Low nutrients.

Catchemall · Jul 18, 2017

Sounds good just do like half that amount and test about 15 minutes later. And go from there. What will happen is you'll dose till you get a reading that your shooting for then the next day or so it'll bottom out again redose to get a reading and it'll do it again. I dosed for a few months then went on vacation and let my mother n law feed my tank so I haven't had to redose nitrate since haha. So maybe that'll be a better alternative to dosing for you just let a family member that knows nothing about a reef tank to feed it for a week for you.

XNavyDiver · Jul 18, 2017

130 * .2= 26
26/2= 13ml a day.

Thank you very much!

chevegan · Jul 18, 2017

I have the same problem, so I turned off my skimmer and started dosing acropower amino acids. That's raised it a tad. I also have an algae scrubber, but being a natural filter it has less of a drastic impact I think. Does suck up the po4 though.

sghera64 · Jul 18, 2017

Stump remover (or straight X-NO3 chemicals) can have a bit of a delayed response in showing up in the test kit. Then there seems to be a bounce.

An alternative to adding Ca(NO3)2 for me was to add amino acids. I use Fuel (by AquaVitro). It's also "dirties" the water for those goniopora. I've also been experimenting with adding pure amino acids. Currently, I add L-Aspartic acid and Glycine (both off of Amazon). I've noticed I'm able to keep my PO4 and NO3 from bottoming out with these amino acid additions.

sghera64 · Jul 18, 2017

mckinney0171 said:
Speaking of Goniopora (sorry to hijack the thread but I wanted to talk to someone who knows more about them than me!).. I have a goni that started out red and over the years has turned a bright pink color (really light pink). Have you ever seen that happen and do you know the cause?

I have a red Gonio. It's color got duller as it grew in size. It might be an age thing. Older = muted color.

wrestle1952 · Jul 18, 2017

I have the same issues. Barely detectable levels of phosphates and nitrates. If my alkalinity level goes above 7.7 I get alkalinity burn (acropora on the tips and bottom) and easy SPS (montipora) birds nests, pocillopora burn FAST above 7.7. I've scoured the net and it seems many hobbyists experience similar situations. It is the same situation VERY low nitrates and phosphates and difficulty maintaining high alkalinity. This happens with excessive GFO use, bio-pellet reactors. This has forced me to test on a daily basis. Calcium is @ 500 magnesium 1500.

Catchemall · Jul 18, 2017

wrestle1952 said:
I have the same issues. Barely detectable levels of phosphates and nitrates. If my alkalinity level goes above 7.7 I get alkalinity burn (acropora on the tips and bottom) and easy SPS (montipora) birds nests, pocillopora burn FAST above 7.7. I've scoured the net and it seems many hobbyists experience similar situations. It is the same situation VERY low nitrates and phosphates and difficulty maintaining high alkalinity. This happens with excessive GFO use, bio-pellet reactors. This has forced me to test on a daily basis. Calcium is @ 500 magnesium 1500.

Alkalinity and nutrients go hand and hand for sure. Low alk you should try for low nutrients high alk you need higher nutrients. Same thing with the light level brighter lights then everything else needs to be inline to allow the coral to grow faster.

MikeYasin · Jul 19, 2017

I, too, was running with undetectable nitrate and phosphate at .002 to .035 (6ppb using the Hanna UL meter). Kept my Alk at 7 to 7.2 and didn't suffer any burnt tips in any of the acros I keep.

However, I was not happy with SPS coloration, so decided to dose sodium nitrate (reagent grade bought off Amazon)- chose sodium vs potassium because potassium isn't something I'm checking for currently, so I thought to avoid any additional sources.

There is a recent thread where @Randy Holmes-Farley provided a recipe; 10 grams of sodium nitrate dissolved in 1L of water and dosed @ 1ml per 2 gallons of system volume added 0.8 ppm of nitrate.

I've been dosing this daily (adjusted for my systems uptake) for a week now, and can tell you that it's worked well for me- I'm fine tuning for ~1ppm. The deep reds are back in my Fox flame, as are the gorgeous blues in my super man and orange passion.

SashimiTurtle · Jul 19, 2017

sghera64 said:
Stump remover (or straight X-NO3 chemicals) can have a bit of a delayed response in showing up in the test kit. Then there seems to be a bounce.

Agreed, mine was a about a 4 day delayed response. My NO3 and PO4 were both 0. Dosed a few ml KNO3 into my nano and tested. 0.75ppm. Dosed 24 hours later and tested, 0.75ppm. Dosed one more time 24 hours later, 1ppm. 24 hours later no dose and I was at 12ppm. Big water change (5 gallons lol) and I had it back at 2ppm.

mckinney0171 · Jul 19, 2017

MikeYasin said:
I, too, was running with undetectable nitrate and phosphate at .002 to .035 (6ppb using the Hanna UL meter). Kept my Alk at 7 to 7.2 and didn't suffer any burnt tips in any of the acros I keep.

However, I was not happy with SPS coloration, so decided to dose sodium nitrate (reagent grade bought off Amazon)- chose sodium vs potassium because potassium isn't something I'm checking for currently, so I thought to avoid any additional sources.

There is a recent thread where @Randy Holmes-Farley provided a recipe; 10 grams of sodium nitrate dissolved in 1L of water and dosed @ 1ml per 2 gallons of system volume added 0.8 ppm of nitrate.

I've been dosing this daily (adjusted for my systems uptake) for a week now, and can tell you that it's worked well for me- I'm fine tuning for ~1ppm. The deep reds are back in my Fox flame, as are the gorgeous blues in my super man and orange passion.

does this also increase phosphates?

MikeYasin · Jul 19, 2017

Nope, it does not. I've never needed to nor have ever dosed phosphates. if you need to dose phosphates, I would search the threads for those who have done so and what methods they used.

XNavyDiver · Jul 19, 2017

Robin Haselden said:
Agreed, mine was a about a 4 day delayed response. My NO3 and PO4 were both 0. Dosed a few ml KNO3 into my nano and tested. 0.75ppm. Dosed 24 hours later and tested, 0.75ppm. Dosed one more time 24 hours later, 1ppm. 24 hours later no dose and I was at 12ppm. Big water change (5 gallons lol) and I had it back at 2ppm.

That's really weird about the delayed response. I wonder why that is?

SashimiTurtle · Jul 19, 2017

XNavyDiver said:
That's really weird about the delayed response. I wonder why that is?

My only theory, is it takes a little while for the bond with potassium to weaken. KNO3 to K and NO3 might take a few days to naturally occur in saltwater. I'm not sure. I noticed the same thing on another thread I used to decide I was going to start. He tested low the first few days and then got a spike to 10ppm.

XNavyDiver · Jul 19, 2017

Robin Haselden said:
My only theory, is it takes a little while for the bond with potassium to weaken. KNO3 to K and NO3 might take a few days to naturally occur in saltwater. I'm not sure. I noticed the same thing on another thread I used to decide I was going to start. He tested low the first few days and then got a spike to 10ppm.

Ok, that makes sense. I'm gonna start at 13 ml for the first few days (which is half the dosage for the volume I have) and see where that gets me in couple of days.

SashimiTurtle · Jul 19, 2017

XNavyDiver said:
Ok, that makes sense. I'm gonna start at 13 ml for the first few days (which is half the dosage for the volume I have) and see where that gets me in couple of days.

That's all power plant operator non-chemist slightly educated wild guess.... don't rely on it, lol. Check out this calculator. Its for FW planted tanks, but when looking to boost nutrients I've always been told to look at what those guys are doing.

http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/calculator.htm

XNavyDiver · Jul 19, 2017

Robin Haselden said:
That's all power plant operator non-chemist slightly educated wild guess.... don't rely on it, lol. Check out this calculator. Its for FW planted tanks, but when looking to boost nutrients I've always been told to look at what those guys are doing.

http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/calculator.htm

This is the thread suggested by Catchemall that I read through about this subject. Not sure you've seen it. The dosing amount suggestion was given to me by Catchemall.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/potassium-nitrate-spectracide-stump-remover-dosing-steps.215730/

SashimiTurtle · Jul 19, 2017

Yea I've looked thru that one. I used that calculator I linked and came up with a solution that should raise my nitrates up .50ppm/2ml. I mixed up 2TBSP with 1 liter of RODI water. I'm currently trying to get PO4 up without the spike and chemicals, I'm close to resorting to chemicals.

RobbieMVFC · Jul 19, 2017

From my experience ULNS are a risk and must be carefully Maintained. I in the past have experience STN/RTN when I run my tank too low a with nutrients. I run ULNS with the help of Zeovit. Therefore nutrients are addressed. (Plus currently feeding the fish 3 times a day) Every time that nitrates at undetectable and Po4 bellow 0.01 I panic. I have stop doing WC and add trace elements via dosing. This works for me but I suggest doing homework. Just remember that corals need food to survive.

sundog101 · Jul 20, 2017

Could someone explain the alk and nutrient relationship? Or are there any good articles out there?

Hans-Werner · Jul 20, 2017

I wouldn´t care about nitrate. Nitrate is just a kind of waste product of the nitrogen cycle. Only surplus nitrogen which is not taken up by the corals when it has been amino acids and ammonium ends up as nitrate ... and corals are very efficient in taking up ammonium. Besides this corals can make their own available nitrogen by nitrogen fixation of mutualistic bacteria.

I would care more about the dropping phosphate concentration. I recommend not to add nitrate in this situation. In my experience nitrate interferes with phosphate in corals. Acropora spp. but also other SPS are especially prone to phosphorus deficiency. I had bleaching of tabular Montipora after I changed from an organic nitrogen source to nitrate and it was not caused by nitrogen deficiency but by the interference of phosphate with nitrate since nitrate was available in surplus and phosphate was low.