water chemistry questions

[DEMONREKON]

so ive had my 90gal tank 20Gal sump 7olbs marco rock 3inch sand bed running since march so about 4 months my water parameters are as follows
DKH 8.6 hanna tester
ph 8.3
salinity 1.025 refractometer
calcium 460 seachem titration
nitrates- 10ppm sailfert test kit
phosphate 0.45 this is hanna ulr tester
ammonia- 0 sailfert test kit
nitrite- 0 sailfert test kit

my phosphate had been at .02 to .1 i recently (about 3 weeks) added a snowflake eel and hand feed it krill every other day. can this be what is causing the spike in my phosphate. i just started the cheato in the refugium and run filter sock that i left a couple days longer than i normally do in. usually change it weekly and this was right at 2 weeks. i did just go thru an d ugly stage with brown and reddish sand got cuc and it has been clean since then. was getting some green hair algea and the lawnmower mowed it down and its gone. so that may also be part of the phosphate rise im seeing. have done several 10gal water changes when i was dealing with the ugly stage when cleaning the sand and tank walls. my gsp, duncans, and hammer and kenya tree all look good and are opening and closing normally. am i over reacting at the .45 phosphate or do i need to get more cheato to drop it.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

More foods for more fish will certainly raise nutrient levels.

 

[KrisReef]

Trust your eyes and your corals, and be careful hand feeding your eel. The food will quickly raise P levels as you have measured them, but an eel bite can cause a nasty infection in your system. Your eel will be hungry if you end up in the hospital with an IV drip to stop the infection.

 

[DEMONREKON]

Trust your eyes and your corals, and be careful hand feeding your eel. The food will quickly raise P levels as you have measured them, but an eel bite can cause a nasty infection in your system. Your eel will be hungry if you end up in the hospital with an IV drip to stop the infection.

by hand feeding im using tongs just regulating how much food it gets and only feeding it till it wont take more to make sure im not overfeeding and wasting it adding to the bio load.

 

[KrisReef]

by hand feeding im using tongs just regulating how much food it gets and only feeding it till it wont take more to make sure im not overfeeding and wasting it adding to the bio load.

Good enough! Some people put their hands in their tanks and I have seen an eel bite a hand that was over a tank when the eel tried to eat. Bloody mess and a serious injury.

Most fish can live with much less food than we think. My wife gets shrimp for dinner and she can eat a dozen easily. A 2 foot long eel can have a shrimp a week and survive ok. It may be hungry but in a fish tank it’s not going to starve like it would in the wild. There is a huge amount of energy in one shrimp for a sedentary fish.

Knock off the Thanksgiving feast’s for better results, ime.