Cheap Calcium Nitrate source?

Thumbster · Aug 3, 2023

I’ve recently been battling dinos and of course my phosphate and nitrate is bottomed out. I’m dosing loudwolf Trisodium Phosphate and Calcium Nitrate.

I think the Trisodium phosphate will last me a while in my 40 breeder but I’ve realized that I will be going through a lot of Calcium Nitrate quickly (and expensively). Just wondering if there is a cheaper source (or chemical) for the nitrate?
Thanks

A_Blind_Reefer · Aug 3, 2023

Thumbster said:
I’ve recently been battling dinos and of course my phosphate and nitrate is bottomed out. I’m dosing loudwolf Trisodium Phosphate and Calcium Nitrate.

I think the Trisodium phosphate will last me a while in my 40 breeder but I’ve realized that I will be going through a lot of Calcium Nitrate quickly (and expensively). Just wondering if there is a cheaper source (or chemical) for the nitrate?
Thanks

How are you mixing it and dosing it? I’m just curious as I’ve been dosing with loud wolf sodium nitrate for a while now and find it to be very inexpensive…especially when compared to neo nitro. There are other sources that are even cheaper that people have success with. I myself like using higher grade chemicals as opposed to tree stump remover, even if they are identical in composition but that’s just me. I recently switched to ammonium chloride. I don’t know about your system but you could look up Randy’s thread on diy ammonia dosing for low nitrate systems if interested.

Thumbster · Aug 3, 2023

Here’s what I’ve been dosing for nitrates and phosphate.

If my math (or this chart) is right I can get about 100 doses of phosphate but only 50 doses of nitrates. I’ll probably start doubling the dose of the nitrates too so that will take it down to 25 nitrate doses.

I realize $10ish a month isn’t going to break me and now that I’ve written it down and looked at it, it’s really not that expensive for this hobby. Just hoping to get better mileage out of the Calcium Nitrate I guess.

A_Blind_Reefer · Aug 3, 2023

I can’t read pictures or charts on my end so I can’t confirm. I used James planted tank calculator and have dosed nitrate and phosphate for several years. I have about 200 gallons total and mixed 76 grams of sodium nitrate per gallon of rodi and dosed about 50 ml of that per day. Well over two months per gallon and I could make three gallons total out of an 8 ounce bottle of sodium nitrate. About seven months worth from that $10 bottle. Everybody’s system is different, but I think something’s wrong and you should be getting more mileage.

A_Blind_Reefer · Aug 3, 2023

Have you established a maintenance dose yet? If you’re still at zero I’m guessing not. My experience has been that once you hit your target and it stabilizes the maintenance dose should be much lower so you may use a bit to get to say 5 ppm but it should maintain 5 ppm with a much lower dose

Edit. I’m just sharing my experience and I’m not professing anything here. There are much smarter people on here to get absolutes from

Thumbster · Aug 3, 2023

I’m on day three of dosing lol. Nowhere near figuring out a maintenance dose yet. I also used The planted tank calculator and am dosing 3 ppm of nitrate to start. I may bump that up to 9ppm if I don’t get any readings on the test kit. I see you’re dosing 1 ppm if I plugged the numbers in right.

Honestly I didn’t even consider that I would have to continue dosing n and p once things get settled.

I also bought the 4oz bottle of Calcium Nitrate instead of the 8oz bottle. I wasn’t completely committed to the idea of dosing n and p at the time. I could have cut some cost buying the bigger bottles.

billyocean · Aug 3, 2023

Rocks will absorb before they saturate. So after saturation, dosing changes. Stay on top of testing until that happens

A_Blind_Reefer · Aug 3, 2023

Thumbster said:
I’m on day three of dosing lol. Nowhere near figuring out a maintenance dose yet. I also used The planted tank calculator and am dosing 3 ppm of nitrate to start. I may bump that up to 9ppm if I don’t get any readings on the test kit. I see you’re dosing 1 ppm if I plugged the numbers in right.

Honestly I didn’t even consider that I would have to continue dosing n and p once things get settled.

I also bought the 4oz bottle of Calcium Nitrate instead of the 8oz bottle. I wasn’t completely committed to the idea of dosing n and p at the time. I could have cut some cost buying the bigger bottles.

Oh fun. I first started with Neo phos…. Three 500 ml bottles before I was able to keep any measurable nitrate for more than a day or two (not all at once of course). I think I was pretty close to 1ppm daily. I’ve been hovering around 10 ppm nitrate plus or minus for a long while now. Are you buying direct from loud wolf? They don’t charge shipping like Amazon does so it’s usually cheaper. No minimum that I’ve ever noticed either. I don’t feed too heavy as my fish to volume ratio is very low and the only way to keep the corals happy, without creating other issues, is dosing.

Thumbster · Aug 3, 2023

Yes I bought direct and I feed pellets and frozen pretty heavily. I’ve got two clowns in the tank along with a dozen or so LPS/SPS and zoas.

The clowns could care less about the mysis but I’ve noticed that the acan that I got last week really likes them.

I’m not convinced that feeding heavy contributes to raising n and p.

Randy Holmes-Farley · Aug 4, 2023

Thumbster said:
I’ve recently been battling dinos and of course my phosphate and nitrate is bottomed out. I’m dosing loudwolf Trisodium Phosphate and Calcium Nitrate.

I think the Trisodium phosphate will last me a while in my 40 breeder but I’ve realized that I will be going through a lot of Calcium Nitrate quickly (and expensively). Just wondering if there is a cheaper source (or chemical) for the nitrate?
Thanks

I'm not aware of a good cheap source, which is why I generally recommend sodium nitrate as an almost as good alternative.