How do you bump up nitrates

Frop · Feb 22, 2017

wkscott said:
Yes, if you don't have excess nitrates and no pods you really don't have much of a need for the chaeto. Chaeto is very efficient at removing nutrients from the water.

Dumb question but I have to ask: Are you by chance running GFO or carbon on your tank?

Are you asking me? (Chemipure elite, so yes to both).

jwshiver · Feb 22, 2017

I use this.
http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/neonitro-balanced-nitrogen-supplement-brightwell-aquatics.html

mcarroll · Feb 22, 2017

ReeferBee said:
Fish waste

You are right of course, and I haven't been doing this for too long compared to some people....but I've always been under the impression that fish waste came from fish food.

If you're choosing a whole or live food like you should, the PO4 and N will be balanced. If you're dealing with an industrially composed food, then it's possible things could be out of whack, but probably not even then.

(Denitrification is what's usually behind the disparity of NO3 and PO4 in a tank where NO3 is low or zero while PO4 builds higher and higher. There's no similar EXIT for PO4 so if nothing like corals or algae are growing and using it, it just builds up. Beyond a certain point, low-NO3 itself actually feeds into this disparity.)

ReeferBee · Feb 22, 2017

Yes fish waste comes from fish food no surprise or secret there

. I'm addressing the folks saying feed more, get an auto feeder and add food to filter socks. This will attribute to a much larger rise in po4. Im just saying there are better more efficient ways of rasing just no3. I believe that's the point of the thread. Which isn't asking how to raise all nutrients, just nitrates. Whole food like frozen shrimp adds loads more phosphate as well, even more so if it is not rinsed. Not getting the point you're trying to make here.

mcarroll · Feb 22, 2017

ReeferBee said:
Not getting the point you're trying to make here.

I guess I was sorta saying that you can feed natural foods and have a balanced tank.

It does happen – often seemingly in spite of the numbers.

So feeding is a fine choice to proceed with.

I suspect that a continuous source of available nitrogen is more important than the nitrogen's form or concentration in ppm's....even more important than the relative concentration of PO4.

Also, there are potential downsides of direct nitrate dosing – neither feeding nor dosing is a no-brainer.

We gotta understand some of the ins and outs either way we go.

Rinsing food is useful if your food has a phosphate-based preservatives on it....I've heard seafood from the grocery (intended for humans, but sometimes also good for our tanks!) could have this.

Rinsing foods that have no added preservatives doesn't do much good, especially in a tank with corals which will like every little drop and morsel as food.

Nobody, however, is recommending to repeat this:

Shaddow_wolf169 said:
I dumped a bunch of mysis and brine 1 cube each with packaged water

Ultimately there's probably no harm from a dump like that in a decent sized tank, but nothing good happens fast in a reef tank, right?

(In a smaller tank you could cause an ammonia spike –

no good at all!!)

Just a little more everyday kind of feeding of fish is what you'd want. And better quality food if that's possible.

An auto-feeder can actually help due to the regularity of feedings – even if you don't increase the overall amount of food going into the system.

But an auto-feeder also makes it much easier to make systematic changes to your feeding quantity – up or down – when you have it automated and have a predetermined dosage rate. (Eheim's feeders make this pretty easy to accomplish in practice too.)

Shaddow_wolf169 · Feb 22, 2017

99% of the time I always rinse my food good. I feed the mysis and brine to my corals and anemones the fish get the left overs. I use phosguard in my sump for p04 control.

ReeferBee · Feb 22, 2017

@mcarroll Whaaa....?
There again the point of the thread is to bump up nitrates. Just nitrates. Over feeding and or uping feeding has much more of a negative impact, such as rasing phosphate. Ammonia is a nitrogen based molecule and one with no benefits in our tanks. Please explain the negative side of dosing nitrates? These "natural" foods you speak of come frozen with nasty water.

mcarroll · Feb 22, 2017

@ReeferBee Keep in mind I'm a firm believer in nitrate dosing as a tool and I've made plenty of posts on it if you wanted to run a forum search. Further, I haven't told anyone to do, or not do, anything.

I do not think every problem is the same. I do not think nitrate dosing is a magic bullet. And I think you're assuming too much.

My blog is linked in my signature. If you want to dig into this more, go there and click on the Nutrients tag. There are a bunch of articles linked that are full of good ideas. These are real articles from science journals (not mine!!) so they may or may not be everyone's cup of tea.....if it's not yours, you can get away with just skimming the abstracts or even just reading just my commentary on some of them, but every article I post has a full version of the article available.

FindNem0 · Feb 22, 2017

First question is what size tank and what size sump? You said 160 gallons, but is that after live rock and sand? Because that skimmer can definitely be killing you r progress. It's rated for 100-250 gallons. That's a pretty wide range IMO. You have bigger problems than no nitrates!!! Calcium, alkalinity, and magnesium. 520!!! 13.5!!!! and 1650!!!!????? Were those numbers pulled right after dosing or a water change? I personally would get my salinity, calcium, alkalinity, magnesium, PH in check before I started putting any corals or fish in your tank. I would do a 10% water change once a week until my levels were stable. I would also check my levels at the same time everyday. I would also pull the cheto.

mcarroll · Feb 22, 2017

Link to section: Nutrients

Latest article linked: Response of heterotrophic bacteria, autotrophic picoplankton and heterotrophic nanoflagellates to re-oligotrophication
A nitrate-dosing favorite: Trophic dynamics of scleractinian corals: stable isotope evidence

mcarroll · Feb 22, 2017

Shaddow_wolf169 said:
99% of the time I always rinse my food good. I feed the mysis and brine to my corals and anemones the fish get the left overs. I use phosguard in my sump for p04 control.

You might like this one: Phosphate Excretion by Anemonefish and Uptake by Giant Sea Anemones: Demand Outstrips Supply

ReeferBee · Feb 22, 2017

I am assuming nothing... Please explain this assumption. Just trying to make since of your contradicting replys, which seem to change with every new post. Like saying the form of nitrogen doesn't matter.. Feeding more will help.. Dosing nitrate has potential negatives.. I am holding to the OP original post about rasing nitrate. I feel I need to reiterate this because I feel like you're skimming over my post lol. The guy asked how to raise no3 and I still hold my ground, dose nitrate. Anything and everything else is and will add other, undesirable nutrients to the OP's tank.

Shaddow_wolf169 · Feb 23, 2017

FindNem0 said:
First question is what size tank and what size sump? You said 160 gallons, but is that after live rock and sand? Because that skimmer can definitely be killing you r progress. It's rated for 100-250 gallons. That's a pretty wide range IMO. You have bigger problems than no nitrates!!! Calcium, alkalinity, and magnesium. 520!!! 13.5!!!! and 1650!!!!????? Were those numbers pulled right after dosing or a water change? I personally would get my salinity, calcium, alkalinity, magnesium, PH in check before I started putting any corals or fish in your tank. I would do a 10% water change once a week until my levels were stable. I would also check my levels at the same time everyday. I would also pull the cheto.

My tank is 125g with a 40g sump I do not dose my tank the numbers I got a week after a wc. Good thing is I am seeing more coraline algae growing so it should start using up a lot of calcium.

Salty1962 · Feb 23, 2017

Maritimer said:
That's a rather light bioload for 160 gallons of water. Not sure you could feed those fish enough to raise nitrates significantly. You might consider dosing, but go slowly and test often, IMO.

~Bruce

+1 on dosing. I use KNo3 for dosing No3 to keep @2~4ppm.

FindNem0 · Feb 23, 2017

If you really think about it, that skimmer can handle a whole other tank that size sitting next to it. All you can do is test and evaluate. Some of these guys crack me up. They get so defensive. Who's got the bigger corals. And the nicest tank. Post em up and that's who I'm taking advice from. Hahahhaha

Beonedge · Feb 23, 2017

or just remove scimmers cup and keep it running 24/7 with/without cup

Shaddow_wolf169 · Feb 23, 2017

FindNem0 said:
If you really think about it, that skimmer can handle a whole other tank that size sitting next to it. All you can do is test and evaluate. Some of these guys crack me up. They get so defensive. Who's got the bigger corals. And the nicest tank. Post em up and that's who I'm taking advice from. Hahahhaha

I have always hear you want to have a skimmer that can double your water volume. I did go bigger because I want to install a 220L or 300g down the road.