Nitrate Hell.... How to Prevent

windlasher

windlasher

Member
I am investigating ways to automatically keep nitrates down. I am looking at reactors, chemicals, nitrate sponges, etc… Do any of you have any experience with these items? Which ones work the best.
Currently looking at:
Poly Reactors with some sort of checmical media
Kent Marine Nitrate Sponge
Seachem Denitrate
Sulfer Reactors
Building a Coil Denitrator
I would appreciate any advice you all might have on the subject. I just recovered from a nitrate crash and even though I did lose anything , “yet”. I am looking to see how to reduce the chances of another crash.
Thanks In Advance…
 
afboundguy

afboundguy

Member
I'm a big fan of refugiums. I've never had any first hand experience with any of the above mentioned items but I always like to keep things as natural as possible in my tank.
I never had a problem with nitrates in my tank (~10ppm all the time). I put in a small in tank DIY refugium made out of a med speciman container to help with my pod population for my mandarin and stuck a powerhead in it. Now I have undetectable nitrates in my tank.
Having a refugium has also helped with my random hair algea blooms (phosphates). There are plenty of good HOB refugiums made my CPR or if you have a sump just throw in some macro algea with a light.
Without knowing more about your system (type of filtration, bioload, size, etc) that's the best advice I can give to help reduce nitrates.
 
davmul

davmul

Member
+1 for the fuge. I have had success controling nitrates by adding mechanical filtration and adding chaeto in a refugium. Nitrates are now 0.
 
prime311

prime311

Active Member
I've been using Sugar in my FOWLR for the last couple weeks, brought my Nitrates down from 30 to 10.
 
confusedfishy

confusedfishy

Member
I have found that routine water changes work great, plus no chemicals are put into the system and you don't have to work about a machine that might break. I do a small water change, 10-15%, each week. It takes about an hour in total to take out and replace but it really keeps the parameters in place. Good Luck!
 
1journeyman

1journeyman

Active Member
Find the source of the problem. Nitrates are a symptom. Why are your's high? Find the source and address it.
Tell us more about your tank and we can help ya out.
 
srfisher17

srfisher17

Active Member
Originally Posted by 1journeyman
http:///forum/post/2649152
Find the source of the problem. Nitrates are a symptom. Why are your's high? Find the source and address it.
Tell us more about your tank and we can help ya out.
Right of course. One of my tanks is an unusual set-up and I know where the nitrates come from. I get so wrapped in my own stuff sometimes that I forget the basics.
 
beth

beth

Administrator
Staff member
If you set up your tank appropriately, you should not really experience a problem. How is your tank set up: filters, live rock, live sand, RO water, skimmer, etc? You have to address the issue from the angle of tank set up, rather than reactionary by trying to "get rid" of it. The goal should be that your tank is set up in such a way that nitrates are exported naturally from your system and are not a problem.
 
kellenr

kellenr

Member
Originally Posted by prime311
http:///forum/post/2648799
I've been using Sugar in my FOWLR for the last couple weeks, brought my Nitrates down from 30 to 10.
Sugar? Really. Can you please explain how you do this? (for those of us who are unfamiliar with this practice).
Originally Posted by windlasher
http:///forum/post/2648627
...I just recovered from a nitrate crash and even though I did lose anything , “yet”...
Thanks In Advance…
I think you mean "didn't".
Originally Posted by Beth
http:///forum/post/2649255
If you set up your tank appropriately, you should not really experience a problem. How is your tank set up: filters, live rock, live sand, RO water, skimmer, etc? You have to address the issue from the angle of tank set up, rather than reactionary by trying to "get rid" of it. The goal should be that your tank is set up in such a way that nitrates are exported naturally from your system and are not a problem.
Can you please elaborate on 'how to naturally eliminate nitrates'. Please give some examples of what they could do to setup their tank to remove nitrates automatically.
--> Well I agree that you should figure out where the bulk of excess Nitrates are coming from if you're having a big problem. With that said however all tanks with fish will accumulate a certain amount of nitrate. It's the end product of the nitrogen cycle and unavoidable.
I have used the Kent Nitrate Sponge. It worked pretty well, the only downside is the media loses its 'charge' and needs to be replaced frequently. I never really had much of a nitrate problem though, so for me it was really no use having it in there. Mine are always between 5-20ppm and water changes take care of it.
 
niskyvaulter

niskyvaulter

Member
it would be useful if you could list tank specs. the important things to know are; size, bioload, pounds of live rock, sand bed, water change frequency and percentage, ro water, protein skimmer, and other types of filtration you use. since high nitrates happen for a reason, the answer is probably somewhere in the setup.
 
florida joe

florida joe

Well-Known Member
In my opinion nitrates are not a symptom but the end product of nitrification (with all due respect to my esteemed friend Mr T). With out which we could not maintain or tanks. We rid our tanks of nitrates in a few ways, physically removing them through water changes. Denitrification through bacteria and harvesting higher allege forms which store the nitrates with in there cells are what most of us use. Over feeding over population poor husbandry all contribute to adding nitrates, which are produced faster, then can be eliminated. For my money a multiple attack is the best way to go. But expounding on what Beth said as far as natural elimination. There are two basic ways to do this one is dissimulator nitrate reduction in which bacteria reduces nitrite to nitrate and eventually to di-nitrogen and nitrous oxide gases since denitrification occurs mainly in the absents of oxygen it is limited to our substraight and live rock The second way is assimilatory nitrate reduction, and it involves direct uptake of nitrogenous waste into tissue mass of algae
 
prime311

prime311

Active Member
SRFisher posted a link Kellen if you want to see it. I'm up to putting in a teaspoon of sugar a day. I'm down to 5 Nitrates(down from 30 when I started 2 weeks ago but at the time 30 was higher then my norm). I have a low load heavy filtration tank so it isn't just the sugar lowering it. Sugar essentially does the same thing as macroalgae, by promoting Nitrate eating bacteria growth. Its just the bacteria consumes the nitrates rather then the macroalgae.
 
sepulatian

sepulatian

Moderator
Originally Posted by florida joe
http:///forum/post/2649455
In my opinion nitrates are not a symptom but the end product of nitrification (with all due respect to my esteemed friend Mr T). With out which we could not maintain or tanks. We rid our tanks of nitrates in a few ways, physically removing them through water changes. Denitrification through bacteria and harvesting higher allege forms which store the nitrates with in there cells are what most of us use. Over feeding over population poor husbandry all contribute to adding nitrates, which are produced faster, then can be eliminated. For my money a multiple attack is the best way to go. But expounding on what Beth said as far as natural elimination. There are two basic ways to do this one is dissimulator nitrate reduction in which bacteria reduces nitrite to nitrate and eventually to di-nitrogen and nitrous oxide gases since denitrification occurs mainly in the absents of oxygen it is limited to our substraight and live rock The second way is assimilatory nitrate reduction, and it involves direct uptake of nitrogenous waste into tissue mass of algae
Can you elaborate on your thoughts here in layman's terms please
 
sepulatian

sepulatian

Moderator
Sure Joe, there were just a few points that I would like you to clarify.
Denitrification through bacteria and harvesting higher allege forms which store the nitrates with in there cells are what most of us use.
And this part
There are two basic ways to do this one is dissimulator nitrate reduction in which bacteria reduces nitrite to nitrate and eventually to di-nitrogen and nitrous oxide gases since denitrification occurs mainly in the absents of oxygen it is limited to our substraight and live rock The second way is assimilatory nitrate reduction, and it involves direct uptake of nitrogenous waste into tissue mass of algae
Please just explain what you mean here, in detail if possible. Thanks so much!
 
florida joe

florida joe

Well-Known Member
In denitrification via anabolic bacteria the nitrate is used in the biochemical pathway of respiration by the bacteria that consume it as food the by-product is nitrous oxide gases which is expelled from our tanks. In assimilatory nitrate reduction the algae uses the nitrate as food only it stores it in its cells. That is why when algae such as caulerpa die it floods your tank with nitrates. What must be done with assimilatory nitrate reduction is the systematic harvesting of the algae. This way your remove the nitrate loaded algae allowing room for more growth and thus more removal
 
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