Clean up crew and NO3

I was wondering what affect a clean-up crew has on nitrates. I had an anemone die recently, taking most of the clean-up crew with it. Since then I have been battling nitrates. Would re-establishing a clean up crew with some good detritus eaters again help? Or is this going to make it worse? Any help would be greatly appreciated, especially since some of the nuisance algeas are coming back and I'd like to have my cleaners again;D

 

Clean-up crews don't lower nitrates. They eat detritus and algae, so they will help keep the tank "clean", but they won't lower the existing nitrates.

 

How badly do they add to them then? I just cant stand this algae and detritus build-up. Or do you think I should wait to regain control after the die-off?

 

I would wait until Nitrates are under control. Are they staying at 80ppm? Or are they going up? Down?

 

they go from about 20 to 80 about every week and a half or so, then I do a partial water change (~10%) and they go back to 20. It always stayed at 10-20ppm till the anemone died, and they only two things I could think of was lack of cleaner crew or still battling the anemone's toxins, and I would think the building up of the detritus couldn't be helping any.

 

That doesn't make sense. If your Nitrates are at 80ppm ,and you do a 10% water change, then they should be 72ppm. A 10% water change will only remove 10% of the Nitrates (8ppm), not 75% (60ppm). Something isn't right.

What's still alive in your tank? Do you use a skimmer? How often have you been changing tha carbon? If you really have a lot of toxins in the water (from the anemone), you may want to change the carbon every week as the carbon could be "exhausted". Then, once the Nitrates are stable (toxins are finally gone), you can go back to changing the carbon every 2-4 weeks.

 

I have 1 tang, 2 damsels, 2 clowns, 1 peppermint shrimp, 1 skunk shrimp, and 2 turbo snails that made it through.
I hadn't been running any carbon till the anemone died. I added it about 2 weeks ago, was told to change it every 4-5 weeks. When it died everything was pegged on the test kit (ammonia, nitrates, nitrites). But maybe the carbon has become exhausted to due the excess toxins? That would make sense.
I am not currently running a skimmer, but one is on its way. Should be here by Wednesday at the latest.

 

I think that's the main culprit. I've never had success keeping Nitrates low without a skimmer. I'd change the carbon, and start changing it every 4 weeks, from now on. And I wouldn't add anything until the skimmer has been running for a couple of weeks (that's about how long it usually takes to break it in). After that you should see your Nitrates start to go down.