a stump remover safe to use

[dragonfisher33]

for the longest time i'm struggling to raise nitrate and phosphate. no carbon/gfo and there was a time when my skimmer was off for 2 weeks and yet i still register almost 0 nitrate/phosphate.

phosphate is tested using Hanna and nitrate is tested using red sea pro. the highest reading of nitrate i have gotten was between 0 and .15. all readings are with maximum feeding that my fish can eat and multiple times a day. food is consisted of frozen food (unrinsed since i want some of that milkiness) and nori.

currently, the livestock is 3 tangs (regal, sailfin, purple), 1 firefish, 1 diamond goby, 3 wrasses (adult social, juvi blue flasher, adult lubbock), 1 ruby red dragonet, 1 cleaner shrimp, 1 tiger conch, 1 blood shrimp, some snails and hermit all in a 5x2x2 penisula tank with Trigger 34 sump.

my question: is the following safe to use and what amount dosage should i aim for to get my nitrate around 3-5ppm?

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Spectracide-16-oz-Stump-Remover/4764059

 

[N2950H]

That's the same one I bought, but so far I've just been staring at it on the shelf. I'm pretty much in the same boat as you, nitrates and phosphates are very low and nothing I do seems to raise them...but something in my brain just won't let me start dosing chemicals just yet.

 

[dragonfisher33]

That's the same one I bought, but so far I've just been staring at it on the shelf. I'm pretty much in the same boat as you, nitrates and phosphates are very low and nothing I do seems to raise them...but something in my brain just won't let me start dosing chemicals just yet.

have you figured out the the amount of stump remover and its dosage?

 

[secret_reefer337]

There’s an old thread about using stump remover somewhere in www.

 

[James Tucker]

I found this in reef2reef:

Question about Spectracide Stump Remover dosing

I've seen a few threads on this topic in concerns to raising Nitrates. I picked up a bottle but haven't the slightest clue on how much to dose. Im not the best with math so the few calculations I have seen provided online don't allow me to come to my own conclusion.. afraid it will be off. So...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[N2950H]

I wound up ordering this instead, i just have a weird mental block about dumping Spectracide into my tank. And from the link James posted above, this is the advice I plan to follow from Randy Holmes-Farley:

Dissolve 10 grams in 1 liter of fresh water. That 10 grams contains 6.14 grams of nitrate, so that solution is 6,140 ppm nitrate. If you add 1 ml of the solution per 2 gallons of tank water volume, that will boost nitrate by 0.8 ppm nitrate.

So in my 80 gal system I plan to add 40ml of the above solution and see what it does.

 

[dragonfisher33]

so since my tank volume = 150DT + 50 % of 34Trigger Sump --> ~160gal total volume after sand/rock water displacement.

and if i want to make a 4L solution.

it will be 40gram of stump remover in a 4 liter of freshwater--> 1mL * (160/2) = 80mL for 0.8ppm nitrate?


and if i want to reach a 5ppm nitrate, that's 400mL? my head hurts. help @Randy Holmes-Farley

 

[dragonfisher33]

also it appears that the plantedtank webpage is down

 

[Salps]

People have used that and it has been safe. I personally use food grade Sodium Phosphate and Sodium Nitrate. Stump remover is Potassium Phosphate. Although there has not been a problem with potassium build up. I took Randy's advise and went with the Sodium because that little amount of salt is not going to hurt anything in the tank.

Just buy a small amount of food grade stuff off amazon, it's cheap and will last forever. You also will not have to worry about impurities.

 

[Halal Hotdog]

So I used Bayer insecticide for dips, so keep that in mind. I personally am not a fan of using the stump remover, but a lot of people have reported no issues with using it. There was a time I was running undetectable nitrates and phosphates. Easy fix is feed a lot everyday. In every low nutrient system I have seen, it was ALWAYS possible to correct with a lot more food. I have yet to come across one that food did not correct the issue. You don't have to turn down your skimmer or filtration, literally feed a lot more and nutrients will go up.