Nitrate control in heavy bio-load tanks

[biecacka]

Hello everyone, question for people. I have a 240 gallon cube with 22 fish in and will possibly add more soon. I am curious as to what others are doing to control nitrates in their tanks. Size of tank doesn't matter, more curious about bio load for your tank. My nitrates are high because for months my skimmer did not perform at all and I tried to keep up w water changes weekly but that just diluted them temporarily. With such a load we have to feed a lot, so who is running pellots, dosing vinegar, zeovit, or any other method. I'm curious as to who is doing what and how is it working for you? Have you tried other methods? I have a new skimmer en route this week so that will help but it doesn't solve the problem! My nitrates are around 50 as I type this, and my corals hate me.

Corey

[edinphilly]

I have a 29g sumpless standard. I had to nuke waving hand coral which was taking over and the resulting die off spiked my nitrates and phosphate. Here is what got me through it. I also have a heavy bioload.

Skimming which I always do.

Vinegar dosing temporarily.

Manually pulling what I could of various algae blooms.

Added small HOB filter so I could run carbon and GFO. Later added Seachem De-Nitrate and Matrix to HOB to supplement my live rock's denitrification.

Increased flow to keep organics in the water column to be skimmed out.

Got more on top of changing carbon and GFO more frequently.

More frequent water changes. I usually do 10% once a month to every six weeks with no issues but to get through the die off I was doing them weekly for a month or two.

That got me through it and everything is good now. I also don't target 0 for either nitrates and phosphates. I know they're there because I always have a little algae and that doesn't both me. Good growth on monti, zoas, and LPS, and fish are healthy so that's all that matter. Back to a hands off approach.

[twon8]

I havent tested nitrates in a decade

I have an oversized skimmer and grow cheato. No bio pellets or carbon dosing ever, Gfo on a rare occasion. Nitrate reduction requires anaerobic bacteria, so I utilize a cylinder crammed with live rock attached to the system.

[Lostinthedark]

I have a similar tank with as many fish as well as mixed corals. After the tank was well established,probably 2 years I have undetectable nitrates. I do have a fuge with Cheato which I think is the biggest reason. I also have a large amount of live rock and run bio-pellets. I was actually thinking of removing half the pellets to try and raise nitrates a little. I also test .03 on phosphate but don't use GFO. I think that is because of the fuge also.

[nmotz]

Vinegar dosing helped, just follow the recommended dose. There is a good article on reefkeeping with a dosage chart. I also grow chaeto in a small HOB refugium and have a HOB skimmer on my sumpless 40B.

My nitrates were originally around 60ppm. For some reason my chaeto had started dying and I noticed I had high nitrates so I replaced my HOB filter with a protein skimmer and cleaned out my refugium so I could start re-growing chaeto. Then I began vinegar dosing.

Over about 3 weeks, all of this brought my nitrates down to about 20ppm so I still have work to do. I stopped dosing vinegar for a while now and may have to start that again soon.

[reefgeezer]

Rock, big skimmer, & carbon dosing (vinegar). I feed pretty heavily but mt bioload is not as heavy as yours. However, I don't have to use much vinegar either.

[CStrickland]

Removing detritus has worked very well for me. By vacuuming out poop and leftover food, and changing my flow patterns so it settles in easy to reach places, I have been able to keep mine under tan without doing much else at all. My stocking is reasonable though. I would think it can't hurt for a heavy bioload tank. The more of that stuff you get out before it rots in the water, the less nitrate you are mopping up after

[biecacka]

Yeah for me part of my problem was my sump wasn't very accessible until now. I moved it out from under the tank to behind it. Now I can clean it easy and like I mentioned I have a new skimmer hopefully shipping out today! I used vinegar on my last tank and it worked fine, this tank I didn't have much luck with it. Mostly because my skimmer was under performing. I would like to grow cheato or another algae but I never have had luck with them. Maybe I will try again, I will just need some contraption to put the Cheato in so it doesn't get to the return pump.


Corey

[d-man]

Although my current tank is new, I plan on having at least 100+ fish in there. Probably only 5-8 tangs, but hopefully bout 30-40 wrasses, 40-50 anthias. And 20-30 random smaller fish(grammas, blennies, gobies, jawfish, psuedos,etc)
My tank is 860g plus a 200+g sump. I have minimal sand, but about 5-600lbs of Rock. But tank looks fairly baron(though pics people always ask if I'm planning on more rock. When they actually see it, they comment on how the rockwork is perfect amount)
I use a BK deluxe300, very minimal biopellets for now, and GAC.
I plan on adding a biodenitrator and taking the biopellets offline. I have an extra CaRx(korallin 4002) lying around, so when the tank gets more stocked I'll put that on.
There are probably 30-40 fish in the tank currently, and another 15ish awaiting in the QT.

Oh and I feed heavily 2-4x a day a homemade slurry.

[pyithar]

vinegar dosing really works for me. i also run algae scrubbers.

[toothybugs]

I've recently become a big fan of vinegar. I was having trouble getting my nutrient values down (25-30 NO3 and ~.2-.3 PO4) because my new sticks were hating it. I started running vinegar diluted to 2% dosed 24/7 at ~4.8mL/hr. Under 2 weeks my numbers dropped to 5 /0.03 and my skimmer started going nuts. It's been pulling junk better than ever since, though it has tapered off significantly since the first few days.

Currently my total system is ~65 gallons, upgrading to a 75 DT/ 40B fuge/ 40gal sump shortly. Then I will keep this up, just running straight vinegar instead of the 2%. I have a macro tank going as well (display fuge) but it didn't take care of things quite as quick as the vinegar did. Interestingly once I started the vinegar my macro growth took off too, probably from the extra carbon in the water.

Given your volume, I would look in to buying straight acetic acid (glacial) and making a 10-25% solution and using that. The solutions would be really easy to make up and you won't have to refill your dosing container very often. Otherwise with 240 gallons plus sump volume you will be blowing through single gallons of vinegar really, really fast. I would expect it to get annoying just changing or storing all those jugs all the time.

[biecacka]

I dosed vinegar on my 220. You're right, I did go through a fair amount of it. Never considered acetic acid. I will look into this. My new skimmer should be here this week so I can start dosing again.
I have also been doing some research on siporax. Any users with reviews?

Corey

[toothybugs]

Originally Posted by biecacka

I dosed vinegar on my 220. You're right, I did go through a fair amount of it. Never considered acetic acid. I will look into this. My new skimmer should be here this week so I can start dosing again.
I have also been doing some research on siporax. Any users with reviews?

Corey

(As you may well be aware) vinegar is just diluted acetic acid, so while you won't really save much on the actual cost of acid, you do save yourself a lot of hassle. IMHO it would be worth it since it's not hitting your wallet any harder. BRS carries it or I have been known to buy gallons off Amazon and/or eBay for 40 shipped.

Also interested in info on Siporax

[reefgeezer]

[QUOTE=toothybugs;24192076](As you may well be aware) vinegar is just diluted acetic acid, so while you won't really save much on the actual cost of acid, you do save yourself a lot of hassle. QUOTE]

I like vinegar rather than acetic acid because the dilute form lessens the damage if my pump accuracy is poor and because it is less likely to cause a pH swing if dosed a little too quickly. I buy a box that has 2 gallons of vinegar in it @ Sam's Club for cheap. When a jug gets low, I simply replace it. I dose 34 ml/day via a BRS dosing pump & digital lamp timer. A gallon jug lasts about 3 months.

[ca1ore]

Last time I checked nitrates (6 months ago) it was measurably zero. 40 or so fish in a 265 feed multiple times per day. I use all filtration methods except carbon dosing, so skimmer, RDSB, ATS and a chaeto refugium.

[biecacka]

Simon your skimmer is a BEAST!!!!! One thing for me is I live in a flat apartment and my tank is in the living room. So I am limited on space but I have been tinkering with a ATS and trying cheato again. In the past I haven't had much luck with it. Any secrets?

Corey

[amcvay1979]

I dose a home mixture of 60% Vinegar and 40% vodka via a dosing pump and I run a modified Zeo system. No rocks, just my vinegar/vodka and daily sponge power and my nitrates are down to zero and phos is down to zero as well. It took me awhile to realize that you have to ramp up the bacteria slowly, you'll still see nitrates fall, then they'll plateu and you have to add more bacteria until you get to zero, then back the dose off until you stop seeing white film on the glass and nitrates stay near zero. That being said, 1 to 5 ppm nitrates never hurt anyone, and the zeo system does indeed work quite well. I'm just now starting to get the crazy colors out of my SPS. Polyp extension is insane, you can get PE just by dosing sponge power. FWIW sponge power alone took my phos from .12 to zero in less than 2 days while dosing bacteria. I also dose Phols Extra Special (2-3 times per week), Coral Vitilizer (2 times a week), Coral snow (2-3 times a week for water polishing), B Balance (2-3 times per week) aminos (3-4 times per week) and K Balance 2 times per week. Best my tank has ever looked! I have a 150 tall and I have 20 fish currently

[Cujo]

Bacteria dosing with Prodibio Bio-digest and Bioptim with a good skimmer got my 120G tank from a algae jungle to UNLS in two months.

[cvportagee]

I just started a 120G (SPS dominant) that is heavily stocked and i feed heavily. I have been using the Triton method since August. My main nutrient export is macros and an oversized skimmer. I no longer run carbon or GFO or pellets (i used to in other tanks i ran). My SPS seem to love it and i love how simple it is.

[shermanator]

I would do either RDSB (2 x 5g buckets should work for a 220) or two of the big marine pure ceramic plates (if you are worried about the Al (you should not be, but that's an aside), then siporax (sintered glass) will do the same thing at about 10x the cost of marine pure). And, as stated, carbon dosing (vinegar or vinegar + ethanol). If you did one of the media + carbon dosing, you'll no longer have a nitrate problem.

[hobbzz]

I've done vodka and vinegar dosing, ats (pita to clean), and now a mehtanol denitrator. The denitrator is by far the best. What skimmer did you decide on?

[Reefer PT]

I use a big marinepure plate and 60/40 vinager/vodka on a 93 and have not had Nitrate problems

[ca1ore]

Originally Posted by biecacka

Simon your skimmer is a BEAST!!!!! One thing for me is I live in a flat apartment and my tank is in the living room. So I am limited on space but I have been tinkering with a ATS and trying cheato again. In the past I haven't had much luck with it. Any secrets?

Corey

Yeah, been there too. Having a basement sump solves lots of problems and opens up lots of possibilities (like a ridiculously tall skimmer ). I've been wrestling with ATS for decades and my current waterfall model with red/blue LED blows all my prior efforts away. Chaeto always seems to grow pretty well for me, but I dose iron and elevate my sump so I can light it from both above and below (one of those basement sump possibilities ).

[RedStangGA]

I used an 8x8x4 MarinePure block on my 60 cube and never had more than trace nitrates. I'll be using two on my 220.

[biecacka]

Hobbzz I decided on the bubble King double cone 200. I was able to get an great deal one one which played a major role in the purchase.

Shermanator I will check into the the marine pure plates you speak of.

Corey