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0 Nitrates (1 Viewer)

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Tray

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I am asking the experts of what I should do please. I have not been able to detect any nitrates since cycle of new tank back in August with any test kit I have bought, nor has any lfs testing. I have used, red sea pro, nyos, api, and salifert test kits and they all have zero po3 detection. Is this going to be bad for my sps growth? If so other than adding fish which I have about 8 of them now and feed Mysis every day, and make a cocktail of fuel, reef roids, reef frenzy, oyster feast, roe, and pyto that I put give 2 times a week and let set in display with pumps off. My po4 is 0.005, nitrite 0, ammonia 0, ph 8.0, calcium is 400, dkh is now down to 8.4. sg 1.25 temp 77.8. some sps I get great pe, some I never see. I am running a small amount of gfo, and rox.8 in reactor with cheato in refugium.

I have read that 0 nitrates will bleach sps and I want to avoid this if there is a solution.
Thanks for any advice.
 

webster1234

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I would say enjoy it. If things do start bleaching, there are things you can do to increase your nitrates. First, remove the macro algae. Feed your fish more often (at least twice a day), and more at each feeding, add more fish, feed the oyster feast more often, and remove any other nutrient scavenging device like the gfo.

Also I would suggest removing the carbon as it takes things we don't measure from the water which could also be responsible for bleaching. There is really no need for it. If you are running it for water clarity, consider a UV instead. It will make your water crystal clear.

Some people choose to dose things like stump remover etc to bring nutrients up but I wouldn't recommend anything like that unless you are very experienced and have years in the hobby. You may be asking for trouble.

You can also dial back your skimmer if it is removing a lot of skimmate...or put it on a timer running it 12 hrs on and 12 hrs off.

These are a few things you can try if you want your nutrients higher. Bottom line though is learn to read your corals and let them tell you want they want.

If your corals currently look good....then great. But if you want your nutrients higher, I would try some of these, one or two at a time. A lot of time, coral bleaching can be from a lack of trace elements, strontium, iodine, etc. I would make sure those things are in check via something like a Triton test before I started dosing stump remover.

If it were my tank, I would take the macro algae out and take the gfo/carbon off line. Then start feeding the fish 2x/day and the corals with oyster feast 2x/week. Do that for a month and check params. If they still aren't coming up, put a timer on your skimmer and run that for a month while keeping the first things going.

I'm pretty confident that will do it for you. I wished I had that problem. My nitrates run 10-20 and my PO4 about .30, but my corals grow like crazy, and the colors are insane, so that works for me.

I mean think about it, you are concerned about low nutrients, but you are running macro algae in your sump and gfo in a reactor.......all which are designed to.....wait for it.....remove nutrients.......good luck...report back your results
 
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Tray

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Thank you webster1234, your advice has given me things I will try. First the low hanging fruit I will try, turn off gfo and carbon along with reducing protein skimmer I can do tonight. Of course I can also double my feeding , and then test in a few days . I will update my findings in a few days.
 

RobertP

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Not an expert here but I like to do things one at a time. All those suggestions are great but take it slow and do one at a time. Wait a week (or two) and test for nitrates and see if it moved up. If not then do the next one, etc. Remember nothing good happens fast in reefing.
 

Ecamden

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I had the same issue with 0 no3 and po4 that made everything pale and triggered a dino outbreak. I took gfo off and run my fuge at night only. Took about 2 months of heavy feeding and finally got no3 to 10 and po4 to 0.3. Corals are looking great and dinos are going away. Just my personal experience
 
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Zero nitrates will RTN / STN acropora if left unchecked long enough IMO. Corals will pale out, look sick, etc. I never let my NO3 hit absolute zero. If you're not getting a reading... I'd slowly dose nitrates and raise it to detectable levels. Loud Wolf NaNO3 is what I dose.

The only time you should have zero nitrates is if you have a tank full of big SPS colonies that are sucking it up faster than it can register on these hobby grade test kits. When this happens...if you look at the persons tank...it's typically full of large colonies that look very colorful and healthy. A very clear indication that plenty of NO3 is present in the system. If you do not have large colonies or you have pale corals that look unhealthy...I would at least dose a little and observe the results. Don't raise by more than 1-2ppm at a time. More than that can cause issues.

One time my anemone was looking very sick for weeks. Very deflated. My nitrates tested zero on a Nyos test kit. I dosed 2 ppm of NO3. The anemone liked it so much that he fully inflated and go sucked into a powerhead. I became a firm believer about the important of Nitrate after that day.
 
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