Ultra low po4, very high no3. Carbon dose or heavy investment into live rock? Can't decide!

[2Wheelsonly]

Why is Live Rock going to cost 1,000.00 Dollars?

If I went with KP @ $10 shipped at around 100 lbs or so to supplement my dry rock. Hence why I’ll mix it up with TBS as it’s around $6 per lb. My system is larger @ 500+ volume.

the goal would be to remove around 100 lbs of life rock (the ones that are not so pretty) and replace them with live rock.

 

[2Wheelsonly]

Started with all dead rock (life rock) and dry dead sand 2 years ago.

Lots of automation to keep things stable. Roller Mat, GFO, UV, O3, KH Keeper and Auto dosers.
3 part dosing plus AF Components strong for trace elements.

90 gal system (75 display)

4 x Nero 5
2 x Hydra 64 HD
2 x Prime 16 HD

SG 1.026
Alk 8.0
Ca 430
Mg 1300
NO3 5-10 ppm
PO4 0.05-0.10
K 420
I 0.06

Stability.

It’s crazy because I never had issues with sps following my same methods. My previous 300g was jam packed. The only difference is this build has pretty much all Carib sea life rock. I wonder if part of my issue is the leaching. This rock sucks up phosphate like crazy and when I test I sometimes show 2-3pbb which is ultra low. I was able to get my nitrates to drop by actually aggressively dosing nitrates.

about 6 months ago I was having decent success with sps but still had issues with reds. They would turn green, all my green, blue and purple were fine. Then I’m guessing my po4 dosing caught up with me because my rocks started leeching and I had a massive turf algae infestation. This is why I feel the life rock is just causing me all types of issues.

 

[TangerineSpeedo]

Just throwing this out there... Hows your flow? What lighting and what intensity? Does your flow match your lighting intensity? ie: As your lighting ramps up, does your flow also?

 

[Krampus]

The Redfield Ratio

Your tank is phosphorus restrictive, so your nitrifying bacteria can't do what it needs to do and reduce the nitrogen (nitrates). I've experienced this multiple times myself. By feeding more dried food with more fish (supplying more phosphates, which dried food does a good job of adding), or simply dosing phosphates, you will both reduce the nitrates and provide the phosphates necessary to help your corals perform photosynthesis and grow.

 

[Krampus]

Just throwing this out there... Hows your flow? What lighting and what intensity? Does your flow match your lighting intensity? ie: As your lighting ramps up, does your flow also?

Without adequate levels of phosphates, photosynthesis can not occur and it null and voids any of the things you're suggesting. Without the supplies to make the food that corals need, flow will not mater.

 

[2Wheelsonly]

Just throwing this out there... Hows your flow? What lighting and what intensity? Does your flow match your lighting intensity? ie: As your lighting ramps up, does your flow also?

Good question, flow is roughly 100x and my light spread is high.

display tank is 72x48x30. Two full sized gyres, 2 tunze 4000gph on other end and 5 mp40 mixed throughout running at 100% crest at daylight. Ramp up matches lights.

lights are 7 xr30 g4 pros, 1 Neptune sky (replaced a dead 8th g4) and 4 Orphek 48 “ blue or3. Light blankets the entire tank. 280 par low and 450 top. Bad colors in sps everywhere, doesn’t seem to follow high vs low light placements.

 

[2Wheelsonly]

The Redfield Ratio

Your tank is phosphorus restrictive, so your nitrifying bacteria can't do what it needs to do and reduce the nitrogen (nitrates). I've experienced this multiple times myself. By feeding more dried food with more fish (supplying more phosphates, which dried food does a good job of adding), or simply dosing phosphates, you will both reduce the nitrates and provide the phosphates necessary to help your corals perform photosynthesis and grow.

On Monday I installed an auto feeder to drop pellets in addition to my daily frozen. I’ll note if I start to see it improve. My file fish won’t touch the dry food which bums me out because I’d like to automate feedings for when I travel. Everything else devours the pellets.

 

[gbroadbridge]

On Monday I installed an auto feeder to drop pellets in addition to my daily frozen. I’ll note if I start to see it improve. My file fish won’t touch the dry food which bums me out because I’d like to automate feedings for when I travel. Everything else devours the pellets.

I guess that's something I didn't mention.

My tank is permanently on auto feeder with pellets, as I travel a lot (6 out of 10 weeks)
For consistency with Nutrient levels the feeding is always the same, 4 feeds a day.
However I run GFO and a lanthanum drip overnight so the phosphates are locked in.
Heavy in and heavy out.

 

[fishywishy]

My parameters are around the same because i have 13 fish in a 55 gallon and i don’t have any problems, why don't you just make a big refugium and put a bunch of live rock in it instead of in your tank so you don’t have to rip apart your tank and add new rock, you also wont have to worry about bad hitchhikers because i can’t imagine how many you would get on 200 pounds of rock.

 

[2Wheelsonly]

Well my frustration got the best of me, started getting bad turf algae again on my rocks and my tank just ugly with AB+ light schedule (which is very ugly white to begin with because it doesn't show off the blue enough). I took about 300lbs of rock out. There is only about 20-40 lbs right now, threw the struggling red acros away too because I'm sick of looking at them lose color. Been in this hobby close to 15 years now and NEVER EVER had this struggle.

Going to order live rock, I welcome any pests it comes with. This Carib sea life rock looks good but it's been a challenge; 2 years with this tank and it will NOT balance out.

I do believe there are people that find success with all dry rock but I have to accept my limits, I feel it's a constant back and forth and after 2 years I am ready to have my SPS back as I miss them dearly!

 

[2Wheelsonly]

I guess that's something I didn't mention.

My tank is permanently on auto feeder with pellets, as I travel a lot (6 out of 10 weeks)
For consistency with Nutrient levels the feeding is always the same, 4 feeds a day.
However I run GFO and a lanthanum drip overnight so the phosphates are locked in.
Heavy in and heavy out.

After one week of pellets I now have a decent amount of po4. It's crazy how fast that changes...going from 100% reef frenzy where it was all nitrates. Interested to see how the influx of po4 balances out my no3.

 

[djf91]

I have a similar size tank as you with the same goals with SPS. I’m about to hit the two year mark and things are just starting to head in the right direction, although it’s been a very fragile ecosystem thus far. I still lose frags from time to time. Like you, I started with 300 pounds of dry rock + 80 pounds of live rock from a former tank. I believe this is why it has taken so long for the tank to stabilize and mature. There’s no substitute for starting a tank from all live rock like we did in the old days. I’m also having issues bringing my nitrates down. They currently sit at about 40.

 

[Jason_MrFrags]

Sounds like your ultimate goal is to have more sps in the tank.
So having nitrates that high could be restriction.

Please don't think that changing your live rock will change your situation, its just going to add another factor.

So balancing out your nitrates/p04 to allow bacteria to bring them both down. Could look into having a refugium for algae.

 

[2Wheelsonly]

Sounds like your ultimate goal is to have more sps in the tank.
So having nitrates that high could be restriction.

Please don't think that changing your live rock will change your situation, its just going to add another factor.

So balancing out your nitrates/p04 to allow bacteria to bring them both down. Could look into having a refugium for algae.

Understood,

I was looking at potentially placing around 20 lbs of TBS live sand and about 20 lbs of base live rock in sump (not sure if that's enough to help seed my existing larger system). I just want to focus on getting most of this "life purple rock" from carib sea out of the tank because it just soaked up po4 and then eventually my rocks get covered in algae. I feel I can never keep up.

The good news is that changing my feeding will help balance out po4 to where I can carbon dose on a schedule. I want to lower nutrients but keep them balanced. I will just have to keep at this for the next few months and hope for the best.

I do know some good things are happening because coraline is everywhere (constantly scraping off walls)

 

[TBDuval]

@2Wheelsonly - I had the same issue as you. My PO4 was super low 0 to 0.01 (Hanna) and my nitrates would be higher around 25 to 35. Same as with you, I would do a 50% water and in a couple of days my nitrates where back to where I started. So decided enough is enough and I put PO4 on a doser and started dosing Brightwell phosphate to the tank. Started with the dose of 3ml a day. I tested every few days and upped the dosage of phosphate until I was at a solid 0.03. During this time, my nitrates went from 25 to 2. I backed off phosphate dosing to 10ml a day and now my levels are holding solid at 0.03 - 0.05 PO4 and 5-8 Nitrates. I would look into PO4 as being why you nitrates are so high!