Nitrates and Phosphate Problem

[K1ng]

I have a 220 gallon that I cannot keep straight.

I have nitrates 100+ as per multiple salifert tests and Phosphates around 1.7 as per Hanna test

Tank info:
- 220 gallon tank with 80 gallon sump
- Running skimmer 24/7
- Have a refugium with chaeto that does not grow and possibly even dying
- Infrequent water changes
- Have some lps and leathers that dont grow at all. Will survive but slowly wither away over a long period of time
- Fish are blue tang, yellow tang, purple tang, foxface, squaretooth birstletang, 3 clownfish
- Had a huge problem with red cyano and seems to have transitioned into green slime which is probably just green cyano

Any suggestions on how to fix this mess?

From what Ive read getting something like siporax would be good to soak up some nitrates

 

[Lavey29]

Why infrequent water changes with high nutrients? How old is the tank? What are your complete parameters? What other filtration media do you use? GFO? What do you feed?

 

[PokeFish]

What light is on your refugium? I'd try dosing chaeto-gro. Really get that refugium going its gonna help tons

 

[K1ng]

Why infrequent water changes with high nutrients? How old is the tank? What are your complete parameters? What other filtration media do you use? GFO? What do you feed?

Don't have enough time to be doing water changes all the time but I should be on top of them.

Alk - 9.6
Cal - 480
Mag - 1500+ assuming 1600ish as I had to add more solution from salifert test

I am not using any other forms of filtration at this time. Was thinking about adding Siporax for nitrate reduction.

What light is on your refugium? I'd try dosing chaeto-gro. Really get that refugium going its gonna help tons

Good idea on the chaeto-gro I will give that a shot!

Im using a 60w 5000k bulb on my refugium

 

[Pickle_soup]

You have to find time for water changes at least for now. I doesn't take much longer than 30 minutes. How often do you feed the fish and how much?
I recommend: 25% water changes weekly over the next 4 weeks. Vacuum the sand really well, and try to get as much detritus out as you can. If you have LR, you might have to move that too, and vacuum it out. See if you have any dead spots in your tank, and increase the flow, making sure that you are getting some decent surface agitation. If you can, get a reactor with Seachem Matrix ( I will put my life on its reliability). It seems like you let that tank go for a while. Do you have a newborn? It seems that your tank is suffering from Newborn syndrome. If your sump is loaded with detritus, try to get as much of that out as you can too. I have dealt with similar issues in the past, and that's pretty much how I got through it. Cleaning up a tank is far more work-intensive than keep it clean.