Po4 & sps question

CRookSkee

CRookSkee

Member
Ok so ive been scratching my head day and night since the last time i tested my phosphates in my 120gal reef, tested it with hanna ppb tester and got a reading of 130 ppb. High huh been freaking out, some of my sps lost a little bit of color but are coming back. so i checked my po4 again tonight and got a reading of 94ppb ??? im so confused of how could it be that high and my sps be doing ok, Im not getting a lot of growth but the color is there, is this possible or is my hanna off ? Also should i run gfo to bring it down slowly ?

Manny
 
Where are you located? Maybe someone local can test your water so you can compare and rule out your Hannah. How's your nitrate? I've had sps do fine in high nitrate and phosphate levels. If everything looks fine just make small and slow changes to get where you want to be.

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It's all about stability, I've seen gorgeous tanks with super high nitrate n phosphate without any issues. My nitrates have been in the 50ppm for awhile now n all my sps are coloring up great n showing great growth. Nitrates were tested by 3 different test kits


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FishyBeaner said:
Where are you located? Maybe someone local can test your water so you can compare and rule out your Hannah. How's your nitrate? I've had sps do fine in high nitrate and phosphate levels. If everything looks fine just make small and slow changes to get where you want to be.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Hey im located in southgate 90280, i think i might take my water to be tested somewhere then. My nitrate is around 5ppm. Yea i added a little bit of gfo to lower it very slowly.

Manny
 
laverda said:
It has been proven that the low levels most strive for, are not really needed and that at least some SPS corals actually grow faster at hight levels of phosphate.
http://packedhead.net/2014/skeptical-reefkeeping-ix-test-kits-chasing-numbers-and-phosphate/
Click to expand...
Yea i understand that im not trying to wipe them out completely maybe just lower them a bit to see if i get better growth, only thing that is really taking off is my bubble gum digi. I also dont have no algae maybe some every couple days on the glass but that is all.

Manny
 
hersheyb said:
It's all about stability, I've seen gorgeous tanks with super high nitrate n phosphate without any issues. My nitrates have been in the 50ppm for awhile now n all my sps are coloring up great n showing great growth. Nitrates were tested by 3 different test kits


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

My nitrate and PoS dropped to zero in my display.. and poof.. the tank looked like it crashed. The water is crystal clean, but what good is that when your sps STN. Took some advice from some friends... up feeding, turned off Cheato light, and tossed my siporax. Tank is finally recovering after 2 months. The thing with Nutrient control is that it takes a very long time to see your changes affecting the coral, which complicates the issue.

All in all, what I have learned from speaking with some smart people is a normal to high nutrient tank is more robust than a tank running lean on No3 and PoS. Right now, I'm running mine at 10PPM nitrates and .11 phos. I have an autofeeder going, so I can keep my levels consistent.
 
I have high nitrate (20ppm) and moderate phosphate (0.04-0.08) and my setosa has been coloring up like crazy! It went from a pale pink to a deep saturated orange. Of course, the addition of Red Sea colors made a difference as well. All you need to do is follow the rule of higher nutrients more lighting lower nutrients less lighting. The only thing with higher phosphate levels, which bothers me to death, is that you have to clean the glass every day. I can tell when my Po4 reaches 0.08 because then I have to clean more. 0.04 is my sweet spot.
 
JustAClownFish said:
I have high nitrate (20ppm) and moderate phosphate (0.04-0.08) and my setosa has been coloring up like crazy! It went from a pale pink to a deep saturated orange. Of course, the addition of Red Sea colors made a difference as well. All you need to do is follow the rule of higher nutrients more lighting lower nutrients less lighting. The only thing with higher phosphate levels, which bothers me to death, is that you have to clean the glass every day. I can tell when my Po4 reaches 0.08 because then I have to clean more. 0.04 is my sweet spot.
Click to expand...
Yea thats around where id like to keep my po4 too, tested today and now reading 45ppb on the hanna checker. So it dropped a lot with the gfo hopefully i didnt shock anything wasnt expecting that much of a drop since i only added a cup of gfo, waaay lower than the recommended dose.

Manny
 
My last phosphate reading was 2.4 --- not .24 and not .024 but 2.4. My colors were good, growth was a little slow.

I have seen more people have issues (and losses) by over correcting rather than fixing.

If you think high phosphates are the cause of an issue in your aquarium. Don't attack the phosphates with a fix... figure out where your phosphates are coming from and why they aren't being naturally removed.

Setting up a tank that is biologically stable is so much more important than a pretty tank with 8 different band aids all barely keeping the tank in balance.

It doesn't take a crystal ball to see what to do, it takes just a few hours on google. Few years ago everyone was raving about the phosphate cure all aka Bio-pellets... but how many tried that and now have a reactor (or 2) sitting in our tool shed.

If you want to adjust your phosphates, don't add more GFO. Thats too drastic, and as soon as the GFO does its job, phosphates start going back up and once again the stability for your tank is gone.

Dave B
 
Manny,

Don't listen to Dave B :)
Dave has thousand (s) of gallons of extremely mature tank which is not applied to many of our ordinary reefers.
Haha kidding.
Believe it or not, I only control my nutrient with Refiugum light timing.
I test weekly and either reduce or increase the length of Ref. Light.
I fell into this trap and started to dose Nitrate and then Phosphate and after many trials I decided to just leave it alone.
I feed heavily and solely rely on my algae and bacteria in the rocks to export nutrient.

I wish it was easy to understand for all of us to have a nice tank and don't chase the numbers.

Happy Reefing.


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o2manyfish said:
My last phosphate reading was 2.4 --- not .24 and not .024 but 2.4. My colors were good, growth was a little slow.

I have seen more people have issues (and losses) by over correcting rather than fixing.

If you think high phosphates are the cause of an issue in your aquarium. Don't attack the phosphates with a fix... figure out where your phosphates are coming from and why they aren't being naturally removed.

Setting up a tank that is biologically stable is so much more important than a pretty tank with 8 different band aids all barely keeping the tank in balance.

It doesn't take a crystal ball to see what to do, it takes just a few hours on google. Few years ago everyone was raving about the phosphate cure all aka Bio-pellets... but how many tried that and now have a reactor (or 2) sitting in our tool shed.

If you want to adjust your phosphates, don't add more GFO. Thats too drastic, and as soon as the GFO does its job, phosphates start going back up and once again the stability for your tank is gone.

Dave B
Click to expand...

Well, sometimes it takes a crystal ball. Certain dry rock leches phosphates or if you cycle with a dead shrimp your rocks might suck all the phosphates up. And some tanks just don't work without band-aids. My big tank doesn't function without my canister filter and some clear fx (I don't have a sump). I've tried. It doesn't work. I used Carib Sea fake rock which doesn't have a lot of surface area. So my biological filtration is crappy, to say the least. My tank looks beautifully colored now, though. It works for me. Using a canister filter is still nothing compared to what other people do to maintain their tanks.
 
Justaclownfish.... "some tanks just don't work without band-aids" --- Within your own post you list multiple reasons why your tank isn't/wasn't working.

If you want to drive on the autobahn in the rain, you can't expect your mini-van with bald tires to keep up.

But the fact is success is available to everyone if they follow mother nature and not trying to take short cuts. You don't want a sump. But you want a reef tank.

And where did you discover that cycling with a shrimp causes rock to suck up phosphates.... I guarantee your rock does not care what is used to start an aquarium cycle. And a shrimp does not carry some unmeasurable quantity of super phosphates that store up in calcium based rock and then has a half life equivalent of plutonium.

The tanks that only work with an assortment of band-aids are missing something key to proper biological filtration. And trying to beat mother nature with mechanical or chemical is a an impossible and expensive battle that you won't ever win.

In this hobby you can find one person that has had success with every imaginable method of filtering an aquarium. if you want to be successful long term - you have to follow the biology.

You have had success with a canister filter, congrats. I promise you having visited a majority of the major aquariums in the United States, and fish holding facilities around the world, you don't walk behind the exhibits and see canister filters sitting behind the tanks.

Dave B
 
so you're using a really big sump? are you bare bottom?

what are you using for nutrient export, lot of growing macro algae?

I love the K.I.S.S method.

what is your targeted alkalinity and calcium?

amazing tank.
 
JustAClownFish said:
Well, sometimes it takes a crystal ball. Certain dry rock leches phosphates or if you cycle with a dead shrimp your rocks might suck all the phosphates up. And some tanks just don't work without band-aids. My big tank doesn't function without my canister filter and some clear fx (I don't have a sump). I've tried. It doesn't work. I used Carib Sea fake rock which doesn't have a lot of surface area. So my biological filtration is crappy, to say the least. My tank looks beautifully colored now, though. It works for me. Using a canister filter is still nothing compared to what other people do to maintain their tanks.
Click to expand...

I don't see how cycling with a dead shrimp caused any issues. The only issue with that is if you used a set time rather than waiting for the shrimp to process through the nitrogen cycle.

If your theory is correct, then anyone with a dead fish/shrimp would crashed their reefs. This is simply not true if you give enough time for your tank to mature.
 
Thank you everyone for chiming in all these answers are very helpful, i think the problem was me running my skimmer on the not so wet side and over feeding. I will check it again today. I have also started to rinse the frozen food prior to feeding.

Manny
 
o2manyfish said:
Justaclownfish.... "some tanks just don't work without band-aids" --- Within your own post you list multiple reasons why your tank isn't/wasn't working.

If you want to drive on the autobahn in the rain, you can't expect your mini-van with bald tires to keep up.

But the fact is success is available to everyone if they follow mother nature and not trying to take short cuts. You don't want a sump. But you want a reef tank.

And where did you discover that cycling with a shrimp causes rock to suck up phosphates.... I guarantee your rock does not care what is used to start an aquarium cycle. And a shrimp does not carry some unmeasurable quantity of super phosphates that store up in calcium based rock and then has a half life equivalent of plutonium.

The tanks that only work with an assortment of band-aids are missing something key to proper biological filtration. And trying to beat mother nature with mechanical or chemical is a an impossible and expensive battle that you won't ever win.

In this hobby you can find one person that has had success with every imaginable method of filtering an aquarium. if you want to be successful long term - you have to follow the biology.

You have had success with a canister filter, congrats. I promise you having visited a majority of the major aquariums in the United States, and fish holding facilities around the world, you don't walk behind the exhibits and see canister filters sitting behind the tanks.

Dave B
Click to expand...

Your way is not my way and what you consider a band-aid is not what I consider a band-aid. Just because you don't need GAC or GFO or whatever the hell you're using or not using doesn't mean that you are the prime example of how it is supposed to be done. A reef tank is an ARTIFICAL ecosystem and the smaller the tank the more likely you'll have to use some 'band-aids' to keep it going.
Having a sump is not natural AT ALL as it is a BAND-AID. Do public aquariums have a sump? Oh did I use your argument against you now? My bad.

My sumpless setup just with a canister filter is closer to mother nature than a tank with a sump. I only run GAC to keep the water sparkling clear which my corals like due to more light penetration. People who have come by have wondered how I can keep my tank so healthy looking without a sump and all that fancy equipment people normally use. I defy common internet wisdom but here you are berating me that I do not have a natural working tank, smugly insinuating that tanks like mine will crash at some point.:eek2:


Furthermore, I'm not a public aquarium. How much biological filtration can you get out of a 40g tank vs a 100.000 gallon public aquarium? The bigger the tank, the easier it can export nutrients THE NATURAL WAY. What's the number one reason for a sump? More water volume. In public aquariums, you don't need a sump because there is enough water to export nutrients naturally. Having said that, every public aquarium uses some sort of filtration system. Some pump real ocean water into the facility and run it through a filter system to get rid of toxins, oil etc. from the Pacific. It doesn't work without some sort of filtration because it is an ARTIFICAL environment. You cannot replicate the vastness and nutrient export efficiency of our oceans in an enclosed space. You have to show me one major successful aquarium that doesn't have some sort of filtration going on. Even in your tank, if I were to dump 100lbs of dead shrimp in there, you think it could handle it just like that?


Lastly just because the old way and 'natural' way is to dump a dead shrimp in there doesn't mean it's the most efficient way or THE way to do things. If you cycle your tank with decaying matter, you'll introduce more than just ammonia. Your rocks will leech that back into the water for a short period of time causing you to go through the uglies big time. You won't have as much of a diatom bloom if you cycle with ammonium chloride. Why? Because you haven't introduced too much phosphate. I'm not the first to point this out. Regarding the phosphate leeching issue, you might want to talk to Randy Holmes. He stated as well that phosphates can be stored to some extent. Maybe you will believe a big name in the community.

Case closed.
 
Justaclownfish....

Wow.... You've been in this hobby a whole 6 months, and you have discovered that all the 'standard' methods are BS. And you have the cajones to attack me for recommending tried and proven techniques - rather than your ability to keep a 30g tank clean for 6 months. You and I are on totally different pages.

I have fish that were spawned and born in my system that are older than your canister.

You clearly didn't grasp the points I was making. Best of luck to you (and your livestock).

Your ability to regurgitate the postings and 'findings' of others doesn't give you any credibility.

And you didn't "Case Closed" anything. You haven't made any point to anyone, except yourself.

Dave B
 
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