Reduce Nitrates through better lighting

Measured nitrate again today. It is less than 0.2 mg/L now. I won't say 0 because I know there is some. I can see a small trace of pink in the vile in my Salifert kit when viewed from the side.

So now after reading all of your posts and advice I'm nervous about algae. I just reduced the amount of time my 6500K bulbs will be on to 5 hours from 9. I'll observe the impact on nitrate and corals.

 

i've been using 3 of those 6500k pigtail bulbs they say they are 65 watt but =100 on a 29gallon with a condylactis anemone and the biggest s.o.b damsel the worlds ever seen for almost a year now,the condys grown though not a whole lot and it could be from feeding rather than photosynthesis but its healthy either way, these bulbs also give the ripple effect of metal halide in a comparatively shallower tank. great supplemental lights, as far as the nitrate thing goes i'd have to say its the increase in algae drowth locking it up

 

Changed bulb and nitrates dropped

UPDATE: Oops, I forgot that I also changed my filter media (and I did not record this in my log book -- bad, bad). So it is not possible for me to state that it was the light change that improved the nitrates.

ORIGINAL POST: Similar to the experiences of the initiator of this thread, the nitrates in my 5.5 gallon (yes, 5.5) kept increasing and suddenly decreased in the past month.

For six months the ammonia, nitrite, and nitrates were all basically nil. Starting in July the nitrates started to climb and got to 40 ppm in December. At that time I replaced my CF light bulb (not meaning to, but it broke while cleaning) and suddenly my nitrates are back down to around 5 ppm. No other changes have been made (other than the usual water changes). It would appear that the change of bulb and the resultant significantly improved lighting (we all noticed how much brighter the tank became) helped the bio-system to deal with the nitrates.

 

To add my opinion, I think your fuge just started kicking in. I had a constant 20ppm for months when I had my fuge installed. After a few months it drastically dropped and within a couple weeks I test at 0. Nothing changed except the mangroves and chaeto growing at the same rate.

Maybe that's what happened?? Just my opinion.