High Nitrate

[GammaYankee]

I have 3-year-old 20 gallon nano with mixed LPS and SPS. About 6 months ago, my tank was matured to the point that 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate can be read with my Hanna checker. Then, I had a crash (probably due to the low nutrients and low iodine) and quite a few torches and hammers died. After that, my nitrate and phosphate started to grow slowly, even though I keep doing my 10% weekly water change. Right now, I am measuring 50 nitrate and 10 ppb phosphrous, using Hanna.
Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature. My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers. I have 2 clownfish, one small sixline wrass and a watchman goby. I am running an Aquamaxx HOB protein skimmer 24/7, and I have a small DIY chaeto reactor that runs 8 hrs a day.

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous. Should I start to dose carbon, something like red sea NOPO-X?

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[Dburr1014]

I have 3-year-old 20 gallon nano with mixed LPS and SPS. About 6 months ago, my tank was matured to the point that 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate can be read with my Hanna checker. Then, I had a crash (probably due to the low nutrients and low iodine) and quite a few torches and hammers died. After that, my nitrate and phosphate started to grow slowly, even though I keep doing my 10% weekly water change. Right now, I am measuring 50 nitrate and 10 ppb phosphrous, using Hanna.
Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature. My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers. I have 2 clownfish, one small sixline wrass and a watchman goby. I am running an Aquamaxx HOB protein skimmer 24/7, and I have a small DIY chaeto reactor that runs 8 hrs a day.

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous. Should I start to dose carbon, something like red sea NOPO-X?

Thanks in advance for any help.

50% water change will lower it 50% to 25ppm.

 

[Peair]

I have 3-year-old 20 gallon nano with mixed LPS and SPS. About 6 months ago, my tank was matured to the point that 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate can be read with my Hanna checker. Then, I had a crash (probably due to the low nutrients and low iodine) and quite a few torches and hammers died. After that, my nitrate and phosphate started to grow slowly, even though I keep doing my 10% weekly water change. Right now, I am measuring 50 nitrate and 10 ppb phosphrous, using Hanna.
Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature. My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers. I have 2 clownfish, one small sixline wrass and a watchman goby. I am running an Aquamaxx HOB protein skimmer 24/7, and I have a small DIY chaeto reactor that runs 8 hrs a day.

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous. Should I start to dose carbon, something like red sea NOPO-X?

Thanks in advance for any help.

What I did to lower my Nitrates was set up a dosing schedule of NO3-PO4 at 2mL per day, it took about two weeks for my Nitrates and Phosphates to get back in range, you have to take it very slow with this stuff because it is very strong.

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[GammaYankee]

What I did to lower my Nitrates was set up a dosing schedule of NO3-PO4 at 2mL per day, it took about two weeks for my Nitrates and Phosphates to get back in range, you have to take it very slow with this stuff because it is very strong.

​

I will try that. After it gets back to the normal range, did you do something different? Like adding bacteria? I don't want to rely on dosing chemicals, it's a headache without doser and I just prefer a more natural way. Thanks!

 

[GammaYankee]

50% water change will lower it 50% to 25ppm.

Yea, I can do that, but it will go back to 50 within weeks.

 

[Subsea]

Not knowing your maintenance schedules or your livestock, consider adding a more robust light above your SMALL Chaeto refugium. Also consider HOB algae refugium with a powerful light.

How often do you prune Chaeto & export nutrients.

 

[sixty_reefer]

I have 3-year-old 20 gallon nano with mixed LPS and SPS. About 6 months ago, my tank was matured to the point that 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate can be read with my Hanna checker. Then, I had a crash (probably due to the low nutrients and low iodine) and quite a few torches and hammers died. After that, my nitrate and phosphate started to grow slowly, even though I keep doing my 10% weekly water change. Right now, I am measuring 50 nitrate and 10 ppb phosphrous, using Hanna.
Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature. My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers. I have 2 clownfish, one small sixline wrass and a watchman goby. I am running an Aquamaxx HOB protein skimmer 24/7, and I have a small DIY chaeto reactor that runs 8 hrs a day.

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous. Should I start to dose carbon, something like red sea NOPO-X?

Thanks in advance for any help.

You may want to consider that 0.01ppm phosphate could be a limiting factor in your system. Did you verified this number with icp? If not try raising it by 0.01 ppm and verify if you have a phosphate deficiency.

 

[Dburr1014]

I will try that. After it gets back to the normal range, did you do something different? Like adding bacteria? I don't want to rely on dosing chemicals, it's a headache without doser and I just prefer a more natural way. Thanks!

I would be wary of carbon dosing when you have extremely low po4.

1) it will drive it to zero, then
2) it will stop working, you need no3 and po4 for it to work.

Water changes is the easiest. Control your food, dose phosphates.

 

[Dburr1014]

Yea, I can do that, but it will go back to 50 within weeks.

Weeks?
So do a 50%, then a weekly schedule of 10% to 20% to keep it in check.
Keep it simple.

 

[Peair]

I will try that. After it gets back to the normal range, did you do something different? Like adding bacteria? I don't want to rely on dosing chemicals, it's a headache without doser and I just prefer a more natural way. Thanks!

Your really need a doser for NO3-PO4, it has to be slow, very low volume, and consistent, I use a Hydros 2ml/min dosing pump, never more then 2ml a day, and it is on a controlled schedule in my Hydros app, I test for nitrates once a week and make adjustments if I ever have to, I never like to do manual dosing because you can over dose or make mistakes, I don't like short term fixes because you can have the same problem three weeks later, now you mention doing something different after getting in range, no but I do dose manually Fritz TurboStart 900 because you cannot use a doser with that, for I use Fritz 900 for every new tank cycle and then dose another bottle twice a year, no more then twice a year, it helps give you that bacteria you want, and it helps keep nitrates stable.

​

 

[Doctorgori]

My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers. I have 2 clownfish, one small sixline wrass and a watchman goby

What problem are you experiencing?

 

[Dburr1014]

What problem are you experiencing?

Did you read the first post?

About 6 months ago, my tank was matured to the point that 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate can be read with my Hanna checker.

Then, my nitrate and phosphate started to grow slowly, even though I keep doing my 10% weekly water change. Right now, I am measuring 50 nitrate and 10 ppb phosphrous, using Hanna.
Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature.

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous.

 

[Doctorgori]

Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous. Should I start to dose carbon, something like red sea NOPO-X?

I have had nitrates this high like forever, I can understand it making you nervous but nobody has ever established a hard line threshold where good is vs bad

Did you read the first post?

yes, I went back and re-read …
I was wondering if you were thinking the growing nitrates were the issue or just the 50 nitrates…
I even re-read it again, and you never actually stated an issue after your nitrate rebound.
Please pardon, there is no negative tone but I’m trying to find an issue …what does your livestock look like?
Numbers are numbers, they could alert you to trends but they are numbers…what your tank looks like and how it is doing is what matters..

I can get with dealing with elevated phosphate but
It VERY debatable if 50 nitrates is actually a bad thing per se

 

[Doctorgori]

My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers.

Apologies, I was just going by your last statement…didn’t get the vibe there was a current issue ( other than the numbers being off)

 

[1stPhantom]

Do you have a deep sand bed if so that could be the issue if your not cleaning part of your sand every water change or depending on your rock work the food you feed could be building up in them crevasse and is just decaying but personally when I see my nitrate rise I do a 50% while cleaning the sand bed then the next day I would do a another 20% water change to get rid of any excess nutrients left over from me disturbing the sand bed then dump in some nitrate eating bacteria from Dr.Times right after the 20% water change I do that for about 3 weeks and target feed everything if possible so there’s no extra
nutrients being added due to food if none of that work depending on the type of filtration you have may have to take out the filtration box or hang on the back filter completely along with a 70% then add nitrate eating bacteria also tried to add some copepods after you add the bacteria

 

[1stPhantom]

Now mind you I have a mixed reef 20g Long tank myself so it’s kinda similar

 

[gbroadbridge]

I have 3-year-old 20 gallon nano with mixed LPS and SPS. About 6 months ago, my tank was matured to the point that 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate can be read with my Hanna checker. Then, I had a crash (probably due to the low nutrients and low iodine) and quite a few torches and hammers died. After that, my nitrate and phosphate started to grow slowly, even though I keep doing my 10% weekly water change. Right now, I am measuring 50 nitrate and 10 ppb phosphrous, using Hanna.
Any idea why my nitrate just keep growing, even though I think my tank is pretty mature. My tank is currently fully stocked again, with a bunch of happy torches and hammers. I have 2 clownfish, one small sixline wrass and a watchman goby. I am running an Aquamaxx HOB protein skimmer 24/7, and I have a small DIY chaeto reactor that runs 8 hrs a day.

50 nitrate makes me a little bit nervous. Should I start to dose carbon, something like red sea NOPO-X?

Thanks in advance for any help.

50 ppm Nitrate is no big deal, and in a small tank like yours should simply be controlled by regular weekly water changes.

10% a week is normal tank maintenance.

 

[GammaYankee]

Not knowing your maintenance schedules or your livestock, consider adding a more robust light above your SMALL Chaeto refugium. Also consider HOB algae refugium with a powerful light.

How often do you prune Chaeto & export nutrients.

I am pretty consistent with my water change. 10-15% every week.

For the 25 gallon, I have 2 clownfish, one sixline wrass and a yellow goby. The 10 gallon frag system only has a damsel. I already have two DIY chaeto reactors, one on each system with grow lights coiled around the reactor, and I harvest my chaeto probably every three months.

 

[GammaYankee]

You may want to consider that 0.01ppm phosphate could be a limiting factor in your system. Did you verified this number with icp? If not try raising it by 0.01 ppm and verify if you have a phosphate deficiency.

I would be wary of carbon dosing when you have extremely low po4.

1) it will drive it to zero, then
2) it will stop working, you need no3 and po4 for it to work.

Water changes is the easiest. Control your food, dose phosphates.

That's really interesting. So the hypothesis is that I am low on PO4 and that limits the amount of NO3 the corals can take in? Dosing PO4 to get the nutrition intake going sounds reasonable but a little bit counter intuitive.

Also, thanks for all the replies. I am MIA for this week, super busy.

 

[GammaYankee]

Your really need a doser for NO3-PO4, it has to be slow, very low volume, and consistent, I use a Hydros 2ml/min dosing pump, never more then 2ml a day, and it is on a controlled schedule in my Hydros app, I test for nitrates once a week and make adjustments if I ever have to, I never like to do manual dosing because you can over dose or make mistakes, I don't like short term fixes because you can have the same problem three weeks later, now you mention doing something different after getting in range, no but I do dose manually Fritz TurboStart 900 because you cannot use a doser with that, for I use Fritz 900 for every new tank cycle and then dose another bottle twice a year, no more then twice a year, it helps give you that bacteria you want, and it helps keep nitrates stable.

​

Interesting. I may want to try the Fritz 900 as well. I used it to cycle my tank and after that, every week after water change I added brightwell bacteria.

Regarding the NO3-PO4, I am just dosing half the recommended amount by hand, using the syringe that comes with Hanna Alk tester. I guess that would be accurate enough? I use that to dose the trace elements anyways.