Best way to reduce Nitrates and Phosphates and best light for refugium

[Tom Toro]

Couple of questions:
What's your favorite way to keep Nitrates in check?

I've started a refugium in one 100g tub. I put in cheato and another unknown macro algae. The cheato and macro have stalled and a red fluff is taking over. I'm using a 6500k bulb. Should I use a lower Kelvin to grow the macros better and faster?

I Don't show any phosphates according to Salifert, but I know how that goes. I have a slight hair algae problem and a large bryopsis problem. I've started with the Tech M, but would rather just reduce phosphates. Do you guys have a specific way to do this that you like?

What foods have the least phosphates?

I have a large skimmer
I have a pellet reactor going with about 700ml
Lots of very small fish
Feed somewhat heavily but have cut down gradually. Keeping Anthias alive.
Use I/O for water
nitrates 30ppm
TDS from r/o is 0 thanks to spectrapure membrane

[slapshot]

Bio pellets for me Tom. My nitrates used to be 15 to 20 ppm with a lot of water changes. You know how I feed. Now it stays at a steady 1 to 3 ppm.

[Tom Toro]

Bio pellets for me Tom. My nitrates used to be 15 to 20 ppm with a lot of water changes. You know how I feed. Now it stays at a steady 1 to 3 ppm.

That is excellent, Don!

I know it all depends on the tank conditions, but what total water volume are you running and how many ml of biopellets? Just trying to get a handle on it. I've been going very slowly and putting about 225ml increase a week and am up to about 700+ for the three weeks it's been running new. Am I still just new and I need to keep increasing the biopellets weekly until I get to ? So far no cyano or other algaes, but I am getting a green film on the glass daily. .

[slapshot]

No stop and watch the ph. A few days after you add them you should see a drop in your ph. 48 to 72 hours later it will recover. Two days after that you should see the nitrates drop. Follow the directions to determine the right amount. i divided mine into 4 and I added them every time the nitrates dropped, or the PH recovered. Now this is important, I know you said you have low PO but how low? PO and nitrates are linked. If your nitrates are not dropping then you need to run some phosban then it will drop. My was on a seesaw until I learned the link. My nitrates would drop then they would rise and PO would drop. Back and forth. I just figured it was a different population of bacteria. And they were switching. Then it just stopped and everything stayed the same and high. I added the phosban and my nitrates crashed to 0 and have been low ever since.

[Tom Toro]

Great, Don!!! I just today calibrated my ph monitor. This is something I can work with. I'm running at 8.0 right now. I'll re-read the directions on the pellets and adjust.

My ph should go down in a couple of days after adding some more and I should wait until it recovers. Then add another 100ml or so and repeat.

Also, my PO was not showing anything on the Salifert tester. I have a reactor I can use for the phosban, but not sure how much to use. I'll look it up on the net to see unless you have a recipe you can give me.

Thanks for the help!! I think the phosban link can help me start at square one! Sounds like that was the ticket to your success.
Tom

[slapshot]

Yep, it's the key. Otherwise you sit in a loop of bacteria consuming nitrate then dying and then PO consuming bacteria growing and consuming PO then dying and so on and so on. My guess is your PO is low because your pellets are consuming it instead of nitrate. Once you remove the PO the nitrate bacteria will take over.

The ph thing is simple enough to explain, as the bacteria grow and feed heavily they remove oxygen and increase carbon dioxide. Once they hit the balance point the levels all return and the ph goes back up. That's how you know things are balanced and you can add more.

I never measure my PO remover. I just add some and replace it monthly or when it stops removing PO.

[jimsflies]

I'm a new fan of mangroves for controlling 'trates.

[slapshot]

I'm a new fan of mangroves for controlling 'trates.

Does it work? I was always under the impression they don't really remove much.

[11purewater]

Here mangroves are 20 dollars each and chaeto is 20 dollars for a basketball size piece ,guess where my nutrients are going

[Sir Patrick]

Does it work? I was always under the impression they don't really remove much.

I was under the same impression.