Needs some help???

[Andresm]

Have a 125g with a huge custom sump, lots of coral manly sps. Running dr. Tim's bio pellets for almost 3m. Running Gfo, have cheato in sump, dosing pump dosing cal, mag, alk. Mp40, 3 Vegas for lights. And am having a problem with Nitrates they got to over 100 now with LOTS OF HUGE WATER CHANGES got the down between 30-40 I do weekly or bi weekly water changes, I use salinity. About 15g before I had to do huge water changes to bring them down. Why can't I get my Nitrates Down, lost a couple sps. This is a established tank. Use Rodi water what is Tds reading at 1
Any Advice ????

[Flyride95]

Are you testing nitrates with the API test kit? That kit ALWAYS read super high. It even said my rodi water was at 80ppm. Personally I would test it with a 2nd test kit.

[ramsey]

If you're running biopellets, you should have near 0 nitrate. What do your phosphates look like? Did you start running GFO just to run it or did you have phosphates but no nitrate? If you look up the Redfield's ratio, it'll explain how bacteria need both of those (way more nitrate than phosphate though). You might try taking your GFO offline and see if anything changes with nitrates. Also, are you sure you're running enough BP's?

I agree you should double check your test kit. Take a sample into a LFS or get a Salifret kit.

One other thing to consider is that your SPS dying is not caused by nitrates, and that nitrates are a red herring. You say you're dosing alk, ca, M. Are you testing and making sure they're stable or are you just dosing based off of the bottle's recommendation? How are your SPS dying? Tip bleaching, RTN from the base, browning, etc. etc.? Alk instability will certainly kill SPS. I have old coral skeletons to prove it. :)

[Andresm]

My phosphate r fine, started Gfo just cause I wanted cleaner water, and yes I check my dosing pump levels and everything is fine,

[jcnkt_ellis]

How heavy is your fish load? How much are you feeding and how many times a day? Also, look into taking your GFO offline like stated above, besides needing phosphates for your denitrifying bacteria, you also need what little phosphates you have for your cheato to grow and take out nitrates.

[Sherita]

Verify with a second test kit.

Check your fresh saltwater before you use it. I've actually had high nitrates in the water I was using for water changes.

[ramsey]

My phosphate r fine, started Gfo just cause I wanted cleaner water, and yes I check my dosing pump levels and everything is fine,

What do you mean by dosing pump level? I'm talking about testing your tank water to make sure you're not overdosing or dosing too much of one additive. Also, how did the SPS die? The way they died will sometimes narrow down what caused it.

[Andresm]

Have checked rodi water before using it and its fine, and yes my dosing levels in tank r fine. My Sps started out alittle white and the died within a day or day half

[footballdude2k3]

Have you pulled the GFO yet? Take the water to a store to get verification of your levels.

[Andresm]

Haven't pulled the Gfo yet,

[Andresm]

Only feeding once a day

[350gt]

My tank has been happy since taking the gfo offline and upping my water changes......

[BBQHILLBILLY]

thinning the LR, increasing sw in the tank, cut feeding in half helped me lower my nitrates, and weekly sw changes and pack in chaeto, light it from the sides, get a small tube and run the sw around it will help too, it works

i should mention I did not run gfo. So I did have some phosphates in the tank and had some other algaes that were helping reduce nitrates, too.

[CoryDude]

So your nitrate issue just came up or had it been a while since you tested for no3? Just wondering if you were testing each week or every once in a while.

Agree with everyone else and verify your readings with a second test kit.

If you truly are having no3 issues it helps to know if this has been a slow build up or if your nitrates went off the charts suddenly. A sudden spike can probably be a simpe fix, but a slow build up of nutrients can be a number of things or even a combination of issues.

[FireWater]

I agree with Cory. Need to know if it was slow vs over night rise. How long has the tank been set up? I k ow you recently added the new sump and did some changes to it.

Get a confirmation on the test.

[Andresm]

I haven't been testing nitrates regularly, so I believe it was a slow rise, tanks been up 3yrs

[Big_Pun]

ive been trying to help andre with this for a while and its crazy. he did have a reactor that had a small pump(gfo)
and caused water to go rotten, i guess it was still feeding into the tank. but this was last or 2 weeks ago and has since been fixed with a better pump. he does water changes and it still creeps up on him.

[ramsey]

Like I said, the only two things I think would cause you to still have nitrate after running biopellets would be either not enough pellets, or the GFO is taking out too much phosphate which is limiting bacteria production.

If your SPS slowly faded away, it could be not enough nutrients (feed more) or too much light too fast. I have a couple pieces that are recovering from that in my tank right now which is why I know.

[CoryDude]

Probably a long shot, but do you have a cat litter box near the tank?

[Big_Pun]

what are all your paremters? cal, alk, ph, phos

[Andresm]

Mag. 1240, cal. 450, alk 9.0 nitrates 30, phosphate 0,

[ramsey]

Did you try taking the GFO offline?

[Andresm]

Not yet, but yes will be in the next couple days, I did add more bio pellets

[Paul28]

How old is your tank ? over 2 years ? were do you have the bio pellets reactor out line is it to your skimmer ?

[Paul28]

have you got any new so called live rock anytime soon since the nitrate problem ?

[Andresm]

No no rock, my out line from bio pellets is in the sane camber as skimmer, tank is older than 2 1/2 years

[Paul28]

how often do you blow a powerhead behind the rocks to get out detritus, and do you maintain the sand bed or do you never touch it ? were the rocks new when you started our out of a old tank ?

[Andresm]

Never blow rock, or touch sand bed. Mostly new rock and some used

[Paul28]

how deep is your sand bed is it below 3 ?

[Andresm]

Yes it's below 3in.

[Paul28]

most older tanks around 2+ years start to leach out nitrats from shallow sand beds and old rock they can start to leach out nitrats im not saying it is your problem but something to look into old tank syndrome

[Andresm]

Ok will look into