Thoughts on if I should start ammonia dosing

[sumpreef]

Hello all,

No matter how often I feed, I can barely get my nitrates to above 1. The tank is already overstocked and I feed at least twice a day maybe three times a day on weekends.

I also have a hair algae problem that I’m battling but the nitrates have been that way even before the hair algae became an issue.

Alk is around 8.1, calc 420, mg 1350. Phosphate 0.09.

I have an oversized skimmer that is on pretty much 24/7. Not sure if that is aggressively skimming away the nitrates.

Lots of primarily LPS corals and little bit of sps all growing but not growing super fast.

Thoughts on if I should start ammonia dosing?

Will the ammonia dosing to help with imbalance between the nitrates and phosphate help with the hair algae or will it fuel it even more?

Thank you!

 

[Boxed Fish]

ammonia dosing wouldn't help as bacteria turned that into coral food any way. but why not just turn the skimmer off and only one over night? you could also place food in the refugium if you have one and let that go to work which will add ammonia and nitrates

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Just how bad is the algae problem? You can't effectively fight algae while trying to increase nutrients at the same time. Corals really don't need much nutrients at all, and algae consumes nutrients much faster than corals do. Algae can also consume ammonia, so IMO you would be feeding the algae. IMO reduce nutrients and solve the algae problem, then turn your attention to the corals.

 

[sumpreef]

Here is a picture of the tank at the moment. Added some more cleanup cre and a sea urchin to hopefully help tackle this as well.


I can try turning off the protein skimmer briefly for a few hours a day to see i that helps with the problem

 

[EnterName]

I can try turning off the protein skimmer briefly for a few hours a day to see i that helps with the problem

I would rather listen to Mr. Mojo. Adding ammonia or turning off the skimmer will feed the algae. With that much algae growth I don't think a lack of nutrients is your issue. In natural coral reefs nitrate and phosphate are below 0.01ppm and yet corals don't starve. Your corals can digest particulate matter and have specialized uptake mechanisms for amino acids (Grover et al. 2008), as well as they can make use of urea (Grover et al. 2006), and more dissolved organics (Houlbrèque & Ferrier-Pagès 2009).

What I'm trying to say is: your tests won't pick up a significant portion of the dissolved compounds your corals have access to and they won't take up the particular food sources at all (Grover et al. 2008).

Turning off the skimmer will just lower gas exchange and let even more organics accumulate which might already be high enough. Ammonia might be low because it's also one of the preferred nitrogen sources of corals (Pernice et al. 2012), but also algae and bacteria. Taking up nitrate requires these organisms to reduce it back to ammonia first using enzymes that require trace elements and energy (Grover et al. 2003). That's a rather inefficient way to feed corals hence the required trace elements include iron (Fe) for "assimilatory nitrite reductase" (Swamy et al. 2005) which has very low concentration in saltwater and is taken up very fast (Shick et al. 2011).

 

[sumpreef]

Thank you!

 

[Boxed Fish]

Here is a picture of the tank at the moment. Added some more cleanup cre and a sea urchin to hopefully help tackle this as well.


I can try turning off the protein skimmer briefly for a few hours a day to see i that helps with the problem

a sea urchin will do but it will also irritate your corals s it tries to get in those tight spots for the algae. a tang or two could do wonders or a sea hare, reef safe crabs

 

[BryanM]

I had an urchin, it was a mistake. Wandered all over most of my corals. Plus it was a long spined version, and it grew fast, with its spines opened up when I rehomed it it was at least the size of a volleyball.

I also believe you need to resolve the algae problem, otherwise I think you're just going to be chasing your tail.

A good option for this could be a lawn mower blenny. They typically love the stuff.