Reducing Nitrates

[1fast300z]

I am having a Never ending battle with my nitrates. I recently purchased an excellent Coralife skimmer which is removing loads of waste but the nitrates are still not dropping fast. I am using sink water (I know I need an RO unit) and I tested the water, its reading 5ppm on the Nitrates. My question is could that be whats making the Nitrates around 80-100 ppm? Or would sink water only add like 5ppm more on the nitrates since thats what it reads at?
thanks,
peter

 

[1journeyman]

What type of substrate are you using?
If you are doing a water change with 5ppm nitrate then that's what it is adding to your tank. Not 80.

 

[dmjordan]

how much and how often do you feed? and how much and how often do you do water changes?

 

[1fast300z]

I do a water change once a week, 30 to 35 percent. I am confused by your reply about how the water being added is increasing the nitrates each time, is that what you meant by that?
Thanks.

 

[1fast300z]

I do a water change once a week, 30 to 35 percent. I am confused by your reply about how the water being added is increasing the nitrates each time, is that what you meant by that? My substrate is 2 inch's of sand.
Thanks.
Edit- I now understand your response, sorry I am tired and its early for me. So the bottom line is my sink water isnt the factor for the high nitrates right? Its only adding a max of 5ppm. But when I do water changes its reducing the nitrates hopefully and not continuing to add 5 ppm everytime.

 

[hatessushi]

If you are removing water with 80-100ppm and replacing it with water that is 5ppm then it should still be reducing the nitrates. Since it's not then it could be overfeeding. The fact that you have a protein skimmer won't noticably reduce the nitrates. That's not it's purpose.
I have a 90 gallon tank and my nitrates were about 80ppm so I did a lot of reseasrch and decided to invest in a DeNitrator from Midwest Aquatics. I purchased the one that uses sulfur and there is very little maintenance. My nitrates after 1 month and 1 week are near 0 ppm. I highly recommend one and they are just a bit cheaper than a calcium reactor. The plus is that it will add calcium to the water so a calcium reactor is not needed. The downside is that the effluent that is dripped back to your tank although has 0 nitrates there is also no oxygen so you have to aerate that before it goes back into the tank. I have a small cheap overhang filter that I removed the filter material from so it's empty and let the effluent drip into therewith an airstone. Works like a charm. I suggest you research these DeNitrators and see if that is something that is feasable for you.

 

[taz_12777]

A DeNitrator would helpto reduce your levels but the question is why are they so high. Your tap water is only at 5ppm so that leaves a lot to be unacounted for. I would take a sample of your water to your LFS and have them test it to make sure your test kit is ok. If it is then you have to figure out where it is coming from. How often and how much do you feed? Put a sample of food into a cup and after a little while test that. Have you tested your changing water to make sure that it is not the salt? Do you have a large enough clean up crew to take care of the left overs?Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[hatessushi]

Originally Posted by TAZ_12777
A DeNitrator would helpto reduce your levels but the question is why are they so high. Your tap water is only at 5ppm so that leaves a lot to be unacounted for. I would take a sample of your water to your LFS and have them test it to make sure your test kit is ok. If it is then you have to figure out where it is coming from. How often and how much do you feed? Put a sample of food into a cup and after a little while test that. Have you tested your changing water to make sure that it is not the salt? Do you have a large enough clean up crew to take care of the left overs?Good luck and keep us posted.
agree
One of the reasons I use a DeNitrator is because I have a 90 gallon with a bioload of 5"trigger, 4" Kole Tang, 3.5" Coral Beauty, 1" Maroon clown, 3.5" daimond goby, with assorted corals. that kind of bioload would mean larger then 10% water changes and I only do 10% a week. with the DeNitrator I don't need to change and all creatures are thriving, even a bit of algea for the fish to snack on.

 

[1fast300z]

I will have the water tested at a LFS tomorrow. I use Instant Ocean sometimes and Red Sea others as far as mixing salts go. At the moment I dont have a clean up crew in the display, because my fish being housed is a large stars and stripes puffer. He is the only thing in my display, besides 65 lbs of live rock and powerheads. I plan on getting 65 more lbs of live rock in the near future. In my wet/dry I have a little hermit crab, two snails, and a Brittle Starfish. I also have a good amount of green plants that I was able to get from a wet/dry on a reef tank, hopefully these will help reduce the nitrates as well.
Speaking of the Brittle Starfish, will he be alright in the wet/dry with some live rock and small portions of krill?
Will My skimmer help reduce Nitrates at all?! I sure hope so, the collection cup is full of black water.
Thanks,
Peter

 

[saltn00b]

you have made your wet dry into a make shift refugium, do you have sand and a light in there?

 

[1fast300z]

No sand yet, should I add sand, I just have a lot of small live rock and plants. With a low powered florescent light that I keep on 24 hours.

 

[saltn00b]

its not a must, but i would suggest doing some research on refugiums to help with that endeavor.

 

[zman1]

1fast300z,
This is a tough one, there are potentially so many things that could be adding to your NO3 levels directly or indirectly. With the levels you are reporting it's most likely a combination of many things here are a few of them.
Tap - can add NO3, TDS, chloramines ( chorine and ammonia used to disinfect public water lines)
Salt - can have trace NO3
Poor feeding habits -
Fish waste - Load
Fish food -
Poor maintenance habits.
Large water changes should bring it down from the levels you have currently, even if you are adding low levels back in. However, they are going to creep back up by top off water alone.
You really should attack the TAP water issue and NO3 may not be the only thing you have a concentration of in your tank (metals, PO4, Silicate).
NO3 is either added or your feeding the process that nets NO3.
Can you describe a little more about your tank, setup, inhabitants, feeding and maintenance habits. This will help others to offer reccomendations....

 

[1fast300z]

I have a copper test kit, tested water parameters and they read 0. I have cut my feeding to every other day on my Puffer. Basic specs of tank.
Set up in August
125 fowlr (65 lbs)
1 large Stars and Stripes Puffer Fish
Two Maxi-jet 1200 Powerheads
Two Powersweep Powerheads (270gph each)
Cora-life 220 Skimmer (largest model)
Sea-clone 150 Skimmer (useless)
Aquaclear Model 3 wet/dry
mag12 return.
I currently have several green plants in my wet/dry, small pieces of Live Rock, a hermit crab, two snails, and a brittle starfish.
I perform a 40 to 45 percent water change once a week. Clean pre-filter sponges, and rinse wet/dry pads once a month in water used from the aquarium.
Pictures of the Aquarium.
In the aquarium photo I have the 4 powerheads circled , in the back left and back right corner i have the power sweep powerheads. In the middle I have a maxi-jet 1200, and above a little to the right is the other maxi-jet 1200. Does this waterflow setup look ok?
Also how does the wet/dry look, should I put sand down there to? Its like a fuge/wetdry.

 

[saltn00b]

how big is that stars & stripes? maybe someone with aggressive fish can chime in here , but it is my understanding that they get very big, and produces a lot of waste - eating even more as growing juveniles, and producing more waste. that fish may have even already outgrown your system. just throwing it out there

 

[1fast300z]

Its possible he has outgrown my filter systems already, but not the aquarium. He is probably close to 10 inches in length, I picked him up from a fish buisness that installs and does maintence on aquariums at rich houses. Apparently he started eating all the other fish once he grew larger so they sold him to me. Anyway He is the length of a football but not as big around as one. I cut back on feeding him ALOT over the past few weeks, I am hoping this will help. He is the only fish in the aquarium and I dont plan on getting anything else for a very long time. He does produce a good amount of waste, but since I cut back on feeding its not quite as bad. Should I look into getting a hang-on filter to help with the filtration?
Here is a picture of Puffer Huey