Fresh tank…Phosphates are reading at .2

[Vanilla]

So I have a fairly new tank. All other parameters are good and all coral/livestock are doing well.

Tested my phosphate for the first time yesterday (never been an issue in previous tanks so I kind of blew it off) and it is reading at about .25 on the API test.

I have 2 clowns in the tank and I feed them 1/3 a cube of mysis daily, that’s it.

I was dosing live phyto for the last week in the hopes of building my pod population, could this be causing it?

I’m also running a bag of chemipure blue which is assumed would bring phosphates down but apparently it’s not working too well.

 

[DenverSaltyFarm]

for sure the phyto can cause a very big spike in phosphate. Always think of phosphate as uneaten fish food. I would stop the phyto and with weekly water changes see what happens

when you feed the mysis is all of it getting eaten? also how large is the tank? do you have a protein skimmer?

 

[Vanilla]

for sure the phyto can cause a very big spike in phosphate. Always think of phosphate as uneaten fish food. I would stop the phyto and with weekly water changes see what happens

when you feed the mysis is all of it getting eaten? also how large is the tank? do you have a protein skimmer?

30g tank, no skimmer. That’s why I’m assuming the Live Phyto is causing the issue as it’s not getting skimmed out once it dies.

I stopped dosing for now and plan on testing again this upcoming Friday before and after my 20% water change.

Most of mysis gets eaten and I have a decent cleanup crew that gets most of the rest, but I’m thinking adding another couple fish may actually help me reduce the phosphates by keeping over-feeding to a minimum.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

API test goes from zero to .25
I keep my phosphate somewhere around .1
As you can see, your API test cannot possibly measure .1
You need to get an ultra low range phosphate tester, salifert is good, I like hanna the best
But you essentially don't know your phosphate level now, it is somewhere in between zero and .25, you need to test it with a proper kit.

 

[exnisstech]

If it were me I would roll with it for a while and let the tank mature a bit and see where it settles and how things look. I set up a new tank 3/12/23 and PO4 has been sitting at 0.25 give or take a point since start up. I'm just watching things for now. My 8 year old tank is never lower than 0.3 and has been as high as 0.9 so to me P04 at 0.25 is acceptable even tho most folks like it lower. I have other tanks with lower P04 that have nuisance algae but I have almost none in the tank with high PO4 but I couldn't tell you why that is I just accept it.

EDIT I test with a Hanna ulr phosphate kit

 

[Vanilla]

API test goes from zero to .25
I keep my phosphate somewhere around .1
As you can see, your API test cannot possibly measure .1
You need to get an ultra low range phosphate tester, salifert is good, I like hanna the best
But you essentially don't know your phosphate level now, it is somewhere in between zero and .25, you need to test it with a proper kit.

Got it, never used these, just got them for free. Assumed if it was pretty low it would just show as 0.

I’ll get a salifert, used them in the past and never had issues.

 

[Vanilla]

If it were me I would roll with it for a while and let the tank mature a bit and see where it settles and how things look. I set up a new tank 3/12/23 and PO4 has been sitting at 0.25 give or take a point since start up. I'm just watching things for now. My 8 year old tank is never lower than 0.3 and has been as high as 0.9 so to me P04 at 0.25 is acceptable even tho most folks like it lower. I have other tanks with lower P04 that have nuisance algae but I have almost none in the tank with high PO4 but I couldn't tell you why that is I just accept it.

EDIT I test with a Hanna ulr phosphate kit

I also have no algae, that’s why I was a bit confused. Going to test with a salifert kit for now.

I would like a Hannah, but gonna wait til I can just buy a whole set.

 

[MrPike]

Salifert is kinda useless for phosphate in my opinion. Phyto can add a ton of phosphate, phosphate is added to the water when they culture it, most of the time there is still some left. Your basically dosing fertilizer to your tank, which isn’t terrible if your reading 0 nitrate 0 phos. I’d wait till I saw near 0 on the Hanna and then dose small amounts of phyto with the goal of increasing those nutrients.

 

[ChrisfromBrick]

Salifert is kinda useless for phosphate in my opinion. Phyto can add a ton of phosphate, phosphate is added to the water when they culture it, most of the time there is still some left. Your basically dosing fertilizer to your tank, which isn’t terrible if your reading 0 nitrate 0 phos. I’d wait till I saw near 0 on the Hanna and then dose small amounts of phyto with the goal of increasing those nutrients.

can’t say I agree with this. Phyto should not be thought of as a source of phosphate. If I am wrong, then you should remove any uneaten phyto with whatever your nutrient source export is.

phyto is photosynthetic and should actually act to remove nutrients, not add to them.

“Phytoplankton consume nitrogen and phosphorous to perform photosynthesis. In an aquarium environment, adding LIVEphytoplankton will reduce your nitrate (NO3) and phosphate (PO4) levels as the living phytoplankton consume these nutrients for photosynthesis.”