The worst paradigm to hit the hobby and more specifically the SPS world

The worst paradigm to hit the hobby is getting your nutrient levels as low as possible?

  • Yes

    Votes: 290 52.5%
  • No

    Votes: 100 18.1%
  • Other (please explain)

    Votes: 22 4.0%
  • Not Sure

    Votes: 140 25.4%

  • Total voters
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Joedubyk

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The worst paradigm to hit the hobby is getting your nutrient levels as low as possible?

Is trying to get your nutrients as low as possible the worst paradigm to hit the hobby? Is it me, or is every other "corals" struggling/dying post always seem to come with either nitrates, phosphate, or both completely bottomed out?

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Sdot

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Is trying to get your nutrients as low as possible. Is it me, or is every other "corals" struggling/dying post always seem to come with either nitrates, phosphate, or both completely bottomed out?
Hmmm, i think it depends on what your levels are now. Most folks are struggling to maintain proper nutrient level.
 

Charlie’s Frags

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Totally agree. I’m not saying just throw a bunch of pellets and Reed roids in your tank bc n/p don’t matter, but they don’t need to be low/ultra low to have healthy colorful Acropora. 25-50 no3 and 0.25 po4 isn’t going to kill sps or brown them out, but starving them and over stripping the tank to get them to 2.5/0.03 will.
 

Sweet Reef Corals

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Totally agree. I’m not saying just throw a bunch of pellets and Reed roids in your tank bc n/p don’t matter, but they don’t need to be low/ultra low to have healthy colorful Acropora. 25-50 no3 and 0.25 po4 isn’t going to kill sps or brown them out, but starving them and over stripping the tank to get them to 2.5/0.03 will.
Completely agree! I maintain .05 - .10 Phosphate and 10-20 Nitrate and SPS love it.
 
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Joedubyk

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how do you find and maintain that balance without starving corals or having major algae issues? How do you find the sweet spot?


Nuisance algae is the 2nd most misunderstood area or reefing. A lot of vendors have 20+ nitrates because most find it gives corals better color (WWC for example). I don't think algae needs a lot of ANYTHING to grow crazy. I think when a tank first starts, you're almost always going to get an ugly algae phase. There's like 10 different ways to help out. Clean up crew, fuge (I think works wonders because it will out compete the nuisance algae), turf scrubber, and getting fish that munch on it, are all the best. Once the ugly algae phase is over, it's over.
 
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Joedubyk

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Starvation + any alk large alk swings = death ime.


Yes,! and one of the hardest lessons I le arned is your coral can look fine for WEEKS (maybe months) with super low no3/po4 then one day all hell will break lose and it will take months for most to recover (and tahts if they survive it).
 

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how do you find and maintain that balance without starving corals or having major algae issues? How do you find the sweet spot?
It all depends on your coral load. Like right now, my SPS are consuming so much, that I have had to turn my skimmer off. I’m only running it for 4 hrs, just to get the pH up in the morning.
Clean up crews for algae. I have a ton of snails. Testing often is the key to maintaining a good set of numbers.
 
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Joedubyk

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Yes,! and one of the hardest lessons I le arned is your coral can look fine for WEEKS (maybe months) with super low no3/po4 then one day all hell will break lose and it will take months for most to recover (and tahts if they survive it).

You bring up another good point. Reguarly testing. Whether its weekly or bi weekly. Yes, most people are in tune with their tank. but it's always when something goes out of whack, you don't notice it, and by the time the corals show it, its far too late. if you jsut test, you nip things in the bud
 

lilgrounchuck

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how do you find and maintain that balance without starving corals or having major algae issues? How do you find the sweet spot?
What I’ve noticed is I judge by my glass now, and testing numbers correspond. I’ve found that everything in my tank seems to look and grow best with around .25 no3 and ~.1 po4. At this level I have to clean the film algae off about twice a week. Any more than that I know my numbers have crept up so I’ll feed a bit less, any less than that and I’ll feed a bit more.
 

Ike

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As systems mature and corals grow I think people forget that demands for nutrients increases. As you crank up the CO2 and dosing amounts it's important to also add fish/fish load and/or feed heavier. I can't stress enough how important it is for corals to have a readily available nitrogen and phosphorous source. If you don't, I can assure you it will cause a lot more harm than those parameters being a little elevated.
 

najer

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I have had a series of unfortunate events, phos hit 3 (off the scale) and nitrates 100 (off the scale) but slowly recovering, I should test, maybe tomorrow! ;)
Obviously all my acros rtn'd! :)

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Joedubyk

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As systems mature and corals grow I think people forget that demands for nutrients increases. As you crank up the CO2 and dosing amounts it's important to also add fish/fish load and/or feed heavier. I can't stress enough how important it is for corals to have a readily available nitrogen and phosphorous source. If you don't, I can assure you it will cause a lot more harm than those parameters being a little elevated.

Yup, and will cause people to feed less because they're afraid of getting parameters a little elevated. It's really a triple whammy
 

revhtree

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Is trying to get your nutrients as low as possible. Is it me, or is every other "corals" struggling/dying post always seem to come with either nitrates, phosphate, or both completely bottomed out?

Very good discussion thread. I'm going to add a poll and use it tomorrow for the question of the day! Do you mind if I add a graphic to your first post?
 

Ike

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To add to my post above... It's why most hobbyists shouldn't be messing with carbon dosing and dosing of nitrogen and phosphorous. It becomes really difficult to balance and to control the bacterial balance that you throw off through manipulating nutrients.
 

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It all depends on your coral load. Like right now, my SPS are consuming so much, that I have had to turn my skimmer off. I’m only running it for 4 hrs, just to get the pH up in the morning.
Clean up crews for algae. I have a ton of snails. Testing often is the key to maintaining a good set of numbers.
I feel skimmers today are almost too efficient as well, and hobbyist are extremely reluctant to turn their skimmers off when corals are screaming at them “Feed me Seymour, feed me”. I too only run my skimmer parts of the day to help with Ph. I also have a couple spots of hair algae that don’t bother me bc my corals look happy. I’d rather have a tank full of happy sps and a little hair algae than zero algae with stressed/starved acros.
 
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