Nitrates

[James63]

I have a Waterbox Reef 220 tank which will be 6 months old this month. Live rock in the tank is from a previous established tank. Nitrates in the 220 are testing at 40 ppm. Can't seem to get them any lower. I have a refugium which is keeping Phosphates in check but not the Nitrates. Phosphates test out at .25. Medium bio load in tank. Nyos 160 skimmer. Doing weekly water changes of 20-30 gallons. What else can I do to lower my Nitrates? Currently I am not running any media in a reactor. Suggestions?

 

[Reefer newbie]

I have a Waterbox Reef 220 tank which will be 6 months old this month. Live rock in the tank is from a previous established tank. Nitrates in the 220 are testing at 40 ppm. Can't seem to get them any lower. I have a refugium which is keeping Phosphates in check but not the Nitrates. Phosphates test out at .25. Medium bio load in tank. Nyos 160 skimmer. Doing weekly water changes of 20-30 gallons. What else can I do to lower my Nitrates? Currently I am not running any media in a reactor. Suggestions?

I’m relatively new to the hobby, about 4 years. But from what I’ve read, dosing NO/POX can reduce the amount of nitrates in your tank. It’s the same as dosing vodka I’m told. You can also buy the nitrate reducing blocks from brs or other online saltwater stores. Also I notice your tank is 6 months old, how long did u let it cycle?? That could b the reason for the high nitrate reading, but not 100 percent positive.

 

[BroccoliFarmer]

Welcome to the R2R community!!!

I am a big Cheato fan. If you have a sump and a refugium, Cheato works..sometimes too well.

 

[HuduVudu]

Best to not chase numbers.

Nitrate is one of those numbers that when chased will bring about much pain to the unfortunate soul that is chasing it.

 

[nereefpat]

Carbon dosing (vodka, vinegar, nopox, etc) is a reasonable thing to try. So is an algae scrubber or macro algae fuge of some sort. Those things work, but not quickly, which is fine.

What do you have for fish?

 

[fushi]

I have a Waterbox Reef 220 tank which will be 6 months old this month. Live rock in the tank is from a previous established tank. Nitrates in the 220 are testing at 40 ppm. Can't seem to get them any lower. I have a refugium which is keeping Phosphates in check but not the Nitrates. Phosphates test out at .25. Medium bio load in tank. Nyos 160 skimmer. Doing weekly water changes of 20-30 gallons. What else can I do to lower my Nitrates? Currently I am not running any media in a reactor. Suggestions?

What kind of refugium light do you have and what macro are you using? You might just need a stronger light or a longer refugium photo period. Carbon dosing works great at reducing nutrients but hopefully you just need a simpler fix.

 

[czoolander]

Is there a reason you are wanting lower nitrates ? are you dealing with nuisance algea? If the corals are happy and you do not have overwhelming nuisance algea I would say leave the nitrates where they are .

If you are having issues then I would either put chaeto in the sump or dose Nopox. Both methods will lower your phos and nitrates to near zero so you will have to moniter and increase feeding of the fish and corals to keep up with the depleting numbers.

 

[mdb_talon]

What is the size of your refugium and what is in it? If cheato in there how much do you harvest weekly? A refugium working well should have no issues getting both your nitrates and phosphates down. Both could stand to come down a good amount

 

[moz71]

My experience. Have had nitrates at 40 ppm forever. Always had lower phosphate probably due to mass of cheato in refuge but nitrates never budged. Water changes did nothing. Tried a biopellet reactor for a year with no success not sure why! but a low daily dosing of NOPOX has reduced to 3 ppm and phosphate still stable. Again just my experience as you will get dozens of other suggestions from individuals experience.

 

[capted]

I tried chasing nitrates for almost a year. Nitrates spiked over 100ppm when I introduced 2 diamond gobies and I believe they disturbed my sand bed killing the anaerobic bacteria. Dosed vodka but it bottomed out my phosphates so I stopped. Bunch of water changes got it down to 30 ppm. Won't go any lower. I still do weekly 15% water changes. That being said, the tank is thriving at that level(30ppm nitrate) so that's how I'm leaving it!! I do have to clean the glass weekly though because of some algae. Don't get too crazy about it.