Help! Nitrites and Nitrates are through the roof!!!

ronsgirl520 · Jul 7, 2013

Hello,

Ive had my aquarium for about 4 months now. After my tank cycled, I added my XL Emperor Angel. My levels remained perfect. Then I added Brutus...Brutus is my 12 inch show size Queen Trigger Fish. This guy puts off so much waste! He will eat anything! Im giving him two mussels a day and about 25 pellets. I take the shells out from the mussels after he is done crushing them. Ever since I added him to my tank, I cannot keep my nitrites and nitrates under control. Ive had him for a month now. Last week, I added a show size Arothron Puffer. He is about 9 inches.

I have a 210 gallon tank. My skimmer is running great and I have very powerful pumps. I keep my 2 filter socks clean and clean them once a week. I have a very large reef octopus skimmer. I bought a refractor and hoping that will help me lower these levels. My ammonia is not bad. Is it the meat Im feeding these fish that is spiking my levels? Should I cut back on the amount Im giving them?

Here is the kicker...I did a 25% water change 3 days ago to try and help lower my levels. Didnt budge. I did another 25% water change again tonight to again try and help lower these levels...didnt budge. what the heck is going on here! Isnt water changes supposed to be the fix all resolution???

Im pulling my hair out!

glb · Jul 8, 2013

ronsgirl520 said:
Hello,

Ive had my aquarium for about 4 months now. After my tank cycled, I added my XL Emperor Angel. My levels remained perfect. Then I added Brutus...Brutus is my 12 inch show size Queen Trigger Fish. This guy puts off so much waste! He will eat anything! Im giving him two mussels a day and about 25 pellets. I take the shells out from the mussels after he is done crushing them. Ever since I added him to my tank, I cannot keep my nitrites and nitrates under control. Ive had him for a month now. Last week, I added a show size Arothron Puffer. He is about 9 inches.

I have a 210 gallon tank. My skimmer is running great and I have very powerful pumps. I keep my 2 filter socks clean and clean them once a week. I have a very large reef octopus skimmer. I bought a refractor and hoping that will help me lower these levels. My ammonia is not bad. Is it the meat Im feeding these fish that is spiking my levels? Should I cut back on the amount Im giving them?

Here is the kicker...I did a 25% water change 3 days ago to try and help lower my levels. Didnt budge. I did another 25% water change again tonight to again try and help lower these levels...didnt budge. what the heck is going on here! Isnt water changes supposed to be the fix all resolution???

Im pulling my hair out!

Hmmm. I can understand nitrates but I'm puzzled about the nitrites. Sounds like a mini-cycle. Water changes will definitely help. You could also add A product like Seachem Denitrate or purigen. Or maybe clean the sock more often. What are the exact numbers?

TrialandError · Jul 8, 2013

Maybe your test kits are wrong?

Wrenchedup · Jul 8, 2013

Do you have a sump with bio balls or a fuge with algea if you have a fuge with algea that's kind of strange because the algea in a sump mixed with growing light does n exultant job in keeping nitrates/nitrites out of the tank if you have bio balls they could be contaminated change with Rock if none of that helps then yeah there is a natural chemical from kent marine it's in a black bottle I think that is a natural carbon that pulls it out if all that doesn't work the president of one of the other sites I'm on has this nitrate reactor that you could diy it's 1/4 tubbing wound up around a 4in pipe that leads to the center rude and in the process it does something to pull all the nitrates out of the water I could find out the schematics for you if you need it

Mike J. · Jul 8, 2013

How much live rock and sand do you have? It sounds like you're doing things right. So my thought is not enough denitrifying bacteria. You're also doing it right with the water changes and you should continue until you get it figured out.

ronsgirl520 · Jul 8, 2013

Nitrites are a 2.0 (bright purple) and nitrates are about a 40-80 (bright orange). I have fritz zym 9 I could add but I would have to turn my skimmer off for 3 days and scared that would spike my levels more.

ronsgirl520 · Jul 8, 2013

I have about 100lbs of sand and 150lbs of live rock. My refractor has the bio plastics in it. Its not hooked up yet though. I font have bio balls or an algae refugium

always reefin · Jul 8, 2013

you most likely have ammonia too. have you tested for it?

Mrfresh · Jul 8, 2013

Ok so quick run down.
U feed
Fish poop creating ammonia
Ammonia turns to nitrate
Nitrate turns to nitrite.

When I have a nitrate problem for 3 weeks I was doing water changes every other day about 30%

Here's my link if u want to see https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/reef-chemistry-forum/120915-dropping-nitrates-progression.html

I would just stick with large water changes as offten as u feel comfortable.
Frozen foods have a gel in them to help hold it together and freeze.
Depending on which type it cause either nitrate or phos.

S what you can do with ur food is thaw it out and then take a fine fish net pour it in there and rinse it under some water, rodi if u got it to.
Onces it's been cleaned and its just the food toss it in the tank and let the fish go crazy

Planedoc · Jul 8, 2013

When was the live rock added? 4 months ago or in stages? Did your tank clearly cycle? If your rock is 4 months old and the tank had an obvious cycle than its simply the fact that bacteria has to grow to catch up with bio load. It will take a month or two and the only thing you can do is large frequent water changes to keep things in check.

Tapatalk on Galaxy S3

bct15 · Jul 8, 2013

What kind of test kits are you using and how new are they? Typically when a test kit didn't change much when you know it should the kit is bad... I learned the hard way with a mag test kit. Kept adding and adding and never got above 1200, ordered new test kit and mag was over 1700.

always reefin · Jul 8, 2013

its actually ammonia to nitrite then nitrite to nitrate

Mrfresh said:
Ok so quick run down.
U feed
Fish poop creating ammonia
Ammonia turns to nitrate
Nitrate turns to nitrite.

When I have a nitrate problem for 3 weeks I was doing water changes every other day about 30%

Here's my link if u want to see https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/reef-chemistry-forum/120915-dropping-nitrates-progression.html

I would just stick with large water changes as offten as u feel comfortable.
Frozen foods have a gel in them to help hold it together and freeze.
Depending on which type it cause either nitrate or phos.

S what you can do with ur food is thaw it out and then take a fine fish net pour it in there and rinse it under some water, rodi if u got it to.
Onces it's been cleaned and its just the food toss it in the tank and let the fish go crazy

mike007 · Jul 8, 2013

You need to reduce the nutrient level which means that you are probaly overfeeding and your tank cannot handle the bioload. Water changes are great but they will not correct problem untill you figure out the cause. Many people as l are carbon dosing which works great at keeping levels in check.

ronsgirl520 · Jul 10, 2013

Planedoc said:
When was the live rock added? 4 months ago or in stages? Did your tank clearly cycle? If your rock is 4 months old and the tank had an obvious cycle than its simply the fact that bacteria has to grow to catch up with bio load. It will take a month or two and the only thing you can do is large frequent water changes to keep things in check.

Tapatalk on Galaxy S3

My rock was added at the same time 4 months ago. My levels were crazy at first until it cycled. Then they were perfect. They remained perfect when I added my emperor angel. It wasnt until I added the show size queen trigger that my levels steadily increased. Would bio balls help? I think the refractor I got for my bio pellets is a cheap one that wont do me any good too. I just did another 25% water change last night and didnt budge my nitrates and nitrates. Still off the charts. My test kit is brand new. Ammonia is .25-.50.

Mike J. · Jul 11, 2013

Quick run down on what's happening. Nitrosomonas europaea bacteria oxidize the ammonia to nitrite. As nitrite levels rise, Nitrospira-like bacteria begin to multiply and oxidize nitrites to nitrates. You have plenty of Nitrosomonas europaea bacteria, so there's no ammonia reading. Unfortunately, Nitrospira-like bacteria populate slower, preventing nitrite concentrations from leveling off faster than ammonia. The problem is nitrites is second to ammonia for fish death causes. You'll need to do stepped up water changes to dilute the nitrites until the population of Nitrospira-like bacteria catch up. This is the reason why fish should be added a few weeks or a month apart, especially large fish. The ammonia eating bacteria are not the problem they reproduce quickly, it's the nitrite eating bacteria that take a little time. It's common for a complete nitrogen cycle to take 6-8 weeks. IMO the bioballs will not be necessary.

Wrenchedup · Jul 11, 2013

Man patients is key freaking out causes mistakes I remember when I first started I had all these problems and tried 50 different things and nothing was working until I switched my fish food from frozen to pellets (now frozen once a week) maintain proper cal and alk levels and if your patients is like mine was I found this product that actualy did work it's called Bio fuel from brightwell aquatics black bottle do exactly what the bottle says its just a natural bacteria that works as a liquid carbon more or less maybe this will help you but if you have a sump the best thing you can do is get some cheato or grape algea!! These eat nitrates