Rising nitrate and phosphate levels

[Mario0240]

probably about to get cyano soon.

Finally got that cyano bloom... still have the chemi pure in but I’m looking to change it to phosguard.. I’m thinking my refugium is needing a big of tlc. There are copepods in the DT as well as some bristle works and brittle stars, but the chaeto still looks to be fairly lifeless and hasn’t grown any since I got it. The light in there is just a white led strip so I’m looking to change it to a full spectrum plant light of some sort.

 

[Idoc]

Finally got that cyano bloom... still have the chemi pure in but I’m looking to change it to phosguard.. I’m thinking my refugium is needing a big of tlc. There are copepods in the DT as well as some bristle works and brittle stars, but the chaeto still looks to be fairly lifeless and hasn’t grown any since I got it. The light in there is just a white led strip so I’m looking to change it to a full spectrum plant light of some sort.

Lol, i guess we saw that coming with those high phosphates. But st least cyano can be cured without too much harm. I raised my nitrates and phosphates very quickly to dirty the tank while fighting dinos. Once the dinos were under control, the cyano came on with a vengeance and is still present. I'm afraid to reduce it quickly due to the dinos possibly coming back! So, I'm letting my phosphates come down slowly ( last test was finally only 0.07ppm) while dosing nitrates to around 10ppm. Slowly the cyano has been receding and just finally noticed some gha starting... but im thankful for it! When you reduce those phosphates, just do it slowly over a month or so and make sure you keep some nitrates in there at the same time! I was also squirting in some microbacter 7 every couple of days just to diversify my nitrifying bacteria colony and feel that had helped quite a bit with the cyano.

 

[Mario0240]

I was wondering if adding some healthy bacteria would help at all. I didn’t test water last night but I will in a few hours. I currently am dealing with a vomiting lionfish so that’s definitely not gonna help anything.

Think adding a clean up crew would help later occurrences of cyano and other algae/bacteria problems? I don’t have anything in there besides the urchin and whatever is coming out of the live rock.

 

[Mario0240]

Man, these levels just wont come down and i'm getting some nice green algae taking over everything.. Granted, i've had chemical warfare going on in there recently, I still need a better way to get these phosphate and nitrate levels under control.