Fallow SPS reef while maintaining nutrients

[DaveRaz]

To no surprise N03 has gone down from 5 to .5 since going fallow 3 weeks ago. I'm way over feeding a blood shrimp and blue leg a cube of home made chum every few days. Alternating every night dosing aa, reef chili and oyster feast. One each night, not all three.

Should I just feed the tank more? I turned my skimmer off when I removed the fish. I also removed about 30lbs of rock but the bioblock in the sump and the corals must be eating it all the nutrients. I'm worried if I don't bump them up I will have issues. Thanks in advance.

PS- I searched but no luck!

 

[skp]

I have the same issue but with undetectable nitrates and phosphates. It has been 6 weeks for me and all of my sps have turned a pastel color. They are still growing but I'm worried that they will get worse. I feed the cuc mysis and nls pellets, alternating every 2-3 days and I also target feed aa and zooplankton every other day. I run radion xr15w pros on radiant color mode which changes up the intensity and spectrum throughout the day and I notice that the pale colors are most prevalent under the whiter spectrum. My sps still exhibit the color (although changed a little) under the bluer spectrums. I have a feeling that it is not just the lack of food. Maybe it is the lack of nitrates or something else that fish excrete?

 

[Spslvr]

you could try adding some sodium nitrate to your ato reservoir.

 

[glaukos]

Feed more dave,until NO3 start going up.

Went through the same thing some years ago when i was forced to leave the tank fallow too(almost 12 weeks due to ick outbrake)

Started feeding 1 cube of cyclops every day but had pale colors after the first month.
Then i started feeding 2 cubes and other coral foods(reef fuel etc).That improved the situation a bit but not too much.

Then i decided to try pappone which worked great(at least for my tank and at that time)
It helped a lot.2 cubes every week along with the other "magic fluids" i kept throwing in there

I didn't take out the skimmer though.Wanted to see how far i could go with all these extra feedings.It wasn't oversized,just for the record.

 

[DaveRaz]

Thanks guys. As I said, I'm feeding the corals nightly now and the inverts every few days. I do worry about feeding more pap pone but let's give it a whirl. My weekly no3 test is the same at .5 and po4 undetectable. And I'm NOT running the skimmer or GFO or GAC!

I will also look into this sodium nitrate suggestion.