Very ULNT Nitrate 0 & po4 0... Potassium Nitrate?

Alitoo_81

New member
Hi,

I have an sps tank with this parameters:

Salinity 1026
Amonia: 0 API
Nitrite: 0 API
Nitrate: 0 (salifert)
PO4: 0 (hanna phosphorus ULR)
kh: 7dkh
cal: 420
mag: 1320

Its an big SPS Frag tank 1600 liters with very little rock and also not much fish. 2 yellos tangs, One Salifert tang, one 6 line and 11 chromis. ( 7 chromis added today to try to reis PO4 and NO3). I was Feeding with ocean nutrition mixed pellets 4 - 5 times a day.

When I feed froozen food, some corals start to RTN and some do from base up, others from the tips and other both.

So, I want to try the Potassium Nitrate, but the KNO3 also will keep down my PO4 and I think that this is maybe a bad idea. Maybe will couse the corals to RTN like when feeding froozen food.

I have 2 frag tanks one LPS and one SPS each one with the same fish and have the some problem. Some LPS are not showing negative response but they are not that colorfull. Some mushroom have pale color.

So, can I does Potassium nitrate to the tanks? Is the ULNT issue afects more the sps than the SPS?

I added 8 chromis to each tank and change from Ocean Nutricion to Tetra food to reise first the PO4 and then use the Potassium nitrate. Is this a good way to go?

By the way I dont have any GFO or Biopellets and I dont does votka.

thanks and sorry for My bad English.
 
Hi,

Sorry,

Solving pale color issues and also slow RTN from base due to very low nutrient system. Not to mention no grows. Also Fixing Some colors that are light brown on some millepora. Montiporas are also pale brown.

0 nitrate and phosphate is bad right?

thanks
 
I want the pO4 to be at 0.04 and nitrate at 2 ppm. But I tryed feeding like crazy and nothing. Even snails are dying becouse there is no algae.
 
Potassium or sodium nitrate should be safe to add. I'd start with a small dose.

It's strange that the corals show such a bad response to frozen food. What products were you feeding?
 
Do you have adequite lighting for the SPS? it seems growth slows and they beging to go pale/brown when they don't have enough light. If they've been doing fine then all of a sudden started having problems, than it could either be water nutrients like you've mentioned, or maybe youre light bulbs need replaced.
 
Hi,

I feed frozen mysis and I wash them with ro water. Mi lights are led light zetlight zt6600. They where strong 4 weeks ago and I dimmed them down. New acros are dowing good, only old acros are sensitive. I started feeding cv from korallen zucht and I see some improvement and grows in new corals. Ald corals are starting to recover slowly. Yesterday I aded 8 fish in every tank and I started feeding tetra flake only for fish. Tetra food has more phosphates in it. I feed 5 times and today I see good PE.

The thing is that if I use kno3 alone it will be bad and not good, becouse it will low even more my po4 and I dont even have po4. So I think I will try potassium nitrate and potassium phosphate. This way I can control both of them. I am waiting for them they are lab grade so I hope it works.

Thanks for your replays.
 
Don't change too much at once..

Put your skimmer on a timer, for like 8 hours a day instead of 24h and measure Po4/No3 again in a week.
 
Don't change too much at once..

Put your skimmer on a timer, for like 8 hours a day instead of 24h and measure Po4/No3 again in a week.

Good idea. I have my skimmer now working very dry. I will try that. I think that is better to go off in the day time and on in the night for the ph? Ph tend to be lower at night and the skimmer help a little i think. Am I right?
thanks
 
Hi,

Today

PO4 0
NO3 0

I am running the skimmer 8 hours a day at night and feed more the fish. Till now I am still in 0.

I will give it more time to see.
 
Just check your glass through the side of your tank..

When you have to clean this every 2 days you know you are above zero, and that will be enough.

Low is fine, Ultra low is tricky..
 
I had similar problems at one stage, for the first few years of our coral farm systems. I found adding a daily amino ration allowed the corals to take up some nitrogen and improve the situation greatly. I also ran the simmers on timers.

I currently add NO3 to raise it to 0.2, but my reason now is more so to lower PO4 through carbon dosing.
 
Hi,

Found a problem. Found another KH test and it appers that my old test was expired. My kh was 6 dkh. I am dosing to reise kh and I am supprised on how much I am dosing now. I was dosing 20ml every 5 hours know I am dosing 20 ml every 1 hour and its reising slowly.

Do this negative issues are due to the low kh?

-STN from base up?
-RTN when reise feeding?
-Some brown milleporas? (I think that it may be too little light becouse I thought the leds were causing the issues and I lower the intensity)
-Pale color on stylopora Rose. (Not as pink as when I got it)

Also I have a par meter but I dont know hoe to use it with leds. They say you can not masser correct par reading with a par meter. Only with a pur metter but it does not exists.

also, I have some cyano and some algae in the glass but the reading with salifers and hanna ultra low are still 0 :S.

Wha I will do is slowly reise my intensity it is at 67 par on the apogee. I will try to reise it to 100 - 150 only. Also I will experiment with t5 in the same tank. Its a 3 meter tank so half LEDS and half T5 Pasific sun.

Need to know if colors are afected by low kh. What I think was happening to me is that when I was reising my feeding the coral needed more kh and this caused the kh to go lower and that is why my sps RTN when I feed frozen food.

Sorry for my bad English.

I will reise kh slowly.

thanks
 
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6 dKH is low enough that it might cause problems for corals. I would raise it to at least 7-8 dKH, and make sure the level doesn't drop below 7 dKH at the daily low. You can raise it to 7 dKH in one dose, although I might try two because getting a good guess as to the total water volume is iffy.
 
I had similar problems at one stage, for the first few years of our coral farm systems. I found adding a daily amino ration allowed the corals to take up some nitrogen and improve the situation greatly. I also ran the simmers on timers.

I currently add NO3 to raise it to 0.2, but my reason now is more so to lower PO4 through carbon dosing.

Thanks, what about the led lights? Are they good for sps?
 
6 dKH is low enough that it might cause problems for corals. I would raise it to at least 7-8 dKH, and make sure the level doesn't drop below 7 dKH at the daily low. You can raise it to 7 dKH in one dose, although I might try two because getting a good guess as to the total water volume is iffy.

I will test today to see if it is 7, it must be. No PE it might be also due to lo kh?
 
Ok kh almost at 7 corals still bleaching. Posilloporas too. I started adding Ultra min S from fauna marin and Ultra organics. Are this good por this job with the low nutrient issue?
 
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