy plus altogether for now. This is what's causing your spike in nitrates.
Once you get your nitrates where you want them you can try to dose the reef energy again. Honestly, you probably don't need this at all. Most of the same nutrients will come from fish food and the ammonia, urea created by your fish.
Double check to make sure your nitrates test kit is accurate.
Stop the Reef Energy plus altogether for now. This is what's causing your spike in nitrates.
Once you get your nitrates where you want them you can try to dose the reef energy again. Honestly, you probably don't need this at all. Most of the same nutrients will come from fish food and the ammonia, urea created by your fish.
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Big E
Valuable Member
10 is fine.........there will be plenty of nutrients available for the corals. This 10ppm is what's left over after processing ammonia and also what's produced by the food you add for your fish.
That 20 mls per day is recommended based on their target of your tank being at much lower levels. For nitrates it's below 1.0ppm or even lower and your po4 in a range of .03-.10. That is only if you need to keep those levels from bottoming out.
In other words you're throwing in the Reef Energy to make up for the NOPOX sucking all your nutrients up.
If your nitrates were at 10ppm you really don't need to be dosing NOPOX. What's was your Po4 before you started?
That 20 mls per day is recommended based on their target of your tank being at much lower levels. For nitrates it's below 1.0ppm or even lower and your po4 in a range of .03-.10. That is only if you need to keep those levels from bottoming out.
In other words you're throwing in the Reef Energy to make up for the NOPOX sucking all your nutrients up.
If your nitrates were at 10ppm you really don't need to be dosing NOPOX. What's was your Po4 before you started?
Big E
Valuable Member
Keep this in mind............they target scant levels of nutrients so you use their food products to dirty the water and then you have to use the NOPOX to clean it up or keep those test numbers in balance.
Thanks. I see what you mean. PO4 was around 0.1. So you think I should stop dosing reef energy and dose nopox until nitrates are back to about 10? And how much nopox should I dose to get nitrates back to 10?
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Big E
Valuable Member
Ok, yes, your nutrient levels were actually fine before you started. The directions are to dose 15mls for your 500 liter system. I'd go less to start. Try 10mls a day and then test in a week. Adjust accordingly..........if you aren't getting enough movement down you can raise the dose. Don't go above 15mls per day.
You should have a booklet that came with your NOPOX and the directions are also the same on the bottle.
Keep an eye on your po4..........you don't want it to bottom out, but it should be ok.
You should have a booklet that came with your NOPOX and the directions are also the same on the bottle.
Keep an eye on your po4..........you don't want it to bottom out, but it should be ok.
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