The bacteria approach is interesting..I read Aquaforest NP Pro, produces bacteria that eats the nitrates and then corals eat the bacteria, it isn't the skimmer that removes them, thus allowing the corals to colour up and grow as well. Haven't seen anyone dive into the topic in more detail, but the bacteria approach seems logical and clean
@@ericsfishingadventures4433 isn't Dr Tim's just for cycling and balancing bacteria that uses ammonia in the tank. He covers nitrate consuming bacteria too?
I’ll take nigh nitrates over high po4 anyday. Phospates are the real killer. I have found that you can bottom out po4 and as long as no3 is ok you won’t get Dino. It’s a tight line to walk but I don’t mind no3. No3 is a bitch to drop though and the best way I know is big water changes unlike po4 we have some good options and most almost work too well but no3 is tricky. Don’t sweat it if you are less than 15
Wayne rock: I agree I’ll take high nitrates all day , my nitrates runs at 40, but phosphate I can’t fuck with it’s a killer and I’ve lost a lot of corals because of high phosphate. That’s a struggle for me with my tank right now is keeping it low. Any suggestions?
@@chefjoel21 I always have had kept a bag of chemipure elite in the sump and it has GFO but a small amount of it. It drops higher levels and keeps it low without dropping it too fast like if you where using straight GFO. It might take a few months to get it where you want it but it’s much more gentle on the corals. I change the bag out about every 2 months to keep it working well. Po4 stays at .003 doing this. It also has carbon as a plus but that exhaust it’s self usually before the 1 month mark but the GFO keeps going. It will not effect NO3 which is probably a good thing because you don’t have to worry about both going too low. NO3 is kept in check with ZEOBAK. I use a couple drops every couple weeks. That’s essentially carbon dosing but once again on a smaller scale. There are many other options for carbon dosing of course but I don’t sweat the NO3 till it’s 15+. I wish I could post a tank shot so you can see how my tank looks and you know I am not Bull shitting you. You can always look on R2R under my name if you wanna see what I got
zeolit rocks in reactor works amazing. zeolit removes amonia that cant be broken down to nitrate and it keeps the for rising and if you add refugium macro algae will remove existing nitrate. i used that formula on my skimmer less reef until i switched for skimmer. i switched to skimmer just to raise my ph. now i need to dose nitrate and i needed to dose nitrate when i used zeolit and refugium method
Hanna have a new Nitrate test kit which is much simpler and returns a broader range so worth checking out. Quote of this episode: “Oh Shit what happened to that Blasto?! Ok anyways“ 🤣 keep up the great content March!
Hi March, im interested to know how you maintain the specific gravity level in your tanks when you are constantly removing water when sales are made. Are the tanks topped off with salt water or RODI which would have the affect of lowering SG?
My nitrates run 30 and po4 0.03. I have a 20 gallon water box with 4 fish. Everything looks good and I do a 20% water change every Sunday. What are your thoughts on running a refugium in the middle chamber?
So I need HELP PLEASE.. I inherited a very advanced reef tank from my dad when he passed in 2020 .. it basically self maintained up until a couple months ago when power went out due to storm then not too long after that prob a month +/- My robot vac ran over the power strip and everything was off overnight we lost a lot of our fish with this nitrate spike we were left with our Nemo fish and during a 90% h20 chg found the sea cucumber ... we have mushrooms and some anenamie (i believe thier called the nemo home and similar to the mushrooms) sorry I'm still learning.... but since the 90% h20 chg I've been religiously cleanin the sand and doing that with recycling the tanks own water & using the nitrate treatment solution per its suggested schedule as I'm not confident doin full h20 chgs myself yet... yesterday my sea cucumber came out of the sand and now is super tiny not moving on the top of the sand in the corner of the tank... pls help how do I get these nitrates back down asap I do not want to loose this tank 😢
Mines sitting at 40ppm so I started up my fuge with some chaeto to help bring them back down, I have to do a water change later too. I have some GHA on my rocks but it’s starting to clear up now.
@@Messier87_M87 no, all my corals are bright and they seem to be thriving and growing, two of my large frogspawn colonies have splitting heads and new branches growing.
It crazy I been seeing the opposite lately with people running high nutrient tanks with crazy success… seems like the low nutrient days are over with .. the color and growth in high nitrate and phos tanks are crazy
Only thing you'll get with high phosphates is terrible algae. Best way to increase your phosphates? Use tap water. You'll have 95% less nuisance algae by starting your tank and maintaining it with RODI.
When I used cotton gauze pad as mechanical filtration for my pico the nitrate was almost always zero. But the ph was always low. Until a day I realized how cutton breaking down by bacteria actually inadvertently act as carbon dosing. The lowering effect happens in three days when new cutton filter was added. But I have to stop using it because it really brings down the ph and end up killing acropora. And other corals don't grow either except for montiporas.
Don't forget that marine fish excrete ammonia through their respiratory process, quite a bit more than most people actually understand or even know about, just a quick tip.
My nitrates are 0, phosphates .02, tanks 10 weeks old no water change since set up, 15 fish, 20 snails, 1 long spine urchin and a starfish. I used 80 maxspec bio balls that were from my old old system, 3 bottles of dr Tim’s one and only. I did a fish/dr Tim’s cycling with mollys. Ugly stage lasted a week.
I have found that low nitrates can make your phosphates stay elevated even as you carbon dose. Nitrates help in phosphate reduction, at least, naturally using bacteria. If you use a media then you are doing it chemically and nitrates are irrelevant to the process.
Are you like in my mind dude?! Like most of your videos when you release them..are things I am going through WTF! Or maybe it is because I just started a new tank and your videos are just timely as you are also running new tanks...but f*** it! I'll go with you in my mind.
Beautiful clean and well layed out store! If I lived closer to you I would buy from you! Bob
Have you tried the new Hanna High Range Nitrate Tester? Way easier to use than the Low Range one.
Saw your crashed tank as first video yesterday, sad to see it as its former glory... subbed now though, well deserved!
Thanks March this video has been a great help 👍
What is a light you would recommend for growing chaeto that isn't expensive?
I've tried all techniques over the years. By far the most effective is a sulfur denitrator. Especially if you want to overstock.
That would be an awesome video. Talking about how and why more matured tanks are easier to keep stable and bio diversity.
Another great vid..how about a vid on the difference between wet and dry skim and advantages of both methods?
The bacteria approach is interesting..I read Aquaforest NP Pro, produces bacteria that eats the nitrates and then corals eat the bacteria, it isn't the skimmer that removes them, thus allowing the corals to colour up and grow as well. Haven't seen anyone dive into the topic in more detail, but the bacteria approach seems logical and clean
Check out Dr Tim's channel he has endless information about these topics, by far a must watch channel!
@@ericsfishingadventures4433 isn't Dr Tim's just for cycling and balancing bacteria that uses ammonia in the tank. He covers nitrate consuming bacteria too?
@Fragbox Corals why are canister filters not recommended for reef tanks?
I’ll take nigh nitrates over high po4 anyday. Phospates are the real killer. I have found that you can bottom out po4 and as long as no3 is ok you won’t get Dino. It’s a tight line to walk but I don’t mind no3. No3 is a bitch to drop though and the best way I know is big water changes unlike po4 we have some good options and most almost work too well but no3 is tricky. Don’t sweat it if you are less than 15
Wayne rock: I agree I’ll take high nitrates all day , my nitrates runs at 40, but phosphate I can’t fuck with it’s a killer and I’ve lost a lot of corals because of high phosphate.
That’s a struggle for me with my tank right now is keeping it low.
Any suggestions?
@@chefjoel21 I always have had kept a bag of chemipure elite in the sump and it has GFO but a small amount of it. It drops higher levels and keeps it low without dropping it too fast like if you where using straight GFO. It might take a few months to get it where you want it but it’s much more gentle on the corals. I change the bag out about every 2 months to keep it working well. Po4 stays at .003 doing this. It also has carbon as a plus but that exhaust it’s self usually before the 1 month mark but the GFO keeps going. It will not effect NO3 which is probably a good thing because you don’t have to worry about both going too low. NO3 is kept in check with ZEOBAK. I use a couple drops every couple weeks. That’s essentially carbon dosing but once again on a smaller scale. There are many other options for carbon dosing of course but I don’t sweat the NO3 till it’s 15+. I wish I could post a tank shot so you can see how my tank looks and you know I am not Bull shitting you. You can always look on R2R under my name if you wanna see what I got
@@Waynerock77 thanks brother that helps a lot and I appreciate it I’ll definitely check you out maybe I’ll share a picture of my tank also.
@chefjoel21 dr Tim's waste away it dropped my phosphates, but before you dose make sure you have a clean filter pad to work 💯
Microbactor7 and reef fuel. Run fuge light a lil longer. Works like a charm. Or thrown some clams in.
zeolit rocks in reactor works amazing. zeolit removes amonia that cant be broken down to nitrate and it keeps the for rising and if you add refugium macro algae will remove existing nitrate. i used that formula on my skimmer less reef until i switched for skimmer. i switched to skimmer just to raise my ph. now i need to dose nitrate and i needed to dose nitrate when i used zeolit and refugium method
Hanna have a new Nitrate test kit which is much simpler and returns a broader range so worth checking out.
Quote of this episode: “Oh Shit what happened to that Blasto?! Ok anyways“ 🤣 keep up the great content March!
Hi March, im interested to know how you maintain the specific gravity level in your tanks when you are constantly removing water when sales are made. Are the tanks topped off with salt water or RODI which would have the affect of lowering SG?
I have 50ppm in my 65g mix reef. I dont have any algae prob and corals are growing. I’m confused.
Where can I find that Vitalis food ? I am in the United States .
My nitrates run 30 and po4 0.03. I have a 20 gallon water box with 4 fish. Everything looks good and I do a 20% water change every Sunday. What are your thoughts on running a refugium in the middle chamber?
In the same vein as refugiums but more efficient and space saving is an Algae turf scrubber. Greetings from the Caribbean March.
So I need HELP PLEASE.. I inherited a very advanced reef tank from my dad when he passed in 2020 .. it basically self maintained up until a couple months ago when power went out due to storm then not too long after that prob a month +/- My robot vac ran over the power strip and everything was off overnight we lost a lot of our fish with this nitrate spike we were left with our Nemo fish and during a 90% h20 chg found the sea cucumber ... we have mushrooms and some anenamie (i believe thier called the nemo home and similar to the mushrooms) sorry I'm still learning.... but since the 90% h20 chg I've been religiously cleanin the sand and doing that with recycling the tanks own water & using the nitrate treatment solution per its suggested schedule as I'm not confident doin full h20 chgs myself yet... yesterday my sea cucumber came out of the sand and now is super tiny not moving on the top of the sand in the corner of the tank... pls help how do I get these nitrates back down asap I do not want to loose this tank 😢
Mines sitting at 40ppm so I started up my fuge with some chaeto to help bring them back down, I have to do a water change later too. I have some GHA on my rocks but it’s starting to clear up now.
How much has it dropped since starting the fuge?
Did you notice any browning in your corals with the 40ppm nitrate?
@@Messier87_M87 no, all my corals are bright and they seem to be thriving and growing, two of my large frogspawn colonies have splitting heads and new branches growing.
@@rudra7615 fuge hasn’t been running long enough to have much of an effect, been running for a week now.
It crazy I been seeing the opposite lately with people running high nutrient tanks with crazy success… seems like the low nutrient days are over with .. the color and growth in high nitrate and phos tanks are crazy
Only thing you'll get with high phosphates is terrible algae. Best way to increase your phosphates? Use tap water. You'll have 95% less nuisance algae by starting your tank and maintaining it with RODI.
March Hanna has a New nitrate test kit out very easy to do ,just tear the packet and read 👍😄🏴
When I used cotton gauze pad as mechanical filtration for my pico the nitrate was almost always zero. But the ph was always low. Until a day I realized how cutton breaking down by bacteria actually inadvertently act as carbon dosing. The lowering effect happens in three days when new cutton filter was added. But I have to stop using it because it really brings down the ph and end up killing acropora. And other corals don't grow either except for montiporas.
Definitely make a video on how to lower phosphate.
How to reduce algae on glass . Or best algae cleaner
Great info! 😑 My nitrates with Salifert are 2 ppm., And I do have a light amount brown algae on the rocks. Maybe that's why.
What happened to the blasto?
can a 100 skimmer kept up a 125 tank
do a video on controlling ammonia
In an established tank we don't control for ammonia
Don't forget that marine fish excrete ammonia through their respiratory process, quite a bit more than most people actually understand or even know about, just a quick tip.
My nitrates are 0, phosphates .02, tanks 10 weeks old no water change since set up, 15 fish, 20 snails, 1 long spine urchin and a starfish.
I used 80 maxspec bio balls that were from my old old system, 3 bottles of dr Tim’s one and only. I did a fish/dr Tim’s cycling with mollys. Ugly stage lasted a week.
nitrates are 0? Something is gonna blow up in your tank bro
sugar dosing or NitratR
How to lower phosphate?
Show us the basement 😉
I have found that low nitrates can make your phosphates stay elevated even as you carbon dose. Nitrates help in phosphate reduction, at least, naturally using bacteria. If you use a media then you are doing it chemically and nitrates are irrelevant to the process.
Sounds like many of your viewers are running at close to 0. Lots of peeps having trouble with Xenia from yesterday's video about keeping Xenia.
I AM STRUGGLING TO RAISE NO3.
The redsea nopox have lower price in canada .
Lamotte nitrate tester waaayyyyy better than salifert
You are in video mode! Better write these ideas down.
I couldn’t watch. Made me dizzy moving around.
Are you like in my mind dude?! Like most of your videos when you release them..are things I am going through
WTF!
Or maybe it is because I just started a new tank and your videos are just timely as you are also running new tanks...but f*** it! I'll go with you in my mind.
Get to the point