Considerable drop in no3?

[Reefltx]

So, my no3 has been somewhere between 5-10ppm. I feed pellets twice a day via auto feeder and frozen when I’m home during the evenings, which is just a mix of mysis/brine. For the last 7-10days, I’ve been feeding exclusively pellets 3x daily and noticed my no3 have dropped a good amount. I was barely getting a noticeable color change with salifert so I double checked with Red Sea and got a reading of 0.5ppm..

So, I’m back to feeding frozen and will monitor any changes.

I’m wondering have anyone else notice something similar?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Feeding less foods will certainly alter the balance of nitrate and phosphate in the tank, but there's no food type that will be substantially more or less prone to resulting in nitrate since the N that results in nitrate is inherent to nutritional foods as an integral part of proteins and other biomolecules.

If a food does result in more or less nitrate, it is likely because it has more proteins and other biomolecules packed into what a reefer considers an appropriate amount to feed.