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

[Alitoo_81]

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 thanks what amino acid did you use?

 

[bertoni]

I think that it'll take some time for the corals to recover, even if the problem was the low dKH or very low nutrients. Those additives should be okay. I might add a bit more fish food, as well.

 

[Alitoo_81]

hi,

Update:

- Second dose of Ultra min S and Ultra Organics (in the morning).
- Started with Coral Vitalizer half dose daily (at night).
- dosing 25 ml for kh every 1, now kh at 7,6 dkh. I decrease the dose to 21 ml. i dont want to go over 8dkh.
- Feeding the fish 3-4 times per day flake food and pellets. One time pellets and 3-2 times flake food.
-Started also feeding frozen food, Mysis. Without washing, only thaw with OR water and feed trying to add some of this water in the tank.
-Raised the intensity of light a little.

What the PAR reading must be for SPS with LEDS? I'm aiming to 100-150 becouse I read that they overestimate. Is that right? Also I use a led with 12000k white Chip leds (2 in each lamp) and the other leds are normal leds Blues, RB, UV, Reds Greens and orange. Am I ok with this lamp or do some one think that the chip leds are not good for SPS?

So far I see a stop in the RTN, and more PE.

any advice is acceptable.

thanks

 

[Alitoo_81]

ok ok look what I Have found and it is specialy for reef aquariums, exactly what I was looking for.

http://www.shop-meeresaquaristik.de...utzek/aqua-biotica-phosphor-500-mL::3847.html

http://www.shop-meeresaquaristik.de...zek/aqua-biotica-stickstoff-500-mL::3846.html

Aqua Biotica Stickstoff (Stickstoff : Its in German and it means Nitrogen)
Aqua Biotica Phosphor (To reise Phosphate)

This to products will solve my problem of low nutrient tank. Also they have the exact dosing recomended.

-10 mL per 100 L (26 US gal) increases levels about 0,1 mg/L (1 mL = 0,01 mg/L) for phosphate.
-10 mL per 100 L (26 US gal) increases levels by 20 mg / L (1 mL per 100 L correspondingly increased to 2 mg / L).

I will give it a try I will order them now. I will start by raising PO4 then adding Nitrate. I live in Germany so this is no problem for me.

I am so happy I find this products.

 

[bertoni]

I can't help with the lighting problems. You could ask in the equipment forum if no one adds any comments here. I'm glad to hear that the RTN has stopped.

 

[oceanarium]

Hi thanks what amino acid did you use?

I have used a few, zeo works fine.

Don't make to many changes to quickly or you will be second guessing yourself all the time as to what is actually doing what. It can take weeks or months for corals to respond in vitality and growth to changes in nutrients, especially so if they have been starved they need to rebuild their reserves again before they put energy into new growth.

Playing with nitrate and phosphate need to be done very tentatively, you could easily fuel unwanted growth or brown out sps.

Personally I would never consider a phosphate additive, I would much rather add a coral food that the corals will get direct benefit from like a Papone mix. Pretty sure you wont have to worry about P while using papone food. I have seen some great results in coral vitality and growth using papone, I find it difficult though to control the Phosphate to be using it to much on a big system.

 

[Alitoo_81]

Hi,

ok I have been adding nitrogen and phosphate for one day. I double the dosage of both the first day. Now NO3 is at 2-3 but PO4 is still 0. Today I just added PO4 and stopped the NO3 to see the time that it takes to start going down.

I must say that I started to see RTN before using this products "again" when I added Amino acids and that is becouse I didnt have PO4. Amino Acids works similar to any nitrogin dosing and that is lowering more the phosphate (that is what I think).

This hobby is strage, some with high po4 and no3 problems and others with low levels.

I will update this post in a few days.

thanks

 

[Alitoo_81]

I have used a few, zeo works fine.

Don't make to many changes to quickly or you will be second guessing yourself all the time as to what is actually doing what. It can take weeks or months for corals to respond in vitality and growth to changes in nutrients, especially so if they have been starved they need to rebuild their reserves again before they put energy into new growth.

Playing with nitrate and phosphate need to be done very tentatively, you could easily fuel unwanted growth or brown out sps.

Personally I would never consider a phosphate additive, I would much rather add a coral food that the corals will get direct benefit from like a Papone mix. Pretty sure you wont have to worry about P while using papone food. I have seen some great results in coral vitality and growth using papone, I find it difficult though to control the Phosphate to be using it to much on a big system.

Hi,
did not read this before sorry... I will read more about how to do the pappone.

thanks

 

[tmz]

The alk level and fluctuation is likely a big part of the problem ,IME.

With 0 NO3 and PO4 I wouldn't dose one or the other as any deficiency in N or P might be exacerbated. Dosing both might be ok. Generally the uptake is about 16parts N to 1 part P. Extra food should do the same thing for N and P and add other necessary elements like potassium, iron, iodide ,carbon etc.
Frozen hikari mysis, brine and some micron food ( coral frenzy or golden pearls ) does well,IMO.

I would not turn of the skimmer for extended periods of time . The skimmer won't take out inorganic phosphate or nitrate anyway. Turning it off leaves some stagnant water in it and cuts off the aeration it provides which would likely be even more of an issue at night.

Don't know about leds for sps . Some report success. I run halide and vho and get good resulsts. Some of my friends use led and the sps even frags from my tanks don't do as well in terms of color and growth , anecdotally.

 

[Alitoo_81]

The alk level and fluctuation is likely a big part of the problem ,IME.

With 0 NO3 and PO4 I wouldn't dose one or the other as any deficiency in N or P might be exacerbated. Dosing both might be ok. Generally the uptake is about 16parts N to 1 part P. Extra food should do the same thing for N and P and add other necessary elements like potassium, iron, iodide ,carbon etc.
Frozen hikari mysis, brine and some micron food ( coral frenzy or golden pearls ) does well,IMO.

I would not turn of the skimmer for extended periods of time . The skimmer won't take out inorganic phosphate or nitrate anyway. Turning it off leaves some stagnant water in it and cuts off the aeration it provides which would likely be even more of an issue at night.

Don't know about leds for sps . Some report success. I run halide and vho and get good resulsts. Some of my friends use led and the sps even frags from my tanks don't do as well in terms of color and growth , anecdotally.

Hi, thanks for the info. My skimmer only works 8 hours at night but I will make it 12 hours. My skimmers have variable speed. Can I only turn down the speed a little?

Tested PO4 and I have it in 0,04 for the First time in almost a year with the hanna checker. I stopped dosing PO4 and started with the pappone. Nitrates are in 2,5 with Salifert. I must say every thing now is happy. No more STN or RTN and more PE. The only thing I see is that the montiporas Have no PE in the night and thats maybe becouse of the PH swing coused by the skimmer and the timer?

I dont know why but I feel that LEDS are not good for ULST. With leds I think that its better with some nutrients in the tank. 0 NO3 and PO4 is not good with LED lights.

I will start dosing Potassium and Iron. I want my potassium to be at 800 but I will go slowly. Iron till greens are green and not yellow.

thanks

 

[tmz]

Turnign down the speed might be fine for the skimmer.

800ppm in potassium will be trouble . NSW is around 398ppm.

 

[Icefire]

I think you seriously try things way too rapidly chassing your own tail adding a bunch of product and making too much change.

Keep it slow, stick to the base

 

[stephenhall1987]

I dont know why but I feel that LEDS are not good for ULST. With leds I think that its better with some nutrients in the tank. 0 NO3 and PO4 is not good with LED lights.

I have a 100g frag tank full of sps and lps that are thriving with 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate, and 4 AI SOL LED fixtures. Only one fish (a tang to eat algae). I have to do a lot of water changes and additives to keep Ca Mg and Alk in range.

Every tank is different, But I'd take things slow and see how your tank balances off.

 

[Alitoo_81]

Hi I am doing things slowly, I only tryed to reise the NO3 and PO4 where I want them to be slowly. And at the same time getting KH to 8dkh also slowly.

Till now kh is where I want it to be, NO3 also is in the range of 2-5 Stopped dosing no3 days ago. PO4 is at 0,03-0,04 stopped dosing it days ago and started "Slowly" feeding a little very little pappone to the corals at night 2x per week.

Skimmers are on again all day only I turned down the speed of the pumps a little.

As for the potassium, well one day I had a very bad potassium test and I thought that my potassium where low, so, started dosing potassium and every thing looked nice. Then I buyed the test from Korallen zucht my potassium where at 700-800. Stopped and started to search and read about it till I found this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmeoPS09Lx8

its Justin Credabel gaving a talk at MACNA 2014 and he apparently keep his potassium arround 800 and 1200. It is about 19m 50seconds in in case you want to skip the rest of the video.

That was my personal tank, tryed it, never stopped dosing potassium after this video and had very good results. But as they mention you must go slowly. If not corals will die. So, this is my question: How will the corals do if they where in the see (maricultured corals) with a potassium level of 380ppm and suddenly put them in waters that have 800ppm of potassium? also what will happen in the costumer tanks that will not have the same levels of potasium that we do? that goes also to kh, if a swing in kh can STN your corals, then why when we sell a frag from 7 dkh to a 10 dkh tank nothing happens? That is why for now I will consider only keeping the potassium at 380-400ppm.

Also I have another issue. In a coral farm corals come and go almost every day and its hard to know when you must reise or lower the Cal, mag and KH dosing. Specialy for KH. So if I do an importation I must reise the KH dosing and lower it down as I sell the corals. I must do KH test almost every day. What is helping me now is that I take notes of every dosing changes that I make and I use the same info based on the quantity of corals left. Its not 100% accurate but it helps a little. Any Ideas or advice on how to do this easier???

thanks you all and sorry again for my bad English.

 

[Alitoo_81]

I have a 100g frag tank full of sps and lps that are thriving with 0 nitrate and 0 phosphate, and 4 AI SOL LED fixtures. Only one fish (a tang to eat algae). I have to do a lot of water changes and additives to keep Ca Mg and Alk in range.

Every tank is different, But I'd take things slow and see how your tank balances off.

I almost remove the leds and go with T5. I was blaming them. But now that every thing is doing well, I dont think that the leds were the issue. Happy to know that your corals are doing well down leds in your frag tank. I didnt use them before and that is why I blamed them.

thanks

 

[Alitoo_81]

Ok every thing is looking very good, PE in all corals and grows. Colors are back again.

Important notes if you have PO4 and NO3 in 0:

-Add no3 and po4 only if needed.
-Start with PO4 first becouse if you add NO3, PO4 will go down.
-Stop when you reach 2,5 nitrate and 0,02-04 phosphate and see what happens.
-In my case they maintained there with extra feeding and pappone.

After and before:

- Colors came back, the fastest colors was the green, blue and purple. Some still need time but they are improving. Like the shortcake.
- Extreem PE.
- Frags are doing there bases much faster than before.
- I was sad, now I am very happy .

Do not hesitate in adding NO3 and PO4 if needed but do it slowly.

thank you all.

 

[ridetheducati]

I have said it a thousand times.

For low nutrient systems that corals do not respond well, I recommend increasing nutrients to the following levels.

Nitrate: 2 - 5 ppm (Salifert)
Phosphate: .03 ppm (Hanna)

Low nutrient systems only work well when food export AND input is high.

 

[Alitoo_81]

i have said it a thousand times.

For low nutrient systems that corals do not respond well, i recommend increasing nutrients to the following levels.

Nitrate: 2 - 5 ppm (salifert)
phosphate: .03 ppm (hanna)

low nutrient systems only work well when food export and input is high.

+1

 

[tmz]

Personally , I wouldn't worry about lower nitrate, ie <1ppm.

 

[Alitoo_81]

Personally , I wouldn't worry about lower nitrate, ie <1ppm.

long term not good. unless you are dosing amino acids.