Phosphate reduction

R

rudedogg

New Member
Hey all...I recently purchased an up and running nanoreef tank(45 gallon O'Dell) system. I posted a couple questions earlier and a link to a video of the tank. Ive got about 12 soft/leather corals and 5 small fish, plus the C.U.P crew: urchins,snails, Hermits satrfish. ANYWAY...After moving the tank and stirring everything up, i had an algea bloom, Nitrates were at 50!!! Phosphates at 1ppm. After a few water changes...ive got the Nitrates to about .5 ppm and seem to be resolving itself now. i upgraded the lighting with the addition of some t5 H.Os with 6400k bulbs, and then upgraded those to 10,000k. Algea is SLOWLY dying off. The problem is that the Phosphate level is still at about .5 to 1 ppm....Will that resolve or should i still be doing big water changes?? Im a newbie to reef tanks but experienced fishkeeper so please excuse my ignorance. Oh yea..calcium is all good too

Thanx
john
 
rmlevasseur

rmlevasseur

Active Member
If you feed, you are always going to introduce phosphate. It is a nutrient essential to life. Unfortunately, life only needs so much, lol. Best way to reduce is to wash/rinse all food. Running chaeto or alage scrubber is a highly efficient and cheap way to use up the phosphate, and running granulated ferric oxide in a simple reactor also works very well.

Available phosphate can also be absorbed by rock and sand, and later re-released into the water. Do a search on "cooking" rock if you suspect that your rock is too phosphate laden.
 
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