Is my BTA dying?

[SallyWho]

I've had this BTA for about four years, and it's been slowly shrinking for the past few months, but today it looks especially awful. I will readily admit that some health and financial issues resulted in poor maintenance of the tank. I can only correct it so fast without crashing it- do you think the nem will survive and bounce back? Included is a pic of the post-it where I jotted down the results of last Friday's testing. I repeated the phos using a different kit to confirm, and yep it really is that high. Hopefully adding some rowaphos will help bring that down. And I didn't realize my salinity had dropped- my next water change will correct that. But anyway, is my nem toast?

 

[Goaway]

Not toast until they turn to mush and stink of death. If it clings on to life long enough to get your phosphates down, it can recover.

 

[kmagyar]

Definitely does not look good. PO4 is very high, but those nems usually can tolerate high PO4. Are there any corals in your system?

 

[bradleym]

The salinity is fine, but the phosphates are really bad, and something else is probably already dead based on the nitrites. You should do a big water change ASAP so things start to stabilize.

 

[C4ctus99]

The salinity is fine, but the phosphates are really bad, and something else is probably already dead based on the nitrites. You should do a big water change ASAP so things start to stabilize.

10 nitrates is high? My nem has been doing fine in much higher

 

[bradleym]

10 nitrates is high? My nem has been doing fine in much higher

Nitrites...

 

[C4ctus99]

Nitrites...

Oh… 0.05? @SallyWho what tester did you use?

 

[SallyWho]

Definitely does not look good. PO4 is very high, but those nems usually can tolerate high PO4. Are there any corals in your system?

Yup. Softies and LPS. They're all okay, but could be happier.

The salinity is fine, but the phosphates are really bad, and something else is probably already dead based on the nitrites. You should do a big water change ASAP so things start to stabilize.

I've got saltwater mixing. I can only change about 30g at a time though. Which isn't awful on a 120g with 40b sump, but it does make for slower changes.

 

[SallyWho]

Oh… 0.05? @SallyWho what tester did you use?

It's all Red Sea, with the salinity measured by a freshly calibrated refractometer, and the phosphates confirmed with a Hanna checker (in-date reagent confirmed).

 

[exnisstech]

Nitrites...

Hmm I never test nitrites even when cycling a tank. Is there really a good reason to test for them?

 

[Nano_Man]

Imo BTA like a bit of of nitrate and phosphate but your phosphate is high but your nitrate looks ok . Like above have said if it’s still footed and no bits are coming off it and no smell of death when you smell your water . BTA are quite hardy imo. I see you have a small nitrite reading but don’t worry about it it doesn’t effect your tank unless through the roof. You need to find a good phosphate remover which your happy to use . Just water change never helped my own phosphate issue at all leaching back out of sand and rock. Randy can tell you your best approach on high phosphate he helped me @Randy Holmes-Farley

 

[bradleym]

Just to be clear, I am calling out the nitrites because a healthy, stable tank has enough bacteria to consume the ammonia and nitrites before they are detectable. It could be a bad test result, but if it's accurate, then either something is rotting faster than the tank can handle it, or the bacteria have died off and the tank is cycling again as if it was new. Either way, this instability is a big issue for anemones. I hope this helps.