Nitrates making me nuts
 

I have been fighting high nitrates and algae blooms over the past 6 months (since the tank has been set up). All of my parameters appear to be fine accept nitrates.

Ph 8.2
Temp 80
Sal. 1.027
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 50
Phosphate 0
Magnesium 1150
Calcium 440
Alk 4.90
Ammonia 0

I have chaeto in the fuge, Use excellent ro/do water, do 17% water changes weekly. I dont have any fish ( on 2 seperate occasions they died after 4 days). I just scrubbed 2 rocks yesterday of bubble algae, and other macro. I occasionally feed my coral some cyclopeeze. Im lost at this time. Iv tried everything over the past six months. Could it be my skimmer? Im running a euroreef-80 on a 75 gal tank with 30 gal sump (actual water volume is 68 gallons). Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Bio balls?

nope. No bioballs. Pure skimmer, fuge and chaeto.

Vodka?

[url]http://archive.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1248238[/url]

Im thinking of dosing some sugar. Have also been trying out some podibio bacterial supplimentation. Im stumped about the cause of the nitrates since my rock is done cycling, and i have no fish to create much of a bio load.

do you run carbon?
do you run phosphate remover?
4" deep sand bed is not a deep sand bed and too deep to be a shallow sand bed...
get a 5 gallon bucket a maxi jet 900 and fill the buck with 3/4 live fine live sand....use the maxi get to pump water to the sand...basically set up a remote deep sandbed. or add more sand to you re system...setting up a remote deep sand bed is what i chose because if sand ever needs to get changed...it makes it real simple.
how much live rock do you have? 1.5-2 lbs of porous live rock is what you should have.

also try products like zeovit or ultralith...they are scientifically proven to work.

I was combating high nitrates like you and won..my nitrate reading was over 100...i added more live rock..from 130 lbs to 215 lbs in my 90 gallon, i set up a remote deep sandbed like i suggested to you...i started using ultralith....without stuff like vodka...sulfur...bioballs which band aid the underlying problem..
like everything in this hobby it takes time to win...i took me 3 monthes with all these changes to see my nitrates drop..mother nature will do her thing just provide the right environment for her.

Thanks for that info. I have 105 lbs of live rock. Im not running any type of phosphate remover. My phosphates are at 0, but could that be a miss reading due to the kit? (salifert). I will look into the other suppliments, and possibly add more sand. I didnt want to overload the tank with rock since I was planning on having some room for fish. Should I increase the depth of the sand in my fuge?

A pic of your tank would help.

the phosphates can be taken up as fast as they are produced...you can increase the depth of you re fuge sand bed as well... it will be more benifit for you re tank ..for a deep sand bed you want a minimum of 6"....not all rock has to be in you re display...i have some in my sump...some in my fuge...most in my tank...i am planning on increasing the depth of my fuge bed...my display has 2" sand bed...
zeovit and ultralith are bacterial systems that you dose into the aquarium.

ohh and add the rock slowly...you re tank is big enough that 10 lbs every few monthes wont hurt anything...if you are planning on adding rock.

[QUOTE][i]<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11546828#post11546828 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by george81 [/i]
[B]4" deep sand bed is not a deep sand bed and too deep to be a shallow sand bed. [/B][/QUOTE]

I disagree. 4" is a valid DSB. I think you are thinking of 3 inches (which is not really DSB or SSB and can cause issues).

just thougth u should maybe rule this out to.

get ur water tested at ur lfs or a friends kit, just to make sure ur nitrate kit isnt faulty :D

I plan on taking my water this weekend to get it checked, just for that reason stated above. The Prodibio that Im adding is also a bacterial additive. So will the addition of more sand to my fuge make a difference?

after seeing you dont have bio balls, no fish, running cheato and fuge, using ro/di, i have 2 words for you, sulphur denitrifier, they work, got my nitrates from 30 to 0 ppm in a month

sana

3 #3 koralias maybe low for flow. LR and the LS Will convert nitrate into harmless nitrogen but if flow is low then they will only help maintane its levels. Aswell as rock placement. I ll bet my tank and membership in RC if you add better flow and some CUC with 25% weekly water changes and after a few wekks you will see the level drop. Any tool you add for control may help but not eliminate. There is now one way to control any problem. It takes a combanation of things to controll.

This article covers nitrate in detail:

[url]http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/august2003/chem.htm[/url]

How much Chaetomorpha is being harvested out of the refugium, and how often? How much and what is being fed? Just the Cyclop-Eeze?

Those pumps should give more than enough flow for the system.

What animals are in the tank? What is the units on the alkalinity? 4.9 dKH is too low; 4.9 meq/L is too high.

You can add some more time.

My chaeto is hardly growing, and I think its due to the macro algae that was growing in the tank. I just scrubbed and took out allot of macro, so I hope that makes a difference in the chaeto. As for animals, I have 2 emerald crabs, a serpent star, a few blue legged hermits, 1 turbo, 10 Astrea snails, one rock urchin (hitchiker). Corals are 4 small clusters of zoa's, a orange plate, and frogspawn. Feeding the tank is every 2 to 3 days with a few scrapes of frozen cyclopeeze into ro/water. The alk is in meq/L. My skimmer cup is never foul. Pulls some crud off, but not at the amount or consistency of others on the site.

How about flow? Do you have enough flow in the tank to keep rocks, sandbed clean? If you have crud settling on/in your rock, instead of being suspended in the water column to be skimmed off, this could contribute to the problem. If you use a turkey baster on the rocks, is there a lot of debris that come loose?

I have 2200g/h turnover in my 75. Seems to be enough. The rock has debris when i turkeybaste it. The rock is very porus. No real dead spots on the sand.

I have the exact same problem. But my nitrates are 30 and I have fish...

Without any fish and only cleanup crew - my nitrates were 5 - 10.

What kind of test kit are you using?

How aggressive is your skimming?

What kind/how old is your salt?

Also, how much live rock and what kind? How was is cured? It's a simple diagnosis that your rock is leaching nitrates....

The rock was cured in the tank at start up. was very patient with the process. Phophates and Ammonia were never a problem. Did numerous water changes. Im trying my best with the skimming, and am wondering if the skimmer is underpower for the size tank. I have approx. 115 lbs of live rock. Also wondering if the sand in which the rock was cured on is leaching nitrates. The sand isnt bad but not as pristine as others I have seen on this site. I use salifert test kits across the board.

Everyone seems to have nitrate problems. I guess I am blessed to have never had that issue. I haven't really had any water problems. I wonder if I am doing it wrong. hahaha.

If you want to see results increase your water changes, bump it up to 30-40% I do 45% every 2week... I would start by getting your nitrates down via water changes, and then try to figure out if/why they rise.

You can do water changes very often without to much negative impact.