1st clam Water parameters

[Mad Scientist]

My new 250mh (marinedepot.com) just came today, so I'm going to getting my 1st clam soon. Aside from reading alot of old threads here I just finished Knop's book, and he seems to say that clams do best with some nitrate and phosphate present. Well, my 29gal reef has been running for about 3 months now and there is very little of either one of these present, is this a problem? Also, I see lots of great reefs with clams and SPS (which I presume would not tolerate much nitrate at all), do these clams do as well as clams housed in tank with either lots of fish or a small skimmer allowing some nitrate (5-15ppm) to build up?

Thanks

 

[toptank]

In my 180 SPS/Clam tank, I use to run a little high on Nitrates but since I added some clams my nitrates are barely detectable. Not to say that there isn't any, the clams are using it up.