fed up with nitrates!!!!

coltsfan80 · 08/21/2006, 02:00 PM

ok I have had really high nitrates 80ppm and higher. I have done everything i can, the partial water changes, scale back feedings, cleaning the canister filter weekly, with only phosban, denitrate and carbon in it. Last week I did about a 60 percent maybe 70 percent water change using ro/di water and it knocked the nitrate to under 20ppm....still high but alot lower than it was. Well I did my weekly testing today and in over a weeks time it is back up around 80ppm again. I am at a total loss as to why they are shooting straight back up. I am positive I am not overfeeding. The canister is still running. Should I just ditch the canister...could it cause my nitrates to shoot that high up again in a week????? I am using a skimmer and I have about 40lbs of live rock in a 29 gallon. Could I get away with not running a filter (canister?)

dhoch · 08/21/2006, 02:10 PM

How old is the tank? (maybe your tank has not fully established its nitrate reduction yet?)

How much livestock? (maybe you have too much bioload for your tanks nitrate reduction?)

Do you/have you grown macro? Do you have a refugium?

What type of substrate (if any do you have).

Dave

Sk8r · 08/21/2006, 02:16 PM

Sorry, the minute I read "cannister filter" it was a dead stop---cannisters are bad in that regard. You should be fine with no filter with that much live rock. In point of fact the cannister and your lr are in a seesaw die-off battle because it's boom or bust with the nutrient-disposal in the filter: clean, the rock gets the waste; dirty, it starves the rock: dieoff of bacteria, new spike. You'll see things level out, I'm pretty sure, once you're rid of it. Use it for intermittent particulate removal: it's not worthless, it just can be out of the system most of the time.

coltsfan80 · 08/21/2006, 02:24 PM

How old is the tank? (maybe your tank has not fully established its nitrate reduction yet?)

How much livestock? (maybe you have too much bioload for your tanks nitrate reduction?)

Do you/have you grown macro? Do you have a refugium?

What type of substrate (if any do you have).

Dave

The tank is 3months old. It hsa 40lbs of live rock, I do not have a refugium, sorry to say but I am new at this hobby and dont know what macro is.....I have about 3 inches of live sand....I have a false perc clown and a blue damsel..i have about 10 blue legged hermits and 5 or so asteria snails....ever since the tank has started all levels except nitrate has been fine....is it possible it is still cycling toward the nitrate reduction????

CiroFuentes22 · 08/21/2006, 02:40 PM

yes. Just ride it out and go buy some nirtramax. trust me i had same prob and the nitramax plus water changes helped me alot. but do the water chage first before puting the nitramax. its good stuff. good luck

coltsfan80 · 08/21/2006, 02:44 PM

ok I will try that ...thanks alot

GlobaLPimP · 08/21/2006, 02:45 PM

I second the ditch the cannister idea as it worked for me! Good luck and REEF ON!

coltsfan80 · 08/21/2006, 02:47 PM

is nitramax like amquel plus??? where might i find nitramax? I looked on liveaquaria and it doesnt look like they carry it...

afelder · 08/21/2006, 04:03 PM

You can also try algone or purigen. They both are pretty good at nitrate removal, as well as removing some other disolved compounds. Combining the two worked very well for me when I was having nitrate issues.

Ariel

GobyJohnKenobi · 08/21/2006, 11:22 PM

It's been 6 months and my nitrates finally went to 0.

All the advice sounds good. You could put a couple pouches of Purigen in the canister. It helps, and you can clean and reuse it over and over again.

I stuffed a ball of Chaeto Algae behind one of my rocks in an area with good flow and light. That helped, also.

Patience and diligence. It'll happen for you, too.

SeanySean · 08/22/2006, 04:30 AM

If you are only using the canister for polishing your water and not for mechanical filtration I do not think that will cause your nitrate problems, I think you are ok doing what you are doing with it at the moment

Sean

brownsugar · 08/22/2006, 05:01 AM

haha even tho its a short term soloution but i dose with prime on a regular basis if i cant do a water change

syilk1 · 08/22/2006, 08:52 AM

Take a look at sulfur dinitators, I had same problem and these things work like you wont believe, I got mine from Midwest aquatics. They make a very nice unit and cheaper than the H & S version.

SeanySean · 08/22/2006, 09:37 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by syilk1
Take a look at sulfur dinitators, I had same problem and these things work like you wont believe, I got mine from Midwest aquatics. They make a very nice unit and cheaper than the H & S version.

This is the route that I am wanting to take I think that I will need 2 of them setup in series...

Have you had any issues with them whatsoever?
Do you have to take any precautions when you are using them?
How long do the beads last (is it really 2 years)
Are they just setup and go or are they a pita like my denitrificator was?

Thanks,

Sean

coltsfan80 · 08/22/2006, 09:53 AM

I have some purigen in there now, and so far it hasnt helped...I have some denitrates in there too as well as some stuff to remove phosphates...so I dont have a clue...I dont know why they are so high....especially they were around 20 a week ago..now they are around 80 again...I think I am going to do a large water change again, and leave the canister off this time and see what happens

SeanySean · 08/22/2006, 10:07 AM

Don't worry about the cannister, you do not have any media in there to trap waste like filter wool and sponges, bio balls etc, that should not be the cause of your problems, unless you have not changed the carbonm, antiphos in a very long time?

Just out of interest what denitrifactor are you using, I was using the one by aqua medic and although it was a real pain to get it going once it worked, my nitrates were down to 0 in a couple of weeks...

Sean

coltsfan80 · 08/22/2006, 10:17 AM

The carbon in the canister is only a week old. the other media in there is denitrate...its supposed to remove nitrate, and there is a bag to remove phosphate both of those are a week old too...Thats what I was using before the big water change too. I had lots of people tell me the canister is the problem, so I am really clueless at this time. I am getting ready to throw the towel in because with high nitrates like I have I cant get any corals or anything that like becaue they wouldnt surive....I have tried everything I know of and in a matter of days...after the 70% water change using ro di water...they went from around 20 back up to over 80 again....this might sound like a dumb question..but if I move my stuff to a larger tank..would that help the nitrates??? probably not, probably make it a bigger headache to deal with but I figured I'd ask because I am out of ideas

BurntOutReefer · 08/22/2006, 10:35 AM

IMO...This is what I would do. Use your Fluval to polish and/or run carbon and/or Nitramax.
Feed your fish sparingly.....and just wait another month before you add anything else to the tank. To me, it sounds like a prolonged cycle....did you do water changes during your initial cycle? Are all of your Hermits alive? I suspect the source of your problems is not really the canister....

GMAX · 08/22/2006, 10:57 AM

Do you have bioballs or other filtration like sponges somewhere in your system? You have a nitrate factory someplace. going from 20 to 80 in short order is your indicator. I would try to remove anything that may be farming nitrate.

RobNJ · 08/22/2006, 11:58 AM

ditcht he canister and get a good protein skimmer

coltsfan80 · 08/22/2006, 03:48 PM

I only have 2 fish...a small false perc clown and a blue damsel...2 of my orignal 5 hermits are alive...I bought a dozen more after my nitrates dropped, and I have lost a couple of them...my snails drop like flies......1 thing about my skimmer..which I thought was weird is that it has 2 sponge type things on the skimmer...one goes over the intake and the other goes where the air line feeds into the pump....other than that..no bioballs..no sponges in the filter..just carbon, denitrate and phosban....And I believe the sponge one the intake of the skimmer is to keep fish or anything else from being sucked up in there...

coltsfan80 · 08/22/2006, 03:53 PM

honestly...and this sounds bad..but I really never saw a cycle....i have had this set up since the middle of may this year..and the ammonia, nitrite, have been 0...I do have trouble keeping my ph at 8.2 it falls to around 8.0.....but ever since the beginning the nitrate is the only thing that has been out of sorts and has been....I never saw a nasty algae bloom like people talk about when their tank is cycling...I didnt start to get algae until about a month ago when the nitrates soared off of the chart...when I bough my live rock..I bough it from a beautiful display tank from a lfs that was closing up shop...so I thought maybe since my rock was cured and had been in an established tank for awhile..mine might not "cycle like other tanks....

MCary · 08/22/2006, 04:11 PM

A cycle as it used here is when the ammonia's and nitrite rise because there isn't enough bacteria colonized in the system to reduce it yet. You have 40 pounds of liverock in a 29 gallon tank. There's a good chance you already had enough bacteria to handle any ammonia production, so you didn't see a classic cycle. However, you are seeing the nitrates so you know its happening. If your liverock is able to reduce the nitrates, which is not always the case, they will do it by way of anaerobic bacteria inside of it in areas where the amount of oxygen is low or non-existant. This anerobic bacteria needs more time to establish than the aerobes. Being that your tank is only 3 months old, I suggest a dose of this:

Mike

GMAX · 08/22/2006, 04:16 PM

Bet me someone asks where to get this new additive. LOL

SeanySean · 08/23/2006, 03:58 AM

Mcary - Does it Work?

08/21/2006, 02:00 PM	#1
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	fed up with nitrates!!!! ok I have had really high nitrates 80ppm and higher. I have done everything i can, the partial water changes, scale back feedings, cleaning the canister filter weekly, with only phosban, denitrate and carbon in it. Last week I did about a 60 percent maybe 70 percent water change using ro/di water and it knocked the nitrate to under 20ppm....still high but alot lower than it was. Well I did my weekly testing today and in over a weeks time it is back up around 80ppm again. I am at a total loss as to why they are shooting straight back up. I am positive I am not overfeeding. The canister is still running. Should I just ditch the canister...could it cause my nitrates to shoot that high up again in a week????? I am using a skimmer and I have about 40lbs of live rock in a 29 gallon. Could I get away with not running a filter (canister?)

08/21/2006, 02:10 PM	#2
dhoch Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Maryland Posts: 1,762	How old is the tank? (maybe your tank has not fully established its nitrate reduction yet?) How much livestock? (maybe you have too much bioload for your tanks nitrate reduction?) Do you/have you grown macro? Do you have a refugium? What type of substrate (if any do you have). Dave __________________ Check out my tanks website... click the red box above my post Current Tank Info: 180 gal Acrylic, 29 gal refugium, 40 gal sump, Mag 18 -> 2 Sea Swirls, Tunze 6100, 8 x 80W overdriven T5 Lights, ASM G4 skimmer

08/21/2006, 02:16 PM	#3
Sk8r RC Mod Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Spokane WA Posts: 34,628 Blog Entries: 55	Sorry, the minute I read "cannister filter" it was a dead stop---cannisters are bad in that regard. You should be fine with no filter with that much live rock. In point of fact the cannister and your lr are in a seesaw die-off battle because it's boom or bust with the nutrient-disposal in the filter: clean, the rock gets the waste; dirty, it starves the rock: dieoff of bacteria, new spike. You'll see things level out, I'm pretty sure, once you're rid of it. Use it for intermittent particulate removal: it's not worthless, it just can be out of the system most of the time. __________________ Sk8r Salinity 1.024-6; alkalinity 8.3-9.3 on KH scale; calcium 420; magnesium 1300, temp 78-80, nitrate .2. Ammonia 0. No filters: lps tank. Alk and cal won't rise if mg is low. Current Tank Info: 105g AquaVim wedge, yellow tang, sailfin blenny,royal gramma, ocellaris clown pair, yellow watchman, 100 microceriths, 25 tiny hermits, a 4" conch, 1" nassarius, recovering from 2 year hiatus with daily water change of 10%.

08/21/2006, 02:45 PM	#7
GlobaLPimP Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Palm Harbor, Florida Posts: 911	I second the ditch the cannister idea as it worked for me! Good luck and REEF ON! __________________ This hobby is educational; it teaches you how to spend a lot of money in a hurry! Current Tank Info: 75gl, SPS, LPS, IceCap/T5/SLR, 2 modded Tunze 6045's, PCI 350 skimmer w/ Gen-X 2400, 95lbs LR, GEN-X 4100 return

08/21/2006, 04:03 PM	#9
afelder Registered Member Join Date: May 2006 Location: Tustin, CA Posts: 1,160	You can also try algone or purigen. They both are pretty good at nitrate removal, as well as removing some other disolved compounds. Combining the two worked very well for me when I was having nitrate issues. Ariel __________________ Thought For The Day.... "In the Torah it says "love thy neighbor as thy self". The Buddha says there is no "self". So maybe you are off the hook." All animals are created equal some are more equal than others.~Orwell Current Tank Info: NEW 70 gallon rr with a 25 gallon sump Bermuda 3-C that skims rings around a RS80 and 2 koralia 4 & 2 tunze 6045 eheim 1262 return 6x39 watt t-5

08/21/2006, 02:24 PM	#4
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	How old is the tank? (maybe your tank has not fully established its nitrate reduction yet?) How much livestock? (maybe you have too much bioload for your tanks nitrate reduction?) Do you/have you grown macro? Do you have a refugium? What type of substrate (if any do you have). Dave The tank is 3months old. It hsa 40lbs of live rock, I do not have a refugium, sorry to say but I am new at this hobby and dont know what macro is.....I have about 3 inches of live sand....I have a false perc clown and a blue damsel..i have about 10 blue legged hermits and 5 or so asteria snails....ever since the tank has started all levels except nitrate has been fine....is it possible it is still cycling toward the nitrate reduction????

08/21/2006, 02:40 PM	#5
CiroFuentes22 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Miami (Westcheaster/ Olympia Hights) Posts: 790	yes. Just ride it out and go buy some nirtramax. trust me i had same prob and the nitramax plus water changes helped me alot. but do the water chage first before puting the nitramax. its good stuff. good luck

08/21/2006, 02:44 PM	#6
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	ok I will try that ...thanks alot

08/21/2006, 02:47 PM	#8
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	is nitramax like amquel plus??? where might i find nitramax? I looked on liveaquaria and it doesnt look like they carry it...

08/21/2006, 11:22 PM	#10
GobyJohnKenobi Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Atlanta Posts: 413	It's been 6 months and my nitrates finally went to 0. All the advice sounds good. You could put a couple pouches of Purigen in the canister. It helps, and you can clean and reuse it over and over again. I stuffed a ball of Chaeto Algae behind one of my rocks in an area with good flow and light. That helped, also. Patience and diligence. It'll happen for you, too.

08/22/2006, 04:30 AM	#11
SeanySean Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Manchester (UK) Posts: 885	If you are only using the canister for polishing your water and not for mechanical filtration I do not think that will cause your nitrate problems, I think you are ok doing what you are doing with it at the moment Sean __________________ _______________ You paid how much for moldy rock!!!! Current Tank Info: 130G http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1042110

08/22/2006, 05:01 AM	#12
brownsugar Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Sydney Australia Posts: 194	haha even tho its a short term soloution but i dose with prime on a regular basis if i cant do a water change

08/22/2006, 08:52 AM	#13
syilk1 Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Chicago Posts: 391	Take a look at sulfur dinitators, I had same problem and these things work like you wont believe, I got mine from Midwest aquatics. They make a very nice unit and cheaper than the H & S version.

08/22/2006, 09:53 AM	#15
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	I have some purigen in there now, and so far it hasnt helped...I have some denitrates in there too as well as some stuff to remove phosphates...so I dont have a clue...I dont know why they are so high....especially they were around 20 a week ago..now they are around 80 again...I think I am going to do a large water change again, and leave the canister off this time and see what happens

08/22/2006, 10:07 AM	#16
SeanySean Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Manchester (UK) Posts: 885	Don't worry about the cannister, you do not have any media in there to trap waste like filter wool and sponges, bio balls etc, that should not be the cause of your problems, unless you have not changed the carbonm, antiphos in a very long time? Just out of interest what denitrifactor are you using, I was using the one by aqua medic and although it was a real pain to get it going once it worked, my nitrates were down to 0 in a couple of weeks... Sean __________________ _______________ You paid how much for moldy rock!!!! Current Tank Info: 130G http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1042110

08/22/2006, 10:17 AM	#17
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	The carbon in the canister is only a week old. the other media in there is denitrate...its supposed to remove nitrate, and there is a bag to remove phosphate both of those are a week old too...Thats what I was using before the big water change too. I had lots of people tell me the canister is the problem, so I am really clueless at this time. I am getting ready to throw the towel in because with high nitrates like I have I cant get any corals or anything that like becaue they wouldnt surive....I have tried everything I know of and in a matter of days...after the 70% water change using ro di water...they went from around 20 back up to over 80 again....this might sound like a dumb question..but if I move my stuff to a larger tank..would that help the nitrates??? probably not, probably make it a bigger headache to deal with but I figured I'd ask because I am out of ideas

08/22/2006, 10:35 AM	#18
BurntOutReefer Registered Member Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Granada Hills Posts: 4,376	IMO...This is what I would do. Use your Fluval to polish and/or run carbon and/or Nitramax. Feed your fish sparingly.....and just wait another month before you add anything else to the tank. To me, it sounds like a prolonged cycle....did you do water changes during your initial cycle? Are all of your Hermits alive? I suspect the source of your problems is not really the canister....

08/22/2006, 10:57 AM	#19
GMAX Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: DFW Posts: 839	Do you have bioballs or other filtration like sponges somewhere in your system? You have a nitrate factory someplace. going from 20 to 80 in short order is your indicator. I would try to remove anything that may be farming nitrate.

08/22/2006, 11:58 AM	#20
RobNJ Premium Member Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Hasbrouck Heights, NJ Posts: 945	ditcht he canister and get a good protein skimmer

08/22/2006, 03:48 PM	#21
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	I only have 2 fish...a small false perc clown and a blue damsel...2 of my orignal 5 hermits are alive...I bought a dozen more after my nitrates dropped, and I have lost a couple of them...my snails drop like flies......1 thing about my skimmer..which I thought was weird is that it has 2 sponge type things on the skimmer...one goes over the intake and the other goes where the air line feeds into the pump....other than that..no bioballs..no sponges in the filter..just carbon, denitrate and phosban....And I believe the sponge one the intake of the skimmer is to keep fish or anything else from being sucked up in there...

08/22/2006, 03:53 PM	#22
coltsfan80 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: indianapolis Posts: 128	honestly...and this sounds bad..but I really never saw a cycle....i have had this set up since the middle of may this year..and the ammonia, nitrite, have been 0...I do have trouble keeping my ph at 8.2 it falls to around 8.0.....but ever since the beginning the nitrate is the only thing that has been out of sorts and has been....I never saw a nasty algae bloom like people talk about when their tank is cycling...I didnt start to get algae until about a month ago when the nitrates soared off of the chart...when I bough my live rock..I bough it from a beautiful display tank from a lfs that was closing up shop...so I thought maybe since my rock was cured and had been in an established tank for awhile..mine might not "cycle like other tanks....

08/22/2006, 04:11 PM	#23
MCary Premium Member Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Hardin, Montana Posts: 3,142	A cycle as it used here is when the ammonia's and nitrite rise because there isn't enough bacteria colonized in the system to reduce it yet. You have 40 pounds of liverock in a 29 gallon tank. There's a good chance you already had enough bacteria to handle any ammonia production, so you didn't see a classic cycle. However, you are seeing the nitrates so you know its happening. If your liverock is able to reduce the nitrates, which is not always the case, they will do it by way of anaerobic bacteria inside of it in areas where the amount of oxygen is low or non-existant. This anerobic bacteria needs more time to establish than the aerobes. Being that your tank is only 3 months old, I suggest a dose of this: Mike

08/22/2006, 04:16 PM	#24
GMAX Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: DFW Posts: 839	Bet me someone asks where to get this new additive. LOL

08/23/2006, 03:58 AM	#25
SeanySean Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Manchester (UK) Posts: 885	Mcary - Does it Work? __________________ _______________ You paid how much for moldy rock!!!! Current Tank Info: 130G http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1042110