- Location
- Yonkers
Im having a problem dropping my nitrates. I do 5gal weekly water changes and 10 gal every 3-4 weeks. I use denitrate in my canister but it doesnt seem to drop below 20. everything is living and healthy. any suggestions?
nitrate prob
- Thread starter dabadguyswon86
- Start date
- Location
- The Big City
Looking at your setup, for starter I would get a better skimmer, that will help. Also you need to make sure that you're cleaning out the canister filter, at that could be causing the nitrates in the tank. Using Crushed coral can be a problem too, as unlike sand, which is fine and hard for things to get trapped, like food and waste, things can get trapped with Crushed coral, which can cause nitrates. So you need to vacuum the Crushed coral.
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Also that's a lot of fish in a 55, you have 19 fish in there. That is a big bio-load and 60 lbs of live rock is on the light side for enough bacteria to live to handle that bio-load. If you could add a sump onto your tank it would also help as it would add more water volume.
Yeah I agree with marrone. I had the same skimmer you have and I had the same problem. I would do approx 15 gallon water change a week and within 2 or 3 days back to 20ppm. I couldn't believe the difference between the skimmers. My sea clone would produce this light brown watery skinmate. When I got the vertex skimmer within the first 3 days it pulled out this dark brown goo which made me gag. I would suggest till you are able to upgrade do more frequent water changes, maybe get some chaeto, and watch how you feed. hope this helps
- Location
- Yonkers
sorry there arent 12 firefish there are only 2 thanks for pointng that out. I usuall change the filter once a month. I keep the water change the carbon, nitrate and phosban. I dump the crap at bottom of filter. I was looking into a better skimmer, but for now it is gonna have to do. appreciate the suggestions. i also do a pretty thorough job vacuuming the coral. i will try larger weekly water changes
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- Location
- Yonkers
eventually i will build my sump and get rid of the canister.
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