Lowering P04 in an SPS tank. How would you do it?

[Wiskey]

Hello all!

I have a 75G SPS tank that is about 2 years old now. Here is a picture:
2016-10 FTS by Wiskey2727, on Flickr

Recently I've been battling excessive Bubble Algae so I decided to pickup a Hanna low range meter to get a better idea of my P04 level.

It came up at 0.21 PPM

Currently I do water changes of 15G every 2-3 weeks and I have a Fuge of about 10 gallons. Other than my skimmer I don't do anything else to reduce phosphate.

I've been thinking about ways to improve this reading and I came up with these:

1. Currently I have a Bubble Magnus Curve 5. I think it could perform better so one idea is to upgrade my skimmer.

2. P04 remover. I could get a reverse flow reactor and some Phosban GFO.

3. Vodka or Vinegar dosing. I could start dosing and see where things go.

What would you do?
Thank you!
Whiskey

 

[jda]

Do you have NO3 too? If not, then VSorV won't get you very far. If you ever do this, go SLOW or you can starve the coral since the bacteria that you are growing will outcompete the diatoms in the coral.

Skimmer is a good idea regardless.

GFO could be your friend.

You could also replace some of your sand - aragonite binds phosphate and fresh will bind some up like your current sand has.

Bubble algae can still grow with reef-level nitrates (below 5 on that hannah test), so get something to consume it.

 

[ivanotas]

Have u tried rowa? Its pretty good in lowering po4

 

[markalot]

PhosphateRx, start with 1 drop a day and slowly increase until you get a good balance that keeps it stable. I am currently at 3 drops a day in a 150 to hold PO4 at .05ish.

Tank looks fantastic, are you sure you need to change anything?

 

[notenoughtanks]

Your coral colors are outstanding- getting aggressive on reducing that little amount of phosphate will surely impact those thriving corals. I would get 10 emerald crabs and call a day.

 

[Wiskey]

Thank you for the compliments!!

Some coral does look fantastic, but the funny thing is that it's almost like the sand stopped absorbing phosphate suddenly or something. Up until a couple months ago everything was great! Then I started to notice some corals getting darker, and more algae issues etc. I'm guessing that the phosphates had started going up at that point.

Some corals still look great! But others are visibly darker vs a few months ago. I'm also having some minor STN issues on a couple coral that I never had before. I think this accumulation of nutrients is to blame.

You all bring up some awesome points!
I could replace some sand. I had not thought of that, I'd like a little larger grain size.
I was thinking TLF phosban, but rawa is another good choice.

PhosphateRX looks really awesome though! Does anyone know how that works? Does anyone else use it? I'm going to look up some reviews on it.

Do you think a larger skimmer will help? Has anyone documented lowering phosphates by getting a better skimmer?

I do know that bubble algae will survive proper phosphate levels, but my guess is that it will grow much slower making it more manageable and easier to fight back with crabs and manual removal.

Thank you for your advice!
Whiskey

 

[HippieSmell]

I had great success using vinegar. If you have zero nitrates, raise them using spectracide stump remover and dose vinegar. Cheap and effective.

 

[Pife]

I just want to make sure of your reading on the meter. Was it reading 21 on the ulr hanna? If so that's ppb.

If not then, I would use lanthum chloride.

 

[Rakie]

You have not answered where your nitrates are at yet. Dosing kn03 greatly reduces phosphates -- Additionally, you could try doing a series of big water changes as well.

 

[Wiskey]

I just want to make sure of your reading on the meter. Was it reading 21 on the ulr hanna? If so that's ppb.

If not then, I would use lanthum chloride.

Oh, no. It was 68 or something like that on the meter. Then I read you have to multiply by 3 and divide by 1,000 to get PPM of PO4 and that's where I ended up with 0.21.

I've been reading great reviews on the LC, I think I will try some out!

Whiskey

 

[Wiskey]

You have not answered where your nitrates are at yet. Dosing kn03 greatly reduces phosphates -- Additionally, you could try doing a series of big water changes as well.

I'm not sure what my nitrate level is. I don't have a test for it. Now that I found phosphates I'm waiting for a nitrate test. I never used to test this stuff.

I am doing water changes to correct the issue right now, but I don't think that's a long term solution because I won't be able to keep up with multiple water changes per week long term.

Whiskey

 

[Wiskey]

I had great success using vinegar. If you have zero nitrates, raise them using spectracide stump remover and dose vinegar. Cheap and effective.

Is that the same thing as Potassium Nitrate? I have some of that for my FW planed tank.

Whiskey

 

[Rakie]

I'm not sure what my nitrate level is. I don't have a test for it. Now that I found phosphates I'm waiting for a nitrate test. I never used to test this stuff.

I am doing water changes to correct the issue right now, but I don't think that's a long term solution because I won't be able to keep up with multiple water changes per week long term.

Whiskey

Gotcha! Well definitely need to test them for SPS as I'm sure you know. I think some phosphates and nitrates aren't a bad thing. Personally, I've dosed Nitrates (KN03) quite a few times and my SPS absolutely LOVE it.. But dosing it causes a RAPID reduction of p04, which can apparently shock Zoanthids and other corals. So if you happen to have VERY low nitrates, dosing kn03 will raise the nitrates, while lowering the phosphates.

The large series of water changes is meant more as a "reset". Your phosphate didn't get to 0.75 overnight. If you do 3-5 30% water changes over 2 weeks, you will have low nutrients. That will give you the opportunity to get them under control more easily, and quickly.

Additionally, I'm a big supporter of Bacteria. Dosing bacterias will help a lot. The bacteria which absolutely OBLITERATED all my nutrients almost immediate was the AquaForest Bio S. It's strong stuff, I described it as a nutrient nuke, because within 3-4 days I went from 25 no3/.08 po4 to 0/0. It surprised me, but it worked a little better than I wanted. Adding the Siporax was good! It takes about 3 months to start showing it's worth and really colonizing bacteria.

SPS isn't half as hard as people hype it up to be -- An inexperienced keeper can easily get a colony to show about 80% of it's potential pretty simply. It gets hard when you're trying to attain that show quality 95%+ potential.

But right now, lets just focus on that 80%. An SPS colony at 80% of it's true potential is still a beautiful thing

 

[Breadman03]

Is that the same thing as Potassium Nitrate? I have some of that for my FW planed tank.

Whiskey

It is potassium nitrate.

 

[Moser]

It looks very nice- be very careful about stripping your nutrients.
That pink table at the top will suffer!

I would add GFO, but in small quantities and slowly increase.
Don't let your phos fall quickly.


Naso tangs love bubble algae!

Mo

 

[jda]

PhosphateRx is lanthanium chloride. Read up on it bigtime before you use it. You can also get it from other sources in more volume and cheaper. You can really take out too much with it. I would never use it in a reef.

Yes, removing nutrients will reduce NO3 and PO4 - not the ones that are in there now, but it will reduce the incoming.

Even if you change a lot of water, the PO4 bound by the aragonite will release some to get into equilibrium with the water and they will rise again. It will only go down a little bit in the end - it takes a lot of WCs to get phosphates down for good.

I would personally replace some sand, suck out as much bubble algae as possible and get a few emerald crabs and then maybe a few more water changes. ...nothing drastic. If you want to get drastic, maybe a few TBSP of GFO.

This is in the "lets don't invent problems to solve" spot for me where everything looks good except for a bit of bubble algae which is going to exist in a lot of tanks anyway. Not to be too doooochie, but I would really study any of the recommendations and especially the posters who gave some of them - see if they have a tank that is anywhere near yours and are on your level. Just because people can post does not mean that they should - screen everybody's opinions and especially mine because not all internet posts are created equal.

 

[Rakie]

PhosphateRx is lanthanium chloride. Read up on it bigtime before you use it. You can also get it from other sources in more volume and cheaper. You can really take out too much with it. I would never use it in a reef.

Biggles himself had a hellish backlash in his SPS tank by using lanthanum chloride. He attributed it to destroying his po4 overnight, and waking up to find mass STN / RTN. He said he's lost several colonies.

 

[madmike10000]

I have the same skimmer on the same size tank it works fantastic


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[organism]

I had great success using vinegar. If you have zero nitrates, raise them using spectracide stump remover and dose vinegar. Cheap and effective.

I do this with vodka and the results are pretty good, cheap way to get phosphates down and avoid stripping all the nitrates. I prefer the natural approach of letting your tank's bacteria take care of everything instead of adding stuff...

 

[Acromaniac]

I use lanthanum chloride, by far the best system for me that I have ever run. Tried zeovit, GFO etc. Lanthanum chloride is just so easy especially if you set it up on a doser, you can get it dialled in exactly where it needs to be for the input of your system and no messing around with exchanging media