High Phosphates and Zero Nitrates

[nilaydeshmukh]

Zero nitrates has been my issue for several months now. If I feed more to the fish, Phosphates tend to go up between 1 & 2 and has no effect on raising the nitrates. I have been adding nitrates (Brightwell NeoNitro) to keep up. If I stop adding for a couple of days, nitrates drop down. Adding nitrates cant be a long-term solution.

I feed fish my home made (BRS Recipe) frozen food 2-3 times a day. Got an automatic filter sock, skimmer, and Cheto in the refugium. If I am taking out too much then I would think Phosphates should also go down but phosphates keep going up and nitrates stay at zero. Corals look good but they don't grow fast enough (for me).

What am I doing wrong?

 

[PSU4ME]

What are you testing with? Any way to remove the chaeto for a test? How many gallons #LR and fish?

 

[nilaydeshmukh]

What are you testing with? Any way to remove the chaeto for a test? How many gallons #LR and fish?

Thanks @PSU4ME

I am testing with Hanna Nitrate (Low Range) and Hanna Phosphate (High Range). I could potentially remove Chaeto and put it in a hospital tank for a while for testing. 170 Gallons total volume w/ sump (- rocks). Live rocks with fish (12 fish including 5 tangs) and corals. Thanks again for your prompt response.

 

[cablez]

Ummmmmm try ultra low range for phosphate tester.........before you do anything crazy O_O.......Then look into phosphate-E and laugh at phosphates as they decline

 

[Chris A.]

What are you feeding?
Frozen foods tend to be higher in No3 and pellets/flakes are higher in Po4

 

[dz6t]

Phosphate-E is lanthanum chloride, a reagent for cleaning swimming pool as a phosphate remover. It is very effective and strip phosphate out of water and cause your coral to stave. If you choose to use it, after the phosphate hits 0, toss in some home made frozen food to help boost it back up.

in general, if your coral looks good and no excess algae, I won’t worry about too much nitrate and phosphate, on the other hand, if N and P hits 0, throw in more food.

 

[nilaydeshmukh]

What are you feeding?
Frozen foods tend to be higher in No3 and pellets/flakes are higher in Po4

I feed frozen, I don't fee pallets. . . It should be other way around, that is what confuses me as well. I have made my own frozen food (BRS recipe) which is very similar to Rod's frozen food.

 

[Slombardi]

Might be worth testing with a different nitrate kit to confirm. I have always liked the red sea one.

 

[nilaydeshmukh]

Phosphate-E is lanthanum chloride, a reagent for cleaning swimming pool as a phosphate remover. It is very effective and strip phosphate out of water and cause your coral to stave. If you choose to use it, after the phosphate hits 0, toss in some home made frozen food to help boost it back up.

in general, if your coral looks good and no excess algae, I won’t worry about too much nitrate and phosphate, on the other hand, if N and P hits 0, throw in more food.

Thanks Dong! Not planning on using Phosphate-E yet. I don't want to do anything crazy since there is no good reason to. Corals are doing well (so far) and don't want to take a risk. I am just puzzled why nitrates bottom out and phosphates go up with the homemade frozen food.

 

[nilaydeshmukh]

Might be worth testing with a different nitrate kit to confirm. I have always liked the red sea one.

Yep! I was in fact using Read Sea all along and thought I should try a different kit to verify the results and got Hanna Checker recently. . . same results.

 

[dz6t]

When you make frozen food, what do you use?

 

[nilaydeshmukh]

When you make frozen food, what do you use?

I made this new batch about a month ago

 

[this is me]

Use a color chart test to see if there’s a color at all.
my Hanna HR doesn’t register my nitrate either. But when I use the RSP color chart test, I do see it turn pink which indicate there’s nitrate. It just too low for the Hanna to read it.
likewise, you can take a cup of tank water and add a drop of the brightwell nitrate to it and test it to see if the Hanna is reading anything. Could be the tester(both the device and the operator)

 

[cablez]

Phosphate-E is lanthanum chloride, a reagent for cleaning swimming pool as a phosphate remover. It is very effective and strip phosphate out of water and cause your coral to stave. If you choose to use it, after the phosphate hits 0, toss in some home made frozen food to help boost it back up.

in general, if your coral looks good and no excess algae, I won’t worry about too much nitrate and phosphate, on the other hand, if N and P hits 0, throw in more food.

I use phosphate-E all the time.......Yes you can sureley over dose it.....but if you actually read the directions and dose like supposed to....then it is quite safe......I usually dose it like once a month for my needs.

 

[luu78]

As I learned from reading, phosphate is being taken up much slower than nitrates per Redfield ratio. At your present nitrate to phosphate ratio, I personally think you should proceed to lower phosphate since it is way out of balance. Either adding pre-calculated amount of lathanum chloride in the skimmer (not consistent result but quicker and very cost effective) or GFO in a reactor (steady and more consistent but not as cost effective). I have been experimenting with lathanum chloride for phosphate removal off and on for last few months and have a couple observations of visual changes to my tank 24 hours after dosing. My skimmate is more brownish and has a more fishy smell to it, and any frags that sit at the bottom of the tank tend to grow more a lot more nuisance algae over them since the lathanum chloride binds to the phosphate and just sink if not remove mechanically through filtration. Standard felt filter sock does not help with removal of the now binded lathanum chloride /phosphate. No visual change in color of filter sock seen. It tends to leave clumpier detritus on the bottom of your tank. You need something much finer like a 1-5 µm. It seems to work well when injected in the skimmer through the skimmer neck. It is the most effective way to solve phosphate problem if you’re willing to start with a lower baseline dosage and willing to do daily phosphate level testing and increasing/decreasing your dosage as you understand how it behaves in your system more and more. Is your tank fully stocked with corals? Maybe your bio load is not enough to consume phosphate fast enough and it just build up overtime to where it is now.

 

[cablez]

As I learned from reading, phosphate is being taken up much slower than nitrates per Redfield ratio. At your present nitrate to phosphate ratio, I personally think you should proceed to lower phosphate since it is way out of balance. Either adding pre-calculated amount of lathanum chloride in the skimmer (not consistent result but quicker and very cost effective) or GFO in a reactor (steady and more consistent but not as cost effective). I have been experimenting with lathanum chloride for phosphate removal off and on for last few months and have a couple observations of visual changes to my tank 24 hours after dosing. My skimmate is more brownish and has a more fishy smell to it, and any frags that sit at the bottom of the tank tend to grow more a lot more nuisance algae over them since the lathanum chloride binds to the phosphate and just sink if not remove mechanically through filtration. Standard felt filter sock does not help with removal of the now binded lathanum chloride /phosphate. No visual change in color of filter sock seen. It tends to leave clumpier detritus on the bottom of your tank. You need something much finer like a 1-5 µm. It seems to work well when injected in the skimmer through the skimmer neck. It is the most effective way to solve phosphate problem if you’re willing to start with a lower baseline dosage and willing to do daily phosphate level testing and increasing/decreasing your dosage as you understand how it behaves in your system more and more. Is your tank fully stocked with corals? Maybe your bio load is not enough to consume phosphate fast enough and it just build up overtime to where it is now.

I use polyfulter.....right in my overflow.......I shover it in the prefilter to the filter sock....it changes to a brownish red color......

 

[dz6t]

i guess the phosphate is coming from the frozen seafood. Frozen seafood are treated with phosphate. What i do is too wash frozen seafood throughly and soak them in freshwater till they thawed.

 

[dz6t]

(PDF) Phosphates for seafood processing

PDF | Seafood is a popular foodstuff with high nutritional value; as a consequence consumer demand exceeds supply and the increasing product costs... | Find, read and cite all the research you need on ResearchGate

www.researchgate.net