Phosphates - Help!

arandacole

arandacole

Member
How do you lower phosphates?
They were perfect 2 weeks ago and now they are off the charts. We are doing 20 - 40% water changes every 2 weeks.
Our nitrates are lower, but our phosphates are skyrocketing... <sigh>
I cannot learn fast enough to keep on top off everything - but I'm trying.
Thank you all for the help.
Love,
Aranda
 
hkgar

hkgar

Member
Other than water changes you might consider investing in a phosphate reactor. They do great job of eliminating phosphates. Use with RowaPhos.
How old is the tank. On new tanks quite often phosphates are leached into the water from the sand bed or rock..
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
Well the first thing you need to do is find the source of the phosphates
1. What do you feed, how often and how much...
2. Do you have any type of sponges collecting junk in the aquarium.
3. What type of water are you using and where do you get it from (have you tested it for phosphates).
If you can eliminate all those things as a nitrate source then you need to look at a way to get rid of them.
There are really only three ways.
1. Water changes with a water source you know is phosphate free (and this won't get rid of it entirely)
2. setting up a refugium with macro algae
3. Running some sort of phosphate remover.
 
hardcrab67

hardcrab67

Member
Check your water that your using to do water changes with. Mine was coming from my R/O. It wasn't removing the phosphates. Need to upgrade the resin filter, I guess, I just buy water from my LFS. Any advice on the R/O is appreciated.
 
arandacole

arandacole

Member
Originally Posted by hkgar
Other than water changes you might consider investing in a phosphate reactor. They do great job of eliminating phosphates. Use with RowaPhos.
How old is the tank. On new tanks quite often phosphates are leached into the water from the sand bed or rock..

I don't know what a phosphate reactor is, so I'll start researching that.
The tank is 5 years old. I have only had it for 2 months. We moved everything - lr, ls, fish, everything. We haven't lost anything - yet (we have 1 large Yellow Tang, 1 huge Maroon Clown, 1 boxer shrimp, lots of snails, 1 crab we cannot identify, 1 yellow fish that we can't identify and 3 blue schooling lil' fish that I forgot the name of - plus mushrooms, bubble coral and a few other things)
Thanks again!
Love,
Aranda
 
arandacole

arandacole

Member
Originally Posted by tangs123
chemicals like phos-ban
or just more water changes

I'll keep up with the water changes and try to figure out what is causing this. I'm so new I haven't heard of stuff like phos-ban, more research :)
Thanks again!
Love,
Aranda
 
arandacole

arandacole

Member
Originally Posted by Birdy
Well the first thing you need to do is find the source of the phosphates
1. What do you feed, how often and how much...
2. Do you have any type of sponges collecting junk in the aquarium.
3. What type of water are you using and where do you get it from (have you tested it for phosphates).
If you can eliminate all those things as a nitrate source then you need to look at a way to get rid of them.
There are really only three ways.
1. Water changes with a water source you know is phosphate free (and this won't get rid of it entirely)
2. setting up a refugium with macro algae
3. Running some sort of phosphate remover.

I was feeding everyday. Formula 1 and 2 and just a pinch eod and then a cube of frozen Brine Shrimp eod. It was always gone in 2 min. I have cut back to eod feeding only and half the amount I was feeding. I've been doing this for 1.5 weeks.
No Sponges
We are using tap water - and here is part of my dilemma. We add whatever (chlorine reamover etc. my hubby does that part, so I'm not sure) but before we add the water to the tank we test it (Red Sea Reef Lab) and it tests out fantastic - I'm wondering if my testing is wrong. Everything is falling within ideal - I wsih I could give you the specifics, but I can't. I'll start writing it down.
Thank you again. I really appreciate it.
Love,
Aranda
 
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