where is your nitrate and phosphate ?

[neupane00]

last week, i had put in a post about colors getting washed out and not enough growth. and few poeple suggested to increase nitrate and phosphate. Currently both are at 0.
So i was wondering where do SPS guys with successful tank keep their nitrate and phosphate,.

 

[Joeganja]

At 0 lol who told u that? Haha iodine gives color to corals and strontium and molybdenum help also. Maybe you don't do enough water changes to replenish the trace elements being absorbed by your corals

 

[ReefMadScientist]

My current parameters:

NO3: 3ppm
PO4: .02ppm

The ideal range is:

NO3 between 2-10ppm (depends on your tank and if it is a high nutrient user or a low nutrient tank)
PO4 between .02 - .08 (depends on your tank and if it is a high nutrient user or a low nutrient tank)

But it does not only rely on those two elements...

 

[jared graves]

last week, i had put in a post about colors getting washed out and not enough growth. and few poeple suggested to increase nitrate and phosphate. Currently both are at 0.
So i was wondering where do SPS guys with successful tank keep their nitrate and phosphate,.

You should always have no3 and po4 in your tank at some detectable level. My parameters look very close to @ReefMadScientist

 

[neupane00]

At 0 lol who told u that? Haha iodine gives color to corals and strontium and molybdenum help also. Maybe you don't do enough water changes to replenish the trace elements being absorbed by your corals

I checked for iodine 0.06 and postassium is at 400. I do weekly 50 gallon water change on my 300 gallon tank. So i dont think its the problem.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

iodine gives color to corals and strontium and molybdenum help also.

FWIW, I'm not convinced that strontium has any benefit in a reef tank, and, IMO, supplemental iodine is also not useful for most reef aquaria creatures.

Many folks, myself included, dosed them both for years, but then stopped and saw no difference.

 

[neupane00]

ah. jared and reefmadscientist, do you think having too low always 0 of nitrate and phosphate would contribute to my growth and color problem?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

last week, i had put in a post about colors getting washed out and not enough growth. and few poeple suggested to increase nitrate and phosphate. Currently both are at 0.
So i was wondering where do SPS guys with successful tank keep their nitrate and phosphate,.

The term 0 ppm for nutrients is meaningless and leads to endless confusion because different test methods have very different lower limits of detection.

So if I had 0.05 ppm phosphate, that would read as 0 ppm on some kits and give actual values on otthrs, and still be higher than I might want to target.

As a best practice, one should always state a value, and that value might be "0.02 ppm" or "less than 0.1 ppm" or "greater than 0.5 ppm" or something like that.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

ah. jared and reefmadscientist, do you think having too low always 0 of nitrate and phosphate would contribute to my growth and color problem?

It could be too low, or too high (which also can brown up corals).

What kits are you using?

 

[neupane00]

ah thanks Randy. I always get 0.00 with my hanna low range phosphate . and i always get 0 from my red sea nitrate test for my nitrate value. wondering if i should start dosing ammino acids etc to increase nutrients.

 

[jared graves]

ah. jared and reefmadscientist, do you think having too low always 0 of nitrate and phosphate would contribute to my growth and color problem?

For me there is no question my corals are growing faster now that I let my nutrients levels rise (for about the last 6 months) now this means your probably going to have a little bit of algae in your tank but to me a little bit of algae is A. Part of the natural environment and B. Worth the benefit to corals growth

 

[ReefMadScientist]

Im just sitting back drinking my coffee, watching Randy do his work

@neupane00 - What Randy said.

 

[ReefMadScientist]

For me there is no question my corals are growing faster now that I let my nutrients levels rise (for about the last 6 months) now this means your probably going to have a little bit of algae in your tank but to me a little bit of algae is A. Part of the natural environment and B. Worth the benefit to corals growth

EXACTLY! I have been dealing with trying to find what alkalinity and Ca levels are at each week as it seems my tank is a growing monster. I do have some algae spots but I won't trade it for the growth I am getting

ah thanks Randy. I always get 0.00 with my hanna low range phosphate . and i always get 0 from my red sea nitrate test for my nitrate value. wondering if i should start dosing ammino acids etc to increase nutrients.

I was getting 0 with my hanna checker for PO4 as well for a long time. This DOES NOT mean you have zero in your tank. It is just undetectable. Adding fish food will introduce PO4 to your tank.

As for NO3, are you running a skimmer? I would suggest taking it offline for awhile till you see your NO3 creep up. I will ditch the amino acids idea. Too many weird algae issues you will be fueling. @Russ265

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

ah thanks Randy. I always get 0.00 with my hanna low range phosphate . and i always get 0 from my red sea nitrate test for my nitrate value. wondering if i should start dosing amino acids etc to increase nutrients.

OK, so yes, no detectable phosphate with the low range Hanna might mean that phosphate is limiting growth.

IMO, the amino acids would be good to try, as might more fish feeding or less nutrient export.

In the absence of an algae problem, aiming for 0.02 ppm phosphate and maybe 0.5 ppm nitrate seems reasonable to me.

FWIW, growth optimization may have a higher nutrient load than color optimization. I presume you want a happy middle ground.

 

[neupane00]

Thanks Randy, yes i am happy with some middle ground!

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Thanks Randy, yes i am happy with some middle ground!

You're welcome.

Happy Reefing.

 

[Russ265]

in my tank i start noticing color fatigue if nitrates get below 2ppm. of course detectable phosphate is ideal for photosynthesis to occur.
this is harder to do with the extreme nature of gfo at times.

like others have said this isnt the whole puzzle but generally can be tracked to the root cause.

lots of great advice given here. i believe i have a writeup somewhere about it if you are interested.

 

[reefndude]

What's your alkalinity at? With the range your nutrients are at a range in 7.5-8 dkh will improve colors some, assuming everything else is good. Definitely try to increase trates and phates some

 

[twilliard]

.014 po4
2 ppm no3

 

[gettaReef]

in my tank i start noticing color fatigue if nitrates get below 2ppm. of course detectable phosphate is ideal for photosynthesis to occur.
this is harder to do with the extreme nature of gfo at times.

like others have said this isnt the whole puzzle but generally can be tracked to the root cause.

lots of great advice given here. i believe i have a writeup somewhere about it if you are interested.

Would you mind posting a link to your writeup? I'm trying to increase my understanding of the relationship between nitrate/phosphate/alk/cal/etc... Currently am in the middle of one of the many, MANY articles by Randy. Thanks!