Well the relaxing hobby is turning out to be anything but. I was doing my daily checks of NH3, No2 and No3. but lately the nitrates are getting out of hand. the NH3 is 0 N02 0.1 and the nitrates are in the red. i change about 20 gallons every week in the 90 gallon tenecor i have. i have been changing with ro/di from the lfs and nutriwater as well. i changed about 30 gallans last sunday and another 45 on fri. the no3 level went to 0 right after thewater change on fri butrose back into the red the next morning.i have 1 longnose butterfly, hippo tang, 2 ocellaris, 1 goby, 1 coral beauty, 1 bannerfish, 1 royal gramma and 1 yellow tang. there are also about 30 snails, 3 mithrax crabs and about 20 hermits as the cleanup crew. theplant life is 2 zoa, gonopora , 1 plate coral( not looking good right now ) and 2 other pieces i don;t know the names of.the tank itself hasa wet dry sump in the back (tenecor simplicity plus) bio balls, and 75 lbs of live rock with about 3 bags of the live sand in the tanks. also have 3 cleaner shrimp. i have a red sea berlin skimer 90 2 bags of chemi pure elite ,one bag of nitrate sponge and a quiet one 4000 moving the water through the system. fish are being fed once a day using krill, formula two and dried brine flake. there are 2 koralia 3's moving the water in the tank. i just turned of theuv sterilizer i was running (12 watt) any ideas on how to control this? thanks guys.:irked:
Nitrates out of control!
- Thread starter jsvokowest
- Start date
Lose the bioballs. They become a trap for all the nastiness/detritus that you want to avoid in a system. The UV wouldn't cause for a rise in nitrates. You may as well put it back on to help prevent fish disease considering water quality is currently poor. Is your skimmer producing a good amount of skimmate? How long has the nitrate sponge material been in the system. Some of those products can leach the things they pull out back into your system. Try cutting down the amount you are feeding for a few days/week until you can get the parameters to stabilize.
i was contemplating pulling half of the balls as to not put the system in a huge shock. nitrate sponge has been in there since last sunday. the skimer has always produced a greenish product never black but i empty the cup aty least 2x a day. the problem i have with the skimmer is that i would like to get a bigger one but i only have a 4x4 footprint to deal with. saw one at the lfs which uses a pump and airstone but the plastic tube alone is 225 think that is a little excessive considering pumps is not included. not that spending money apparantly goes hand in hand with this hobby but is is only a plastic tube. any suggestions for a good one? loking not to add any extra external pieces on the tank for neatness sake.agree with the uv and just pluged that back in. also i was told to wash off the bio balls in a water change water which i did but i think they are too good at what they do. thank you pink.
- Location
- Staten Island
I would also suggest that you check the water you are getting from the LFS, just to rule that out as a source of the nitrate.
- Location
- Flushing NY 11355
Are your snails still alive or are they lowering in number? if so find the dead ones and remove them
the snails had a big go around with the hermits when they we first put in about 2 months ago now there are some ermits in the snail shells and i boiled out the unocupied shells and sucked the sand. the kit is new and t is the third one since the problem started. i do notice the snails are going to the top or the tank more. the lfs water was at a full 0 across the board before i put it in. thanks again to all i really appreciate all the help.
You said the nitrate was in the red that mean it's a possibility nitrate could well be at 120mg/l .So if you make a 50% water change the nitrate would be at 60mg/l and so on.Use two different name nitrate test kits ,make large water change,feed less untill you get things under controll and don't worry too much corals and fish can tolerate some nitrate.I don't use a wet dry filter on my reef because i heard they are nirtrate factories.By the way how is the goniapora doing?
goniapora was in full bloom today. the plate coral looks bad though. skelaton is exposed and the bottom has some redish stuff flaking off. skin? flesh? was wondering if i should take the tothbrush to the bottom as i did for some small red slime algae that would go on some fake coral but it doesn't lok the same. for some reason the goniapora is being hosted by the two clowns. i did two water changes in one week one for about 30 gallons on sunday and one for 45 gallons on fri however the next morning the nitrates were back up from a 0 reading.
from 0 to 20 -50 not quite red yet. the substrate is a crushed coral about 3 inches thick. i was feeling around for snails and checking the shells. like i said the hermits pulled a lot of them out but they are gone and as for fish i check them every day as the four year old says good morning to each one individually.the empty shells were boiled to kill of anything that might have been left in there.the water circulation has a quiet one 4000 in the back of the sump two koralia 3 and a small pump pushing throught the uv. the 4000 runs along the back and i move the outlet once a day. the koralias are one on the left and one on the right midway in the tank height facing each other to allo them to hit the rocks and move the stuff in the crevices. does that sound ok?
Sound good.Feed less,skip a day or two the fish will be fine.Make 40% water change vacum 1/2 of your substrate if you can and test before and after. As someone stated try another test kit.Did you mention the name of the test kit you are using?
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- Location
- yonkers ny
Don't take out the bio balls in large quantities. That will cause your nitrites and nitrates to spike. Take out a few hand fills at a time. I am still doing mine
You have to remove the bioballs and any filter media you have. Changing water is not going to help because all the bioballs and filter media will just leach stuff back in the water.
Also check the source water from your lfs. What is the TDS? Nitrate?
Also check the source water from your lfs. What is the TDS? Nitrate?
20 ppms is tolerable, not ideal but tolerable, regardless like everyone else is saying get rid of the bio balls. When I removed mine I did it all at once and my nitrates dropped from 20-40 down to 0-5. I didnt have any adverse effects by removing them all at once but some do so it may be a good idea to do it slowly. Get rid of those things and your nitrates will be ok
vangoghfish
Advanced Reefer
- Location
- Atlantic City, NJ
vodka dosing?
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