Here's the latest:
45 gallon cube, with 2in sand bed and approx 30lbs live rock.
Canister filter with carbon matrix, and GFO.
Skimmer (Aquaamax) always ran wet.
Have always struggled with high nitrates (20-25ppm) with feeding 2 clowns, 3 damsels, 1 Christmas and 1 anemone. Cleanup crew consists of 2 fire shrimp, 4 hermits, 1 peppermint shrimp.
Feeding: half cube frozen at night dissolved in 20ml tap water - more on that in a second, tiny pinch of seachem flake in morning (about the size of the clicker on a ball point pen).
Anemone fed twice weekly with small amount of clam in tank water.
Water changes every two weeks (10%) with Instant Ocean Sea salt
Recently(2 months ago) I lost patience, and retested all the parameters, and rechecked feeding process and tank setup. I found:
1. Phosphates very high in the tank (Hanna tester) - unmeasurable.
2. Tap water was the same. Stopped using tap water for the feed and switched to RODi.
3. Nitrate still around 25 (salifert)
4.Nitrites 0
5 Ammonia 0
6.Mg 1240
7.Calcium 420
8. Alk 10.2
9. Salinity 1.023
this was after making sure we were testing twice a week and supplementing with Kent Calcium and C-Balance.
Took the plunge on a hob refugium.
2in of Miracle Mud in main chamber, 1 bag purigen, 1 bag chemipure, Cheato, and fuge light running during the day for 10 hours. Also put in a poly pad on the new skimmer (in build with the fuge) output flow for good measure.
2 weeks have passed - I have just lost (quite literally) 1 of the two clowns. Mushrooms are not expanding as much as they were.
Skimmer is producing a thicker skim, although I don't care if it skims wet if its pulling the nitrates.
Astrinea are around, as are shield limpets, some algae on the glass but not much, rocks are clean.
After all this, here are the questions:
A) Should I be so worried about the phosphates?
B) ANything else I should be looking at to reduce the nitrates or just leave things as they are for everything to settle down and just do the water changes to keep nitrates in check. I'm nervous about making any further changes to the tank.
C) Anyone have any observations to make on any part of the above.
Thanks
Simon
45 gallon cube, with 2in sand bed and approx 30lbs live rock.
Canister filter with carbon matrix, and GFO.
Skimmer (Aquaamax) always ran wet.
Have always struggled with high nitrates (20-25ppm) with feeding 2 clowns, 3 damsels, 1 Christmas and 1 anemone. Cleanup crew consists of 2 fire shrimp, 4 hermits, 1 peppermint shrimp.
Feeding: half cube frozen at night dissolved in 20ml tap water - more on that in a second, tiny pinch of seachem flake in morning (about the size of the clicker on a ball point pen).
Anemone fed twice weekly with small amount of clam in tank water.
Water changes every two weeks (10%) with Instant Ocean Sea salt
Recently(2 months ago) I lost patience, and retested all the parameters, and rechecked feeding process and tank setup. I found:
1. Phosphates very high in the tank (Hanna tester) - unmeasurable.
2. Tap water was the same. Stopped using tap water for the feed and switched to RODi.
3. Nitrate still around 25 (salifert)
4.Nitrites 0
5 Ammonia 0
6.Mg 1240
7.Calcium 420
8. Alk 10.2
9. Salinity 1.023
this was after making sure we were testing twice a week and supplementing with Kent Calcium and C-Balance.
Took the plunge on a hob refugium.
2in of Miracle Mud in main chamber, 1 bag purigen, 1 bag chemipure, Cheato, and fuge light running during the day for 10 hours. Also put in a poly pad on the new skimmer (in build with the fuge) output flow for good measure.
2 weeks have passed - I have just lost (quite literally) 1 of the two clowns. Mushrooms are not expanding as much as they were.
Skimmer is producing a thicker skim, although I don't care if it skims wet if its pulling the nitrates.
Astrinea are around, as are shield limpets, some algae on the glass but not much, rocks are clean.
After all this, here are the questions:
A) Should I be so worried about the phosphates?
B) ANything else I should be looking at to reduce the nitrates or just leave things as they are for everything to settle down and just do the water changes to keep nitrates in check. I'm nervous about making any further changes to the tank.
C) Anyone have any observations to make on any part of the above.
Thanks
Simon