High Nitrate

[traib]

My nitrate is running around 20. All other water parameters are good. Aside from water changes does anyone know of a way to reduce nitrate levels. I'm running a fuge with lots of culerpa, a deep sand-bed in both the tank and fuge, and lots of live rock. This is the first time I've had this problem in a number of years.

 

[viper_930]

Are you using test strips or the drops to test the nitrates? Mine were at 20 too, and my friend at the LFS said that he tested ppl's water with the drops and test strips and found many strips to be faulty with the nitrates. And yes, my "friend" at the lfs is the employee, but I know if I didn't call him my friend it wouldn't sound as convincing.

 

[traib]

I'm using two different test kits, both liquid.

 

[bang guy]

Are you removing a significant amount of Algae every week or so?
Have you also tested your Phosphate level?

 

[traib]

Yes I'm removing algae, but I haven't checked phos recently. I'll do that tomorrow morning. I'm going to change another 20% to 30% of the water tomorrow too. See what happens.:notsure:

 

[golfish]

How long have the DSB's been setup. Have you heard of "old tank syndrome"

 

[traib]

The deep sand bed is about a year old. I should mention that the tank was converted to an environmental gradient system as per Steve Tyree's model explained in his book "The Environmental Gradient - Cryptic Sponge and Sea Squirt Filtration Methods" about a month ago. According to Steve Tridacna Clams do reduce Nitrates so I'm going to aquire one this week.
Phosphate is 0.75
Well, time to a start water change.

 

[bang guy]

I'm wondering why your sand bed isn't functioning. A 1 year old DSB should be able to process more Nitrate than any reasonable bio-load could produce.
Has the critter polulation in the sand bed declined over the year?

 

[traib]

Don't have as many pods as I used to, but added a live sand boost a couple of weeks ago and the pods are coming back especially in the refugium.
Just did a 15% water change and the nitrate is still hanging around 20 ppm:notsure: Not real bad and every thing is doing fine, inverts and fish!

 

[golfish]

Yeah, Steve's really big on Sponges and Sea Squirts. He's also big on having clams in the fuge like you mentioned.
1 year isn't really that old so I doubt its OTS although it has been reported in tanks younger then 1 year.