Is it not common knowledge? You're supposed to dose it into a filter sock or something to catch the particles so that the fish don't breathe it in. Tangs are especially vulnerable. The clouding is the result of precipitate and that precipitate impacts their gills and can kill sensitive fish such as tangs
I think any sort of liquid phosphate remover
I can tell you I've been dosing lanthium at 1ml per 90g daily for the past two months to manage phosphates exceptionally well, with no fallout. I don't even use a filter sock and simply drop 1ml in front of my skimmer. This is half the recommended dose however, but I get no clouding in the display and no sign of fish irritation.
yes its only really an issue if you mad with the stuff and cloud up your tank.
I had a lot of issues with SPS and GFO. I think I had a hard time controlling it with a reactor, and it dropped too much too fast. With lanthium, it drops quickly but only a tiny amount according to your measurement. Much less harsh on sensitive coral.
That is why i stuck with PHOSGUARD > GFO - people were telling me its more controllable. I would rather have higher phosphates that are slowly going down, than bottoming out nutrients.
I would imagine its people who go mad with it and cloud up their tanks that loose fish the most lol
The way to control it and lower phosphate slowly is to use half of what you think you need and only have a tiny trickle of water flowing through the reactor.
I was actually thinking of doing that. Just ordered some ROWA GFO yesterday in hopes of speeding up the process a bit, and not risking aluminum. At this rate I feel like I will be reliant on some phosphate exporter long term.
I know you don't like the "unorthodox/uncommon" advice, but just don't care about your NO3. @Kato, in the beginning of the thread hit the nail on the head.
The problem is I am having issues with the tank. Some corals dont look the best, and randomly I have RFA's slowly getting smaller. The only issue with my params is Phosphates are to high, and nitrates to low. The fact I am trying to get the phosphates lower may be bothering the corals as the params are changing each week, but I imagine it is more so the fact the phosphates are to high. Anyways I appreciate your opinion, but just totally disagree. Just "letting it go" would cause more problems with my tank in the long run, and give me a lack of understanding on my water params. Did you even look back and see where it was at earlier?I know you don't like the "unorthodox/uncommon" advice, but just don't care about your NO3. @Kato, in the beginning of the thread hit the nail on the head.
If you feed daily you add nitrogen, the ammonia, which corals much prefer to NO3, will nourish your corals before it's available as NO3 which is then kept low and unavailable for algae. This is perfect!
Only if the corals go pale, you might have too little nitrogen. Look at your corals. They love the PO4 and are colorful, so why try and remove it? It's not adverse for the corals.
Feed your fish, look at your corals and general health of the aquarium and do water changes accordingly. It's such a small tank, this is by far the easiest, simplest and most repeatable approach.
Just my 10 cents.
Yes, I read through the posts, and thought: "so many imaginary problems people try to fix with guesswork and multiple pronged attacks, how can they know what works and what doesn't?"
I agree more or less, I have had really a successfully sps-dominated tank, with phosphates as high as 0.6 and nitrates virtually undetectable. I did get a lot of nuisance slime and stuff forming when I had nutrients like that. If I put a frag rack in the tank it would need to be taken out and cleaned within a fortnight, was very annoying. I think the high phosphates were good for the corals but it's better to keep them lower because it prevents so much nuisance slimes and algae from forming.Yes, I read through the posts, and thought: "so many imaginary problems people try to fix with guesswork and multiple pronged attacks, how can they know what works and what doesn't?"
If you read Andrew Shantz paper on corals' reaction to elevated N and P, you can see it's scientifically proven that PO4 in itself, is "neutral to beneficial" for corals and not detrimental. Nitrate was the opposite.
So if you throw away the glasses that make you view PO4 as bad and NO3 as important, you are left with good nutrient numbers with other glasses. Why not try wearing these glasses for a few minutes and do a brainstorm?
If your corals look stressed, then what could it be? Instead of focusing on a presumption about nutrients, I would brainstorm this.
Maybe the lighting conditions and penetration has changed. Maybe there is a fish or crab annoying the corals. Maybe stray voltage is present. Maybe there are too many bristleworms. Maybe aiptasia underneath the coral. etc etc.
All of these are possible as well, but the PO4 has been made the culprit from the get go, and working on it has not helped it seems.
So maybe it's something else.
I run PO4 0.2-0.9 and NO3 at 0.0-1.0 depending on the tank btw. No corals lose color or tissue with this. On the contrary.
I know you didn't ask, and I'm sorry for butting in. But we are all passionate reefers, we can't help it.
Good luck with the tank, I hope your corals improve, I know how frustrating it can be when they don't!
Show me any legitimate source saying 1.0+ppm of phosphate is in no way detrimental to your tank that is not a 70 page research paper done by one person.. Kind of hard to believe seeing the ocean has basically 0 phosphates.Yes, I read through the posts, and thought: "so many imaginary problems people try to fix with guesswork and multiple pronged attacks, how can they know what works and what doesn't?"
If you read Andrew Shantz paper on corals' reaction to elevated N and P, you can see it's scientifically proven that PO4 in itself, is "neutral to beneficial" for corals and not detrimental. Nitrate was the opposite.
So if you throw away the glasses that make you view PO4 as bad and NO3 as important, you are left with good nutrient numbers with other glasses. Why not try wearing these glasses for a few minutes and do a brainstorm?
If your corals look stressed, then what could it be? Instead of focusing on a presumption about nutrients, I would brainstorm this.
Maybe the lighting conditions and penetration has changed. Maybe there is a fish or crab annoying the corals. Maybe stray voltage is present. Maybe there are too many bristleworms. Maybe aiptasia underneath the coral. etc etc.
All of these are possible as well, but the PO4 has been made the culprit from the get go, and working on it has not helped it seems.
So maybe it's something else.
I run PO4 0.2-0.9 and NO3 at 0.0-1.0 depending on the tank btw. No corals lose color or tissue with this. On the contrary.
I know you didn't ask, and I'm sorry for butting in. But we are all passionate reefers, we can't help it.
Good luck with the tank, I hope your corals improve, I know how frustrating it can be when they don't!
