Help - Struggling With Nitrates

Hi,
I have been struggling with Nitrates being a constant 20ppm. It ssems like anything I do does not affect it, I do a strict massive amount of maintenance and it is costing a fortune, if anyone has any ideas please help, see below:


PH 8.2 (always been the same)
Amonia 0.0
Nitrite 0.0
Nitrate 20
Temperature - 24c
salt level 1.026

TANK:
Jewel Vision 180 litre tank.
Marine setup has been running for 1.5 years.

FILTRATION & MAINTENANCE:
25% water change a week
1 x 50% water change every month. To put in perspective I am getting through 8 x 25 litre buckets of water a month.
I empty my external filter (Eheim 2213) every two days and rinse the two blue filter pads in the emptied water from the filter so that I do not kill the good bacteria. The rest of the filter is filled with live rock.
I also have a aqua medic phosphate reactor linked to the exit of the external filter
I have changed my protein skimmer from a Prism to a TMC v2 600 and it has made no difference to the water quality.
I empty the protein skimmer cup every day, and clean it so there is no resistance to the bubbles entering the cup.
I use a strong wave machine to blow the rock to remove debris 1 x a week.


SAND BED:
About 6 months ago I had a live sand bed (lots of worms and critters etc) no it appears to be dead. So no I have started to sifen the sand bed to remove debris (2 x a week)
sand bed is approximately 1cm high.


CIRCULATION:
I have three pumps on the left front side of the tank (korilla nano (600lph), korilla one (1500lph) and a 600 lph pointing up to disterb the surface.)
On the back right hand side I have a seio 820 (3200lph) wave machine
These cause the water to go circular motion around the tank, the live rock (30kg) is stacked in the middle of the tank.

FISH & FEEDING
I have 5 fish (royal gramma, 2 x small clown fish, 1 x purple fire fish, 1 x yellow tailed damsel, 1 x bangai cardinal)
1 feed one frozen block of food (1/2 on Saturday and 1/2 on Tuesday, then flake food on thursday, I do not feed on the other days).
No fish have died for about 6 months.

LIGHTING:
1 x T8 White
1 x T8 Blue
Light is on 5 hours a day.

CLEAN UP CREW:
7 x turbo snails
6 x blue hermit crabs
1 x sand sifting star fish
1 x cleaner shrimp

WATER & SALT:
I use ready salted water from Pets At Home.
I have tested this water (0ppm), however not sure if it was at the right temperature.

ADDITIVES
4ml of Kent marine essential elements 1 x a month.

MOST UP TO DATE OVERALL STATUS
The protein skimmer and external filter are working correctly but do not appear to have much to pull out the water.
When i blow the wave machine over the rock, not much comes off now, appears to be debris free.
The sand bed seems to be the most dirtyist area.
I did have quite alot of hair algae, but now it is dissapearing quite quickly.

What type of test kit are you using? Also, have you gotten the results double-checked by another kit, and have you tested the kit on newly-mixed water or 50/50 new water + tank water to see if you can alter the reading? Constant 20ppm despite WCs and skimming seems a bit odd to me, but it could also be related to the disappearing hair algae, since that will be removing a nutrient sink. Do you have any other nutrient sinks in the tank like macroalgae?

I'm also puzzled by the lighting. 5hrs seems an awfully short period of time. Was this specifically to control the algae?

About 6 months ago I had a live sand bed (lots of worms and critters etc) no it appears to be dead. So no I have started to sifen the sand bed to remove debris (2 x a week)
sand bed is approximately 1cm high.

Click to expand...

If the star has been in the whole time, that will be the cause. Sand-sifting stars deplete sand beds of their fauna and then frequently risk starvation. If the star was added after the sand bed "died" then that is a curious thing indeed.

rcracer20071 said:

Hi,
I have been struggling with Nitrates being a constant 20ppm. It ssems like anything I do does not affect it, I do a strict massive amount of maintenance and it is costing a fortune, if anyone has any ideas please help, see below:

FILTRATION & MAINTENANCE:

I empty my external filter (Eheim 2213) every two days and rinse the two blue filter pads in the emptied water from the filter so that I do not kill the good bacteria.



SAND BED:
About 6 months ago I had a live sand bed (lots of worms and critters etc) no it appears to be dead. So no I have started to sifen the sand bed to remove debris (2 x a week)
sand bed is approximately 1cm high.

Click to expand...

These two are your problems. First get rid of all the filter media, you can keep the carbon in (if it is less then a month old. Otherwise its done everything it can so scrap that too). The filter media is useless in marine tanks. They are designed for FW not SW. Stop messing with the sand bed too this isnt helping let it settle down and reseed itself. Live Rock and Live Sand are the real filters in Marine tanks external filter just provide a place to keep carbon, rowaphos, LR rubble and more water turnover.

What type of test kit are you using? - API Saltwater master test kit

Also, have you gotten the results double-checked by another kit, - Pets At Home recently tested my water and got the same results

and have you tested the kit on newly-mixed water or 50/50 new water + tank water to see if you can alter the reading? - I have tested the pre-salted water from the Pets At Home and it reads 0ppm - although the water temperate is probably cold.


Constant 20ppm despite WCs and skimming seems a bit odd to me, but it could also be related to the disappearing hair algae, since that will be removing a nutrient sink. Do you have any other nutrient sinks in the tank like macroalgae? - I used to have what looks like sea weed, but i have removed that about two weeks ago as it seemed to grow and then die.

I'm also puzzled by the lighting. 5hrs seems an awfully short period of time. Was this specifically to control the algae? - yes to try and reduce the algae.

About 6 months ago I had a live sand bed (lots of worms and critters etc) no it appears to be dead. - At this state it was about 1 inch deep

If the star has been in the whole time, that will be the cause. Sand-sifting stars deplete sand beds of their fauna and then frequently risk starvation. If the star was added after the sand bed "died" then that is a curious thing indeed. - I added the sand sifting star fish about 4 months after the sand bed died.

Sorry should have also put that the blue media is acting as a Nitrate factory hence then constant reading.

About 6 months ago I had a live sand bed (lots of worms and critters etc) no it appears to be dead. So no I have started to sifen the sand bed to remove debris (2 x a week)
sand bed is approximately 1cm high. - I did leave the sand bed for 6 months after it died and it did not re-seed, does it take that long or longer to reseed?

I will try removing the blue filter media and just leave the live rock rubble in there instead (at the moment there is two blue filter sponges and lots of live rock rubble)

rcracer20071 said:

I did leave the sand bed for 6 months after it died and it did not re-seed, does it take that long or longer to reseed?

Click to expand...

Yes it will take time, it will help if you can get hold of a couple of cups full of Live Sand for a fellow Reef Keeper.

Here is a better pic of me tank

Nice tank, you could also try some Nitrate Remover http/www.discountedpetproducts.net/DENITRATE_NITRATE_REMOVER_250ML-UKP43886.html but i would do the others first.

Hi,
I have just spent the night warming up my fresh pre-salted ro water. at 25c i just got a reading of 5ppm nitrate - is this acceptable or is this a bad sign that I am putting bad water into my tank?

if you're adding water with nitrates in you're certainly not helping things

a decent RO filter doesn't cost a lot and it definitely worth the investment

Hi,
After everyone has been saying that sponges are nitrate factories, got me thinking, my TMC V2 600 has a massive sponge on the exit pipe to stop bubbles going into my tank, can you folks answer the following questions for me:

1.) should this be removed?

2.) I tried removing it before and bubbles ended up in my tank - is this bad?

3.) In the end, I lifted the sponge just above the water so water flowed through the sponge and then into the tank - would this still cause nitrates?

rcracer20071 said:

Hi,
After everyone has been saying that sponges are nitrate factories, got me thinking, my TMC V2 600 has a massive sponge on the exit pipe to stop bubbles going into my tank, can you folks answer the following questions for me:

1.) should this be removed?

2.) I tried removing it before and bubbles ended up in my tank - is this bad?

3.) In the end, I lifted the sponge just above the water so water flowed through the sponge and then into the tank - would this still cause nitrates?

Click to expand...

this is a very good point as i am strugling at the mo with algae growing on my rock and i have the same skimmer with bubble stop that has the black sponge in it. i have put seachem nitrate remover in my canister filter a couple of days ago so hopefully with kill of algae soon if it is living of nitrates in my tank. oh i also have some rowa phos in filter too

"Nitrate factory" is a term I hate due to the way it is frequently misinterpreted. The reality of situations like this boils down to a very simple thing (ignoring nitrates being added by new water at WCs): you will only end up with as much nitrate as there is waste going into the water in the first place. Sponges and other "nitrate factory" materials are actually helping you avoid having a buildup of ammonia or nitrite. In some cases, sponges and other filter may trap uneaten food that decays instead of being eaten (canisters and HOTBs are often guilty of this if there is no prefilter). This is really the only case where the presence of the sponge or whatever other media is "harming" the system, since it's like throwing food where nothing can eat it. The situation is often cured by the use of prefilters that are cleaned regularly to prevent uneaten food from being sucked away in the first place. Either way, when there is too much nitrate, regardless of the cause, the real issue is that the system is not fully exporting the amount of waste being produced (or added via new water as would seem to be partly the case here). Solutions are to either reduce waste going in or increase exporting capacity. In fact, if you are taking out filter media, you can actually cause ammonia/nitrite spikes if you do it too fast since you're removing part of the biological filter. I'm not going to say you shouldn't remove sponges and replace them with some more useful media like LR rubble or equivalents, but if the majority of your media is made up of things like sponges and bioballs, you could easily cause param swings if you take it out all at once.

Since the new water with low levels of nitrates is coming from a LFS if I read right, you should probably try either mixing your own salt or finding a different source of pre-mixed water that checks out on nitrate. Adding water with nitrate is the only way you get more nitrates than the sum of other waste going into the system.

2.) I tried removing it before and bubbles ended up in my tank - is this bad?

Click to expand...

I don't see anything bubble-averse in your stock list so unless it's literally turning the tank into foam then it's probably just a matter of whether you like how it looks/sounds/etc. with or without the bubbles.

1.) should this be removed?
...
3.) In the end, I lifted the sponge just above the water so water flowed through the sponge and then into the tank - would this still cause nitrates?

Click to expand...

Is there obvious accumulation of debris in the sponge? If so, then it will be decomposing and eventually leading to nitrates as mentioned above (originally starting as excess ammonia). If ther eis debris, make sure to clean it out regularly. If there is no debris, then you will need to look elsewhere for either nitrate exporting solutions (chemical or biological) or find ways to reduce the amount of nutrients going into the tank in the first place.