Nitrate and phosphate dosing recipe

[John08007]

A little background on my tank, a few hrs ago my gsp and xenia that both grew like weeds shriveled up and died. I later purchased another xenia, it never really did anything and died. My skimmer is probably a little oversized for my tank. To simplify maintenance I recently removed my pellet and gfo reactors and added some chaeto with a grow light to my sump. The chaeto is dieing off.

I believe my problems are low nitrate and phosphate. I tested everything, CA 487 ALK 11 MG1560 SG 1.026 Phosphate. 04 nitrate 0, I have seen about people using stump remover for nitrate, I can't find any info on a recipe, what do you use for phosphate? I think I've seen something for planted aquariums used.

 

[John08007]

I just found on BRS ESC B-Ionic nitrate, don't see anything about phosphate

 

[Lenett]

A little background on my tank, a few hrs ago my gsp and xenia that both grew like weeds shriveled up and died. I later purchased another xenia, it never really did anything and died. My skimmer is probably a little oversized for my tank. To simplify maintenance I recently removed my pellet and gfo reactors and added some chaeto with a grow light to my sump. The chaeto is dieing off.

I believe my problems are low nitrate and phosphate. I tested everything, CA 487 ALK 11 MG1560 SG 1.026 Phosphate. 04 nitrate 0, I have seen about people using stump remover for nitrate, I can't find any info on a recipe, what do you use for phosphate? I think I've seen something for planted aquariums used.

I'm not an expert, but if your nitrates are 0, you may have Ammonia or nitrite. Did you test those? How long has tank been up, cycled? My nitrates are always high. If you changed to a refugium, what is your biological filter? Just asking!

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Forget stump remover (which has no purity guarantee) and use a food grade sodium nitrate and phosphate. It is cheap and easy. Amazon, etc. Loudwolf is a good brand, but there are many.

There are hundreds of threads detailing the method in this forum, but use this calculator and enter potassium nitrate or phosphate, even if you use the sodium version:

James' Planted Tank - Dosing Calculator

 

[John08007]

Forget stump remover (which has no purity guarantee) and use a food grade sodium nitrate and phosphate. It is cheap and easy. Amazon, etc. Loudwolf is a good brand, but there are many.

There are hundreds of threads detailing the method in this forum, but use this calculator and enter potassium nitrate or phosphate, even if you use the sodium version:

James' Planted Tank - Dosing Calculator

Would you agree this is why my chaeto, gsp and xenia died? I order some sodium nitrate and trisodium phosphate, both food grade.

 

[Lenett]

Okay, planted tank is completely different, sorry!

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Would you agree this is why my chaeto, gsp and xenia died? I order some sodium nitrate and trisodium phosphate, both food grade.

you mean lack of nutrients? It’s certainly a possibility. Could be other reasons.

 

[Dr. Reef Verified Sponsor]

I ran into similar issues when my nitrates were absolutely 0 and phos also close to 0. Using sulfur denitrator and lanthanum chlorine.
Once I removed both and let nitrates come upto 10-15ppm and phos about 0.05-0.08 range i was able to keep corals thriving.

I used sodium nitrate and phosphate to bring up levels.

 

[User1]

My Nitrates have been reading 0 for the past few weeks. I thought maybe it was my older Nyos kit so ordered a new one and those results also showed 0. Could be why I'm dealing with a large cyno outbreak that does not seem to be going away. I've also always wondered if the test kit readings are low because the visible algae is the consumer (in this case cyno) and thus giving a false indication of low to no nutrients. Confusing to me anyway.

Alk 8.5 (Hanna) 8.27 (Trident) 8.27 (ATI ICP Sept 2020)
Phosphate 0.06 (Hanna) 0.08 (ATI ICP Sept 2020)

Nitrate 0 (Nyos) 6.65 mg/l (ATI ICP Sept 2020)

I was considering dosing Loudwolf's Sodium Nitrate since the Nyos kit is reading 0. I have not yet since the last ATI ICP I ran back in September was saying 6.65 mg/l. Usually there is a cyno outbreak but it passes in this case it decided to stay around so figured I'd dig a bit deeper to see what I'm not doing.

Tank is 2 1/2 years and it started with dry rock (pukani). I've been through all the stages and seeing coral growth now on a few of the test SPS frags but it is mostly soft. Interesting thought though on dosing and my thought was to calculate enough to raise it by one in my tank and see if the nyos kit would measure it...