Fluctuating phosphates, low dKh

[OceanSprayCranberry]

Starting running phosguard for high phosphates a month ago (.15ppm) and it held stable at 0.02ppm for a week then bottomed out. dKh also dropped from 8.9 to 7.5 and I’ve been dosing both but nothing is keeping them stable. Should I dose more?

 

[ahiggins]

Some follow up questions:
1) what coral do you have in the tank?
2) what do you think the “perfect” phosphate amount is?
3) what’s your nitrates?

 

[OceanSprayCranberry]

1. Mostly lps and lots of zoas.
2. preferably below .05
3. Nitrates were very low but I’ve dosed them up to 11.5ppm and they haven’t moved

I am running fallow right now due to ich but I target feed reef roids, phyto, and dose aquavitro fuel every 2 days

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Is the phosguard still in the water? If so, I’d remove it.

 

[OceanSprayCranberry]

Phosguard has been out for over a week. But… phosphate levels rocket back up the next day and the glass is dirty. I thought phosguard only brings it down to 0.02?

 

[ahiggins]

I usually don’t mess with phos levels in my tanks-although I don’t run much chemical filtration either outside of skimming when needed.
the most detrimental thing I’ve done to the tank has been to remove too much phosphate at once.
Why are you trying to remove it? To chase that perfect number or because your coral are suffering?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Phosguard has been out for over a week. But… phosphate levels rocket back up the next day and the glass is dirty. I thought phosguard only brings it down to 0.02?

lol

There's no binder we use that stops binding phosphate at a specific level that you may want.

 

[OceanSprayCranberry]

I usually don’t mess with phos levels in my tanks-although I don’t run much chemical filtration either outside of skimming when needed.
the most detrimental thing I’ve done to the tank has been to remove too much phosphate at once.
Why are you trying to remove it? To chase that perfect number or because your coral are suffering?

Other than some acans looking deflated everything else looks great. I guess you could say im trying to chase that .02-.05 number. Should I just let the phos levels stabilize?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Other than some acans looking deflated everything else looks great. I guess you could say im trying to chase that .02-.05 number. Should I just let the phos levels stabilize?

Depends on where it stabilizes. lol

 

[ahiggins]

Depends on where it stabilizes. lol

Lol true

@OceanSprayCranberry higher phos levels, in my opinion, are much easier to deal with than the effects of depleted phosphates