Where are my phosphates going???

[cillam]

The tank has always seemed to run low on phosphates. i started the tank last may (2023) and i have never been able to detect phosphates using the titration test kits so i bought a Hanna ULR phosphate tester and it normally shows .03. I had a round of Cyano and after a few weeks of no luck i decided to use chemiclean.

After i used chemiclean and killed all of the visible Cyano i started dosing MicroBacter 7 to boost the beneficial bacteria in the tank along with Phyto daily.
After around 2 weeks i had Dino's I tested the phosphates and it read .02 and the day after .00.
I ordered a UV Sterilizer and did a black out and i have not seen any more Dino's, I am now on day 4 post blackout.

I have stopped dosing MB7 as well as phyto as i want to increase the nutrients in the water. I have also turned off my skimmer and left the refugium light off. I have been dosing around .022PPM phosphates twice daily, but my phosphates still seem low.

For example Yesterday afternoon after dosing .022ppm phosphates using Brightwell NeoPhos my phosphates sat at .06ppm i took the reading about an hour or so after adding the Neophos. I then dosed again this morning around 03:00. I then added another .022ppm of phosphates this afternoon and took a reading about an hour later and now my phosphates are sat at .05ppm.

Yesterday i fed my coral with mysis shrimp and reefchilli. I fed the fish pellets twice, as well as a Mysis shrimp cube. Right now i just have 2 clowns, 2 cardinals and a Royal Grama.

It seems like no matter what i do i cant seem to keep my phosphates up, and i am now sure where they are going. Skimmer and refugium are off i am feeding more often and larger amounts as well as dosing .044ppm of phosphate every day.

Ideally i would like to get my phosphates to around .1 and then i can start dosing phyto again and turn the skimmer and refugium back on to remove the nitrates which i have plenty of, around 20ppm.

 

[KrisReef]

Did you start with dry rock?

 

[D3DPrintedThingz]

did you check your keester

sorry , bad habit. not sure , but i would recommend throwing in a couple extra frozen cubes. dont thaw it out either

 

[cillam]

Did you start with dry rock?

Yes i started with around 40lb of dry rock in a 60 gallon display, i then bought around 5lb of live rock from my LFS about 12 months ago just to add some bio-diversity.

 

[cillam]

did you check your keester

sorry , bad habit. not sure , but i would recommend throwing in a couple extra frozen cubes. dont thaw it out either

I normally thaw the shrimp in a small glass bowl with some tank water then dump it in.

 

[KrisReef]

Yes i started with around 40lb of dry rock in a 60 gallon display, i then bought around 5lb of live rock from my LFS about 12 months ago just to add some bio-diversity.

Eventually the dry rock will be in equilibrium with phosphorus in the tank and the numbers will rise easily.

I often get a lot of negative feedback when I mention this, some dry rock is saturated with P before it goes in. Yours isnt.

 

[cillam]

Eventually the dry rock will be in equilibrium with phosphorus in the tank and the numbers will rise easily.

I often get a lot of negative feedback when I mention this, some dry rock is saturated with P before it goes in. Yours isnt.

It seems that way. I have read a lot of posts with people trying to lower phosphates but i am the opposite, i am trying to keep them up.

 

[Dan_P]

The tank has always seemed to run low on phosphates. i started the tank last may (2023) and i have never been able to detect phosphates using the titration test kits so i bought a Hanna ULR phosphate tester and it normally shows .03. I had a round of Cyano and after a few weeks of no luck i decided to use chemiclean.

After i used chemiclean and killed all of the visible Cyano i started dosing MicroBacter 7 to boost the beneficial bacteria in the tank along with Phyto daily.
After around 2 weeks i had Dino's I tested the phosphates and it read .02 and the day after .00.
I ordered a UV Sterilizer and did a black out and i have not seen any more Dino's, I am now on day 4 post blackout.

I have stopped dosing MB7 as well as phyto as i want to increase the nutrients in the water. I have also turned off my skimmer and left the refugium light off. I have been dosing around .022PPM phosphates twice daily, but my phosphates still seem low.

For example Yesterday afternoon after dosing .022ppm phosphates using Brightwell NeoPhos my phosphates sat at .06ppm i took the reading about an hour or so after adding the Neophos. I then dosed again this morning around 03:00. I then added another .022ppm of phosphates this afternoon and took a reading about an hour later and now my phosphates are sat at .05ppm.

Yesterday i fed my coral with mysis shrimp and reefchilli. I fed the fish pellets twice, as well as a Mysis shrimp cube. Right now i just have 2 clowns, 2 cardinals and a Royal Grama.

It seems like no matter what i do i cant seem to keep my phosphates up, and i am now sure where they are going. Skimmer and refugium are off i am feeding more often and larger amounts as well as dosing .044ppm of phosphate every day.

Ideally i would like to get my phosphates to around .1 and then i can start dosing phyto again and turn the skimmer and refugium back on to remove the nitrates which i have plenty of, around 20ppm.

Dose more phosphate more often.

 

[Jasongtr]

I have 75lbs of marco rock in my 75g system, tank is just over 18 months old and I'm daily dosing phosphate to maintain it around 0.08ppm, I'd rather be doing this then using anything to reduce it though, seems more controlled having to dose it back in

 

[East1]

Eventually the dry rock will be in equilibrium with phosphorus in the tank and the numbers will rise easily.

I often get a lot of negative feedback when I mention this, some dry rock is saturated with P before it goes in. Yours isnt.

I agree with this. I believe P is able to bind to calcium and dry rock (or even certain types of coral sand) can be charged with P for quite some time before the tank hits equilibrium. This is likely because dry rock and crushed coral can have both no P bound, and nothing covering or growing on its surface and can uptake a lot of P, like the above post mentions, it also means reducing P once it’s equilibrated can be difficult if it is too high.

Keep an eye out for the point where the P dose starts to rapidly increase P because you really don’t want to overshoot, IMO it’s the point a lot of reefers start to get bad algae problems.