Preventing Phosphates

[Gamepro_inc]

Hello all, lately I have been having a problem with phosphates in my system. I have a 34 solana with a 10gal fuge/frag tank. I know of all the ways to remove phosphates mechanically and chemically(sp), but my question is how to prevent them in the first place. I already use RO/DI water so I figure my phosphates are coming from my food, are there other sources im not thinking of? What can I do with my feeding schedule/routine to help. I feed flake/pellets/mysis/cyclopeez/and Rotifeast all on different days and when I feed my corals I feed a mix of the above with some coral vibrance as well 2x a week. I cant do a phos reactor with my current setup so I have been using phos filters with warter changes but my hair algea is getting crazy. I havent actually tested my phos but I figure thats the problem since all other levels are good, except I have a Mg of 1500. Also my zoes have been getting a grey ring around them and I heard phos causes this.

ammonia-0
nitrate-0
nitrite-0
Mg-1500
Ca-430
Alk 10.3
PH-8

 

[KafudaFish]

Are you rinsing your food before feeding?

I realize it is hard to do with flake but the others?

Maybe figure out a better feeding schedule like every other day or every 3 days?

 

[fishchef]

You really need to test for PO4 before worrying about it. Use a Hanna. If you test with chemicals and you get a value, there's problems. You don't need a reactor for GFO, its better, but you can can put it in a high flow area in a bag. I did that for years and it does the job.

 

[d0ughb0y]

there is no way to prevent adding phosphates, so long as you are feeding your fish. there was a reefkeeping article listing the phosphate contents of various fish food.

 

[Reef_Matrix29]

Remember, even with testing you may still read false negatives if the hair algae is consuming the phosphates at the rate that you are creating them. I too am having a mild algae bloom as I have increased to feeding fish with food soaked in vitamins on one day and corals the next throughout the week, so the tank is getting nutrients daily. Even with my phosphate reactor, carbon and bi-weekly skimmer cup cleaning I'm still seeing faint signs of hair algae on my rocks and snail/crab shells. My water changes are more than 20% every two weeks and only RO/DI water, but I really think the soaking foods in vitamins is where the additional nutrients are coming from in my DT.

 

[Gamepro_inc]

Thanks for the help all. And no I havent been rinsing the food I will try that. I did know you could put resin in a bag in a high flow area but I was looking at prevention over treatment. Thanks.

 

[travis32]

GFO is prevention. You can run GFO in maintenance mode (prevenative), or in treatment mode.

Treatment mode consists of changing the GFO granuales out daily to Twice a week, depending how strong the algae blooms. I had my 125g covered in about 8-10" HA. Huge Algal bloom everywhere. For the last 2 months I've been in treatment mode and 80-90% of the HA has died off. I started some things 2 months ago to also be prevenative measures in the long term.:

1. Chaeto in the sump.
2. ATS screens with lights on the sump.
3. The most recent addition of 3 -4 different kinds of macro in my sump in addition to chaeto.
4. feeding lightly every 2 - 3 days.
5. skimming heavy.


All these things will help prevent and treat phosphate levels. I'm in the process of switching from changing GFO every 3 -4 days to once a week. As the bloom continues to die, I will slowly shift to changing it monthly for maintenance mode.

 

[reefsforme]

Just use a polyfilter pad. It is like a cotton, it removes phosphates, and works like a charm!

 

[psykobowler]

Aside from controlling food intake, keeping your tank clean and using a gfo reactor, I am suggesting topping off with Kalkwasser as kalk also binds to phosphate. I just read about this and I have been using kalk with success.