Did phyto elevate my PO4 this fast?

[NanoNana]

My PO4 went from testing zero on redsea and tropic marin kits to 3.0 in 3 days.
It was reading zero on Sunday. I did a water change last night and tested this evening and it’s at 3.0.

24 gallon aio, nitrates are low at 2 ppm, ammonia is zero. I had an oops with a live phytoplankton spill while trying to pour 5cc. Maybe 20-25 cc spilled in.
Would that raise it so much so quickly?
Two small fish (gramma and firefish) 5 nassarius snails and one yellow lipped conch are the only tank inhabitants other than baby corals and a large whip gorgonian. Copepod population has exploded in the past 48 hours. I feed about an 8th of a cube of brine or mysis a day. Dose Reef energy about 3 days a week. (Ive been doing this for a month with no effect on PO4.). I tested today planning to start dosing PO4 because it always read zero. I know live phyto will elevate PO4. Just wanting to make sure that’s the culprit and ask if this will resolve with water changes or if I need to start with removal agents.

Thanks

Edit: so here is what actually happened. I was washing testing supplies when my mom fell ( she’s okay) my husband kindly put my things away for me. He didn’t know where I’d left off in the process and my guess is he didn’t rinse well. I washed and rinsed everything earlier and decided this just didn’t seem possible so tested again. My guess is that either the syringe, the vial or both were contaminated by phosphates from the soapy water and not properly rinsed by my helpful hubby. I ordered a Hannah for PO4 tonight. Lol

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Let us know if we can help with anything else.

 

[scotty333]

I bought a bottle of phyto and added 100ml to 525ltr tank , po4 went from 0.03 to 1 the next day

 

[Doctorgori]

I’ve noticed this also when I used to dose phyto
my take is it’s unused F/2
so I started harvesting right at peak but before the funky color change/crash

 

[NanoNana]

Thanks yall. As I said, I suspect contamination because that spike shouldn’t have been possible. I also suspect a margin of error in my test kits. I don’t think I have the nutrient export for this tank to be running this clean. I have a pretty low bioload and can believe ammonia

Let us know if we can help with anything else.

thanks! I’m sure I will have many questions when I start dosing.

 

[Reef By Steele]

My PO4 went from testing zero on redsea and tropic marin kits to 3.0 in 3 days.
It was reading zero on Sunday. I did a water change last night and tested this evening and it’s at 3.0.

24 gallon aio, nitrates are low at 2 ppm, ammonia is zero. I had an oops with a live phytoplankton spill while trying to pour 5cc. Maybe 20-25 cc spilled in.
Would that raise it so much so quickly?
Two small fish (gramma and firefish) 5 nassarius snails and one yellow lipped conch are the only tank inhabitants other than baby corals and a large whip gorgonian. Copepod population has exploded in the past 48 hours. I feed about an 8th of a cube of brine or mysis a day. Dose Reef energy about 3 days a week. (Ive been doing this for a month with no effect on PO4.). I tested today planning to start dosing PO4 because it always read zero. I know live phyto will elevate PO4. Just wanting to make sure that’s the culprit and ask if this will resolve with water changes or if I need to start with removal agents.

Thanks

Edit: so here is what actually happened. I was washing testing supplies when my mom fell ( she’s okay) my husband kindly put my things away for me. He didn’t know where I’d left off in the process and my guess is he didn’t rinse well. I washed and rinsed everything earlier and decided this just didn’t seem possible so tested again. My guess is that either the syringe, the vial or both were contaminated by phosphates from the soapy water and not properly rinsed by my helpful hubby. I ordered a Hannah for PO4 tonight. Lol

Glad you figured it out. If you are buying and using live phyto it should not make that large of a swing even if the producer harvested early. If taken as a percentage the overdose is still a very small percentage of the tank so the phosphate would have to be sky high in the phytoplankton. Higher than what one should start with in their culture.