Spectracide Nitrate Dosing: Warning of Potential Danger

[Kurkis493]

Thanks for replies - Sorry to hijack things. Ordered myself some Sodium Nitrate this evening. Excited to get started with it.

 

[jumplittlechloe]

Just wanted to say I had the same experience with Spectracide. Zero nitrate on Salifert test. Started dosing and held at 2.5ppm. Corals looked good first week. Second week saw some green coloration come back in some of the lighter SPS. Beginning of third week euphyllia retracted noticed tip burn on all SPS. Also had a cyano outbreak. This is the first post I have read where someone had a similar experience.

1.026 sg
0.02 - 0.04 phos (RedSea)
420 Ca
7.6 dKH
1320 mg
0 ppm nitrate as of now (ordered the sodium nitrate Adam recomended)

 

[Robink]

Good info.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Just wanted to say I had the same experience with Spectracide. Zero nitrate on Salifert test. Started dosing and held at 2.5ppm. Corals looked good first week. Second week saw some green coloration come back in some of the lighter SPS. Beginning of third week euphyllia retracted noticed tip burn on all SPS. Also had a cyano outbreak. This is the first post I have read where someone had a similar experience.

1.026 sg
0.02 - 0.04 phos (RedSea)
420 Ca
7.6 dKH
1320 mg
0 ppm nitrate as of now (ordered the sodium nitrate Adam recomended)

How's it going now?

 

[rockskimmerflow]

Just wanted to say I had the same experience with Spectracide. Zero nitrate on Salifert test. Started dosing and held at 2.5ppm. Corals looked good first week. Second week saw some green coloration come back in some of the lighter SPS. Beginning of third week euphyllia retracted noticed tip burn on all SPS. Also had a cyano outbreak. This is the first post I have read where someone had a similar experience.

Sorry to hear you went through a similar experience to mine. I was beginning to think I had an isolated incident perhaps due to my lack of protein skimmer. My idea was that maybe those running a skimmer and heavy feeding might be chelating and skimming out any significant toxic metal contaminant before it had a chance to build up in the system. I never experienced a cyano out break as you did, but I definitely had burned tips on the acropora.

The other oddity that led me to believe it was metal toxicity is that the colors AND polyp extension was retained while the corals continued to lose random patches of tissue.

Now that I'm over a month past this issue I can certainly say whatever affected the corals stayed in their tissues/biological systems long after it was present in the water. I lost about 1/2 of my sps colonies in the first week despite large successive water changes, running a metasorb pad, and discontinuation of nitrate dosing. Measurable parameters stayed in the ideal ranges in this period of time. I fed heavier and ran a bit more gfo to keep nitrate above 0ppm (1-5ppm on Salifert). The corals that did not die initially continued to worsen in appearance for another week with patchy tissue loss and burned tips. I continued maintaining parameters as optimally as feasible and rode it out, half expecting to lose the remainder of my colonies to this slow death. Thankfully, everything that made it past week one worsened for another week and then began recovering. All the surviving colonies are doing well now and growing rapidly again - uptaking about 2 dkH worth of alkalinity per day. I was very happy not to lose it all to a careless experiment with a hardware store product I read about on a forum. Lesson learned, again..

I hope no one else has to go through this experience. I only witnessed the effects on a skimmerless purely acropora propagation system so I can't speak to how other corals and tanks may react to Spectracide. Use caution everyone!

 

[.AcroKiller.]

Sorry to hear you went through a similar experience to mine. I was beginning to think I had an isolated incident perhaps due to my lack of protein skimmer. My idea was that maybe those running a skimmer and heavy feeding might be chelating and skimming out any significant toxic metal contaminant before it had a chance to build up in the system. I never experienced a cyano out break as you did, but I definitely had burned tips on the acropora.

The other oddity that led me to believe it was metal toxicity is that the colors AND polyp extension was retained while the corals continued to lose random patches of tissue.

Now that I'm over a month past this issue I can certainly say whatever affected the corals stayed in their tissues/biological systems long after it was present in the water. I lost about 1/2 of my sps colonies in the first week despite large successive water changes, running a metasorb pad, and discontinuation of nitrate dosing. Measurable parameters stayed in the ideal ranges in this period of time. I fed heavier and ran a bit more gfo to keep nitrate above 0ppm (1-5ppm on Salifert). The corals that did not die initially continued to worsen in appearance for another week with patchy tissue loss and burned tips. I continued maintaining parameters as optimally as feasible and rode it out, half expecting to lose the remainder of my colonies to this slow death. Thankfully, everything that made it past week one worsened for another week and then began recovering. All the surviving colonies are doing well now and growing rapidly again - uptaking about 2 dkH worth of alkalinity per day. I was very happy not to lose it all to a careless experiment with a hardware store product I read about on a forum. Lesson learned, again..

I hope no one else has to go through this experience. I only witnessed the effects on a skimmerless purely acropora propagation system so I can't speak to how other corals and tanks may react to Spectracide. Use caution everyone!

How did you mixed the spectracide? How much you added ? What is the aquarium water volume? I have a 60 gallon sps tank and I have dosed spectracide longer than a month with no issues.

Did you get the spectracide stump remover or did you get the other brand from Home Depot?

 

[.AcroKiller.]

Found this while searching potassium nitrate impurities. The guy talks about some of the impurities found on stump removers and copper was not one.

Randy is purifying it like he does would be a good idea?

http://www.nakka-rocketry.net/knpurify.html

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Found this while searching potassium nitrate impurities. The guy talks about some of the impurities found on stump removers and copper was not one.

Randy is purifying it like he does would be a good idea?

http://www.nakka-rocketry.net/knpurify.html

Recrystallization is generally a good way to purify solids, and may be useful here. That said, none of the specific chemical impurities they list are any concern to reefers.

 

[jumplittlechloe]

How's it going now?

I still have some cyano but it has gotten better. I have not started dosing nitrate and am still holding at 0ppm. My euphyllia is extending again. Odd thing about that coral was I found some orange flesh around on the sand bed like it lost flesh. It looks as if the tips are growing back/coloring up. Most SPS did not make it as after losing flesh on their tips the cyano would hold and they continued to loose flesh.

 

[.AcroKiller.]

I still have some cyano but it has gotten better. I have not started dosing nitrate and am still holding at 0ppm. My euphyllia is extending again. Odd thing about that coral was I found some orange flesh around on the sand bed like it lost flesh. It looks as if the tips are growing back/coloring up. Most SPS did not make it as after losing flesh on their tips the cyano would hold and they continued to loose flesh.

What is your alkalinity reading. Has your alkalinity gone above 9dkh?

 

[.AcroKiller.]

I'm asking because I went through this also and the reason was my alkalinity went up above 9dkh due to the Hanna checker bad regent and my acros started experiencing burn tips to the point that the tips were brittle and would crumble if I press with my finger tip.

That's the down fall of keeping a low nutrient system if alkalinity goes up.

 

[Diesel]

How I missed this.
Interesting read but without a good water test info I can say it has no value.
Sorry to hear you lost lots of years of growing colonies.
I had the same happening about two years ago and Triton test came out negative.
Wasn't dosing any No3 at that time.
Have been on the phone with Adam @Battlecorals numerous time as to what it could be but I gave up and try to save what I could.
The problems were as the same you describe after dosing.
As of today I still don't know what happened but Adam and few others all agreed that it could be a bacterial disease.
Tank is doing great again and yes I'm dosing No3 (stumpremover) for the last 6 months, doing a Triton test every other month with no results on elevated copper.
Not saying you didn't had any elevated copper level as your bottle of stump remover might could be a bad bottle, but I don't know if that results in copper elevation.
I think it's time to put our heads together and have a test done on different No3 solutions that some hobbyist use.
Now I must say I add only 3ml per day to my 200gal tank, trying to eliminate it as I feed the heck out of my 10 fish.
I don't run any nutrient removing reactors or fuge just a good skimmer and lots of acro's that in their turn take up some kind of % of the nutrients.









[HASHTAG]#reefsquad[/HASHTAG]

 

[.AcroKiller.]

How I missed this.
Interesting read but without a good water test info I can say it has no value.
Sorry to hear you lost lots of years of growing colonies.
I had the same happening about two years ago and Triton test came out negative.
Wasn't dosing any No3 at that time.
Have been on the phone with Adam @Battlecorals numerous time as to what it could be but I gave up and try to save what I could.
The problems were as the same you describe after dosing.
As of today I still don't know what happened but Adam and few others all agreed that it could be a bacterial disease.
Tank is doing great again and yes I'm dosing No3 (stumpremover) for the last 6 months, doing a Triton test every other month with no results on elevated copper.
Not saying you didn't had any elevated copper level as your bottle of stump remover might could be a bad bottle, but I don't know if that results in copper elevation.
I think it's time to put our heads together and have a test done on different No3 solutions that some hobbyist use.
Now I must say I add only 3ml per day to my 200gal tank, trying to eliminate it as I feed the heck out of my 10 fish.
I don't run any nutrient removing reactors or fuge just a good skimmer and lots of acro's that in their turn take up some kind of % of the nutrients.









[HASHTAG]#reefsquad[/HASHTAG]

I run my tank exactly like yours. I have a huge skimmer and only use filter socks and carbon with no other filtration but I do have a lot of SPS for the tank size that I have.

I add 10 ml a week but my solution is a bit water down. My tank consume .25 nitrates every 3 days. I also add 1 cap of aquavitro Fuel daily

I'm considering on starting the fauna marine zeolight system which relies on the corals to do the nutrient export.

 

[jumplittlechloe]

What is your alkalinity reading. Has your alkalinity gone above 9dkh?

Alk has stayed steady at 7.6dkh. I am testing with RedSea test kit.

 

[.AcroKiller.]

Alk has stayed steady at 7.6dkh. I am testing with RedSea test kit.

Try and have one of the local reefers test your Alk with another test kit. And see if the test kit is bad. I had multiple Red Sea alkalinity and magnesium test kits go bad on me.

 

[rockskimmerflow]

How I missed this.
Interesting read but without a good water test info I can say it has no value.
Sorry to hear you lost lots of years of growing colonies.
I had the same happening about two years ago and Triton test came out negative.
Wasn't dosing any No3 at that time.
Have been on the phone with Adam @Battlecorals numerous time as to what it could be but I gave up and try to save what I could.
The problems were as the same you describe after dosing.
As of today I still don't know what happened but Adam and few others all agreed that it could be a bacterial disease.
Tank is doing great again and yes I'm dosing No3 (stumpremover) for the last 6 months, doing a Triton test every other month with no results on elevated copper.
Not saying you didn't had any elevated copper level as your bottle of stump remover might could be a bad bottle, but I don't know if that results in copper elevation.
I think it's time to put our heads together and have a test done on different No3 solutions that some hobbyist use.
Now I must say I add only 3ml per day to my 200gal tank, trying to eliminate it as I feed the heck out of my 10 fish.
I don't run any nutrient removing reactors or fuge just a good skimmer and lots of acro's that in their turn take up some kind of % of the nutrients.









[HASHTAG]#reefsquad[/HASHTAG]

I agree that there's nothing definitive to be learned from this experience. Just sharing a cautionary tale since the initiation of spectracide dosing coincided directly with the symptoms my acropora exhibited. It could certainly have been due to an infection or some other undetectable agent. I would have liked to get an accurate test -Triton - performed, but I quickly resorted to multiple large water changes in the hopes of saving my acropora. While I did lose some valuable colonies and some serious growth on others, everything that pulled through is doing well with the same husbandry and filtration system. I increased feeding slightly and stopped dosing nitrate, but other than that nothing major has changed. Every piece is throwing off new branch tips and colored back up again nicely. Sorry to hear you went through a similar ordeal. It really stings to lose corals that have been growing out from frags for a year+

 

[Diesel]

Yes sir, but I don't back down and took the pieces and rebuild.
Now back to were I was and doing better every day.

 

[rockskimmerflow]

Yes sir, but I don't back down and took the pieces and rebuild.
Now back to were I was and doing better every day.

Indeed. If there's one thing the reef hobby requires, it's an undying persistence in the pursuit of a goal. If one lacks determination, they aren't long for this pastime.