Nitrate Info

Hi,
My Nitrates have been high 40-60ppm. So I tried to do a large water
change in a couple of days to lower it.

I have a 20L tank
15gal in sump with trickle filter
I only have about 10ibs live rock
and bare bottom for now.
65w PC 50/50 and 48w T5 blue
2 maroon clowns sm
1 coral banded cleaner shrimp
1 turbo snail
1-3 herm crabs had more one is a killer
i pull out anything dead the next morning. gonna get rid of bad crab.
sea mat zoo
brain coral frag?? not real sure what kind got it for free

RO/DI water
OLD CHEM
ammo 0
nitrites 0
nitrates 40 ( have been keeping at 30-40 till now )
phos 0 - .1 API test sucks It looks like 0
salt 1025
cal 450
thats all I test for right now.
Oh yeh my colal looks like crap the zoos are getting smaller and the brail
looks like the mouth areas are opening and the edges are getting white mabee bleaching I dont know its small areas.
I want to catch this before anyhting dies.

Ok I did 5 10gal water changes in a week.
ammo 0
nitrites 0
nitrates 5
phos 0
cal 400
salt 1025

I will do 2 more 10 gal water changes to get to 0 nitrates.
ANY HELP WOULD BE GREAT. Is what I am doing OK and anythings else
i could do.
Thanks

 

You may have a dead something in the tank. Look around for it and see what you can find. Otherwise, I would use a nitrate sponge as a quick fix. After you do that, if the nitrates are not down below 15 or so, do a good sized water change to lower it more and the corals will bounce back. I had a slow rise not too long ago to 100 and the corals were doing well because it was just that.....slow. Your's is quick......so I think you have something rotting. Unless........did you just put in any new live rock?

 

No new LR nothing new for 1 month
that was brain coral

 

Hmmmm. Missing any livestock?

 

Sounds like something died and your clean up crew isn't large enough to clean it up for you. Take an inventory of what you can see.

 

Hello Howie, if that is all the live rock you have and there is no substrate, you are lacking a substantial bacteria base. Large water changes will only make things worse. You really need substrate and more rock unless you plan to upgrade the sump to include live rock rubble or bio balls and/or a substantial refugium. For now start adding live bacteria weekly at the marine dose and cut back on the amount of food offered and the frequency. Try every other day feedings. Leave the tank alone and allow the bacteria a chance to establish. Wait at least 3-4 weeks to another water change.

 

NO3 in levels of 40-60 AREN'T high enough to do substantial damage to your tank. What they WILL do is create more algae issues. Fish can tolerate NO3 in numbers of excess of 100ppm and corals can actually take high levels too, unless algae begins to over take them. The w/cs you have been doing is really the only effective way to remove no3, unclejed brings up a good point with the beneficial bacteria, BUT all the beneficial bacteria in the world will not get rid of NO3, only prevent NH3 and NO2 issues.

At this point in the game as well as the age of the tank, I would not be so concerned with a 0 NO3 level. I would just shoot for under 20ppm until everything settles down.
I would cut back on feeding and forego flakes if you use them, not add anymore livestock and consider more rock and or a sand bed. If a sandbed is out of the question then consider a refugium with a deep sand bed that will help in multiple ways in your system.

Until then, take a break, relax and enjoy the tank!

Happy reefing!

 

my opinion is the bottom is bare and gravel holds a important key to the nitrate change. If no livestock is missing and nothing else is out of wack, then maybe your system is not able to handle it self.