Will my turf scrubber starve my corals?

[Murraydar]

I installed an algae turf scrubber a couple months ago and its done a fantastic job at lowering nutrients. Nitrates and phosphates are both reading zero (using nyos kit for nitrates and hanna checker for po4). Are turf scrubbers aggressive enough to starve my corals, or should i be ok just feeding heavy while keeping my nutrients low? Thanks.

 

[Cory]

Yes it can starve your corals. It happened to me, my montipora lightened up and stopped growing.

For this reason I dose no3/po4 now. I also just dose vinegar instead of an ats to control no3/po4. But my system was substrate free so there were less organics to accumulate and release nutrients. With sand its possible to have enough po4/no3 to get a sort of slow release fertilizer for the corals.

 

[jsker]

Phosphates on average should be .02 to .03 and nitrates 3 to 5 ppm

Feed, Feed, Feed!

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Trim the ats.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

You could just light it less hours per day if there's a concern about excessive nutrient uptake.

 

[Murraydar]

Thanks for the replies. Ill probably cut down on the lighting on it until my nutrients are good. Thanks guys.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Sounds good.

Happy Reefing.