When The Nitrates Are Gone

[Donya]

I gather that the nitrogen cycle is finished, but I don't know what it means about the situation of my LR and what I can do or add at this point. I'd like to add some plants or macro algae. There were very low levels of nitrate until I added my "pico-skimmer", so I'm wondering:

- If I were to add a macro algae or plant, would it get enough nutrients?
- Is the skimmer doing the LR a diservice by taking away the last remnants of nitrate?

 

[steelhealr]

Hi..skimmers don't remove nitrates. They can remove dissolved organis which can break down into nitrates. Important to understand because if your nitrates are 20, skimming is, in the immediate moment, not as important as a water change.

Macroalgaes are photosythetic. They benefit from nutrients but can survive for a time with good lighting. I forgot what type of tank you are keeping but remember that some macros can take over the LR. I you used precured...and ammonia and nitrite are zero and you have some nitrates, you are most likely cycled. If you haven't already done your first water change, you should, 25%, then 10% weekly thereafter. I wouldn't add anything unless the nitrates are <10. SH

 

[Donya]

Doh! ok so that should have been phrased "skimming away the rest of the stuff that turns into nitrate." Sorry about that, thanks for the correction. The nitrates were definitely less than 20 before I put the skimmer on; they have always been very low because I was trying to keep veliger larvae alive (made water changes very interesting/difficult). Nitrates are now 0 since skimming started.

Are some species of macro worse than others for takeovers?

EDIT: forgot to add, I did read the red macro algae takeover thread, but the macros that I've seen available are green and generally pretty different.

 

[Navarre]

You are going to need something in that tank to produce waste materials for the nitrogen process to continue and allow the algaes to flourish. It seesm like you are more interested in the algaes and inverts than fish which is fine but a few snails and crabs wont make any impact on the bioloads and thus wont make much food for the algaes..

I would recomend you purchase a small goby, a citrus goby or perhaps a bicolour blenny. They are harmless and remain very small. They will produice just enough nutrients for your nitrogen cycle to continue.

You meantion that your nitrates were low by being below 20. In freshwater this might seem low but for marines this is really quite high. I would say that to have low nitrates you are looking to have them below 5.

Now of course you are faced with a problem...

Algaes dont thrive well in low nutrients so low nitrates will inhibit their growth. If you have high nitrates then some inverts and larvea wont thrive well. Im afraid this is where the fine balancing come into play. I would aim for nitrates around 5-7 and add a blenny/goby to help with this. Your algaes should help keep nitrates stable and with the tank being low stocked then you should be fine.

 

[Donya]

I don't really have a "fish thumb" I also was under the impression that fish in anything smaller than 10gal was iffy, and mine is a 5gal pico mainly to the end of studying one genus of Nerite...had kinda planned on invert-only. I was wondering about a species of turbo, since they eat a lot, unlike my Nerites. Is the nutrient level something that can be solved without using fish, or is the fish slot in a marine ecosystem hard to fill with inverts?

Not enough nutrients is a new problem to me since fw snails always produce too much in that department lol.

 

[Navarre]

Well its the opposite way around for marines. Basically you canfill a tank with inverst without it doing any impact to your peramters. Ok if you dont want to keep fish at all then i would suggest feeding the tank very small amounts on a regual basis. The crabs and snails will pick this up of course but some is bound to slip past and cause the tank to continue its nitrogen cycle. Just remember, the lower your nitrates the slower your algaes will grow as they need light and nutrients for this

 

[Donya]

Too bad there isn't such a thing as a saltwater apple snail, that would solve it in no time

After looking into the tank this evening and going "hey where are all my snails?" I'm convinced though. If everything can hide in the rocks it's probably not doing a lot to the filtration...and those snails really are extreemly small. I'll see how it stands for a while trying the food tactic and read up on mini fish. Thanks for the help on this!

 

[stegoodall]

ignore this if im wrong because im just guessing. could you add pure ammonia like when cycling freshwater tanks? sorry if its wrong im just guessing

 

[Donya]

I'd be worried about doing that given inverts' sensitivity to ammonia levels. Unless it was an extreemly slow drip line of dilute solution (which I can't do), it would give ammonia spikes periodically...which could turn into a small amonia spike followed by a small nitrite spike before I get nitrate on the other end. I don't know whether that would actually happen or not, but I don't really want to risk it.

I think I may have it solved though...time will tell, but it appears to be going the right direction. I added a different, larger snail species, got a small nitrate blip on the test kit, and put some macro algae in. I'm going to watch it closely the next few days and see if the macro grows a bit--if not I will move it out temporarily and supliment it while I find a better solution. I'm still considering one of those yellow gobies, but finding one could be an issue...no place locally seems to have small marine fish.

 

[stegoodall]

ok.

good luck with your project

 

[Donya]

Been looking at pictures of other macro algae...The stuff I got is about half Caulerpa just my luck I have issues not having enough nitrates and then I get aquatic kudzu.

 

[sammydee]

Hey.

Just adding a flake or two each day will keep the nitrogen cycle going as the flakes are decomposed by bacteria. Putting nutrients in is not a problem - whether the flakes are eaten or not, the same amount of ammonia/nitrite/nitrate is put into the tank. It's getting the nitrate OUT of the tank that most people find hard .

Sam

 

[Donya]

I have always been feeding the snails. The main species I have is an extreemly picky eater, and there isn't enough soft algae stuff growing in the tank yet for it to survive just by foraging. I also hand-feed my Margarites snail some dried seaweed each day to try to keep it from chewing on the powerhead's sponge intake guard. Yeah I know I'm a wierdo hand-feeding snails