Best way to lower phosphates

[Chuck gutshall]

My dads tank has very high phosphates. Would doing a 50% water change, then over the next week doing 20% water changes be better then. Starting with 20% and everyother day doing 20% water changes. All fish have died and corals aren't looking to hot at the moment

 

[T-J]

What exactly are you considering "high phosphates"? High phosphates will not kill the fish, so I suspect something else is going on here.
In regards to reducing phosphates, you need to ID where they are coming from. Water changes will help, but you could be bringing them right back up with heavy frozen food feeding for example.
Having said all of that, I use GFO for phosphate control.

 

[Justin Cook]

I use Brightwell's Phosphate-E. I've had really good luck with it and it's really, really simple. Based on my experience with it, here are a few things to keep in mind when using it:

• It doesn't take much to make a sizeable dent in PO4 levels. I've had the same bottle for years because I treat my tank with a max of 5 mL per dose.
• Go small. When I treat with 5 ML, I do it in 1 mL increments over the course of a few hours. It can cause cloudiness and issues for fish if you're not careful.
• Add it before a good mechanical filter. I think this is the best way because it's the way I do it and it's always worked. I drip it into my overflow that feed directly into a 100 micron filter sock. Doing it like this, I've never seen any signs of cloudiness in the tank or had a problem with the livestock.
• Test, test, test. I like to test a few hours after each dose to make sure I'm not crashing the PO4 levels. I have a very good idea how much PO gets removed per mL of Phosphate-E and I still test a lot.
• Whatever you think the appropriate dose might be, cut it in half. Nothing good happens quickly in this hobby and you do need to be careful with this stuff. Half the dose, test and treat again if required.

 

[excell007]

this thread talks about reducing phosphate: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/did-i-unlock-all-the-phosphate-from-100-s-of-live-rock.766355/
T-J is also correct, I have more than 4ppm of phosphate for several years and never killed a fish.

 

[Chuck gutshall]

What exactly are you considering "high phosphates"? High phosphates will not kill the fish, so I suspect something else is going on here.
In regards to reducing phosphates, you need to ID where they are coming from. Water changes will help, but you could be bringing them right back up with heavy frozen food feeding for example.
Having said all of that, I use GFO for phosphate control.

What exactly are you considering "high phosphates"? High phosphates will not kill the fish, so I suspect something else is going on here.
In regards to reducing phosphates, you need to ID where they are coming from. Water changes will help, but you could be bringing them right back up with heavy frozen food feeding for example.
Having said all of that, I use GFO for phosphate control.

My phosphates are .90ppm+. And they all died at once

 

[Chuck gutshall]

this thread talks about reducing phosphate: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/did-i-unlock-all-the-phosphate-from-100-s-of-live-rock.766355/
T-J is also correct, I have more than 4ppm of phosphate for several years and never killed a fish.

Ok ill do some investigating tonight to see what I can find

 

[josvanmeer]

If you really want to lower them then a reactor is the most efficient and effective way to do it. Get an appropriate sized one with the proper amount of gfo. Is it needed though? If you are always feeding a lot then just reduce feeding, if you don’t have a lot of sps coral that doesn’t look like it’s growing and only have fish, then you don’t have to do anything at all etc etc

 

[excell007]

Ok ill do some investigating tonight to see what I can find

My phosphate is now .19, after several months of slowly bringing it down using LC.
How old is your tank and how long have you had the high phosphate? Phosphate is a bit tricky because it binds on rocks and sand, then leach it back to the water. So sometime it seems like you're going nowhere. I have tried GFO, but for me LC seems to work better.

 

[Chuck gutshall]

My phosphate is now .19, after several months of slowly bringing it down using LC.
How old is your tank and how long have you had the high phosphate? Phosphate is a bit tricky because it binds on rocks and sand, then leach it back to the water. So sometime it seems like you're going nowhere. I have tried GFO, but for me LC seems to work better.

Ok I think imma start back at square one. Test for every thing and go from there