High Nitrates

[trina]

I have a 55gal. tank that has been established for about 6 months. I have a naso tang, a lunar wrasse, a HUGE perc.clown,and a queen angel and a Huma trigger. They are all on the med-large side. I cannot get rid of my nitrates. I feed them one sheet of algae a day and 2 cubes of prime reef. My nitrates are reading about 80 and I did another waterchange today (20%) and it did not seem to effect the nitrates. I am using Prime to dechlorinate my water. Can Prime neutralize my nitrates? Is that possible? Are they just reading high, but not harmful because I have been using Prime? Help!

 

[cardinals]

KEEP CHANGING THAT WATER!!! 20 % Not enough .Do it till its better

 

[wamp]

You have a lot of big fish in a small tank. Also, your feeding alot. That and the fact that you probably don't have sufficent anaerobic bacteria to break down the nitrates.
My suggestion, Cut back on feeding a little. If you can part with one of the big fish, remove it. If not, lower feedings will help but you need to bump up your water changes. This will help remove some but will not take care of it all....
Also, you could add some other means of getting that bacteria to grow, such as an abundance of LR or LS...
Good Luck

 

[ruaround]

Hello Trina...Welcome aboard. Your Nitrate levels probably will not go down. The fish you have in there require much larger tank sizes and for the most part are messy eaters,not to mention perhaps over feeding. The Queen Angel will get to be around 18", and needs around 120 gal. The Huma will get to be over 10", and requires roughly 75 gal. The Naso will also get to be over 18", and requires more than 150 gal. What type of water are you using? RO, tap, Distilled?

 

[trina]

I am using tap water! I have no inverts, so i did not see the need in using the RO water. ever since this tank was established I have had the nitrate problem. How often can I do a water change? Someone posted to do it until the nitrate problem is gone. How much at one time can I switch out? Can I do this every day without stressing out the fish?
My fish are not huge...they are in the medium range. None of them are over 4"...however I know that they will grow to be big!
That algae that I put on the clip seems very messy. I have not been using it for long...a week only. How often should I put that in and then how soon after should I remove it?

 

[ed r]

I think Wamp gave very good advice.
Tap water is likely to contain nitrate, phosphate, and other bad things. If there is nitrate, your water changes will not be very effective. RO/DI water is the best way to go because you are adding zero nitrate, etc. If you can part with a fish or two by taking them to the LFS for credit, it would be a lot easier to get the tank under control. You can do water changes as often as you want if (a big IF), the water temperature, salinity, and pH are a good match for what is in the tank. If you get careless and put too cold of water in, for example, you are likely to see a major ich outbreak. In a crowded tank where the fish are stressed, diseases are usually fatal and can kill all of the occupants.
Feeding that group is a challenge. As mentioned earlier, they are messy eaters. You put a chunk of algae on your clip and they will eat some of it and break a great deal more loose. That loose material will probably gather on the bottom and deteriorate. Why should they bother to pick it off the bottom when there is more on the clip? I would suggest leaving the algae on the clip for only a couple minutes. As soon as no one is actively picking at it, get it out of there. Let the fish patrol the tank picking at live growing algae or scavenging any that was broken loose from the clip. Feed very small amounts more often so nothing reaches the bottom. This is a lot easier said than done, however, because your fish will compete for the food. Your problem will be getting enough to the least aggresive fish.
The nitrate level of 80 by itself is not necessarily dangerous for those fish if it does not change dramatically. Most fish can tolerate levels that no coral would survive. That does not make it a good idea though to maintain those levels because the fish will be stressed to some extent. Also high nitrate will encourage all sorts of undesirable algae growth over time.
A tank full of large attactive fish can be so beautiful, I understand how you got into your predicament. Maintaining such a tank is extremely difficult. I wish you luck.

 

[trina]

Thank you Ed! So I have a plan...hopefully all of you will agree with it. First of all I am not getting rid of my fish...like them too much. Therefore i have to deal with this situation. I am going to feed a little bit a algae at a time and pull it out before it starts floating around the tank. I am going to break up my prime reef into bits and only feed a 1/4 cube at a time to eliminate waste. I am going to change 20% of my water every other day...while maintaining the same SG and PH and temp. The temp part is going to be difficult. This will not eliminate the problem, however will help the problem. I am shocked that I overloaded the tank! I am going to post another ? about the amount of fish that should go in my tank. I need some insight on this. Thank you everyone for your help...much appreciated!

 

[seaguru]

Do a search on nitrates and refugiums on this board and you will learn a lot... the nitrate dilemna is usually the problem that people with large bio-loads encounter. (I know!) You may want to add/start a refugium with macroalgae/mangroves to absorb some of that nutrient/nitrate resultant in your system. If you don't try this route you should at a minimum have a protein skimmer in operation in addition to whatever filtration you use. Good luck, Joe.