Cant find the Source???

Lotus53 · 08-09-2004, 08:35 AM

Ok I need some help. My phos is out of controll in my tank and i cant figure out why. My LFSs have no suggestions. I have a 20 Long, backpack skimmer, run phosguard, only feed 1/3 a cube of frozen brine by Hikari once a day, I'm not in bio overload (1 ocellaris, 1 camel shrimp, 1 fungia, 2 serpent stars & misc. crabs & snails). I do regular weekly 5g water changes with daily top offs of RO/DI. I tested my ro/di no phos, tested mixed no phos, test the tank 24 hrs after change and it's still off the scale. All I can think of to do now is mix up 20g of new water and do a 100% water change. Of course I have red slime b/c of the phos (I spent the better part of an hour sucking it off all the live rock with airline tubing yesterday) FUN, FUN! NOT. The phosguard is only run for 3 days then i take it out - i was told it's only good for about 3 day till it starts leaching the phos back in. HELP my poor tank and my fried brain cells on this problem. Thanks from the bottom of my tank.

SPC · 08-09-2004, 09:41 AM

Can you give us a bit more info, Lotus?

Do you have any other type of filtration other than the skimmer?

Sump?

How long has the tank been running?

Where did the rock come from?

How do you keep the detritus from accumulating on the rock, the bottom?

DSB or other type of substrate?

Steve

Alice · 08-09-2004, 10:20 AM

Yup, if the test kits are accurate and you're not importing it with the water, it has to be leaching out from somewhere in the tank.

No new LR in the tank?

You could try an experiment; take a few rocks out of the tank, place them in clean SW that you've taken a phos reading on, then check the phos level again in 24 and 48 hours. If you still get nothing or not much, it's probably the substrate.

Alice

Lotus53 · 08-09-2004, 10:53 AM

Just the skimmer, no sump, no new LR, existing Fiji LR was purchased from LFS i was working for at the time (their tanks were 0 phos), tank was running for a year then we moved to GA its been set up here about 3 months, little detritus (only 1 fish leftover are eaten by the serpents and snails) circulation by a RIO 800, 1 1/2 - 2" of crushed coral on bottom.
Alice - thanks for the suggestion, i'll use that last as my tank only has "a few" large rocks most with shrooms on them.

mantisfreak · 08-09-2004, 12:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lotus53

1 1/2 - 2" of crushed coral on bottom.
Alice - thanks for the suggestion, i'll use that last as my tank only has "a few" large rocks most with shrooms on them.

Phosphate comes out of the LR all the time. However, bacterial pressure pushes it to the surface. That's why turkey basting your LR to blow this into suspension for your skimmer to catch is important.

However, I suspect your CC substrate is due for a good siphoning. If there is a lot of mulm, detritus, uneaten food, etc. then you are going to get excessive Nitrates and Phosphates.

PS....you can substantially lower the amount of Phosphates in your frozen food by soaking it in RO/DI water for an hour before feeding. The RO/DI water will act like a magnet and suck a lot of it out.

SPC · 08-09-2004, 01:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lotus53

1 1/2 - 2" of crushed coral on bottom.

Ah Ha

, was this substrate from your old tank? If so, how exactly was it transferred to Ga. ? How was the L/R transferred?

little detritus (only 1 fish leftover are eaten by the serpents and snails)

...but these animals also produce poop. As Mantis said, bacteria clean out the inside of the L/R for us, but if we overload them, then....

Another thing you might want to consider here is that L/R will shed detritus for many months, even if there are no animals housed with it. With this in mind, you may be able to trace back to a time when your L/R was housed with more animals than it is now, and see that it may still be shedding detritus it accumulated from that earlier time. When your L/R sheds detritus, or when animals produce waste, then much of the resultant detritus will find its way to the bottom of our tanks. If the tank bottom has crushed coral, then you can see how this phosphate producing detritus would be trapped in there.
Steve

mojoreef · 08-09-2004, 01:26 PM

Test the new Saltwater you are making.

Mike

Lotus53 · 08-09-2004, 02:28 PM

thank you for the fish food tip.

LR & CC were transfered in tank water and rinced with lots & lots of clean fresh only RO water upon arrival(CC only). i just diped and sloshed around the LR to get the loose stuff off it.

Do I need to do a 75% - 100% H2O change to get it down? i'm sure my poor fungia & helio are really stressed with the phos >1.0

mantisfreak · 08-09-2004, 03:02 PM

Go to your LFS and get a siphon hose like this http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...&N=2004+113165 and thoroughly clean your CC. While cleaning your substrate, you will need to replace the water lost through the siphoning. You can do a waterchange then.

mojoreef · 08-09-2004, 03:41 PM

Lotus which salt do you use

Mike

512148048 · 08-09-2004, 04:06 PM

well i can tell you it is excess waste and possibly low dkh waht is you dkh read if it is low slime will grow slowly but if no you nee to go threw you sand bed.

Lotus53 · 08-09-2004, 04:34 PM

mojo-
as stated in my original post, i tested straight ro, ro mixed with salt, and the new saltwater 24 hours after a water change in the tank and the only one that showed a phos reading was the tank.

SPC · 08-09-2004, 04:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lotus53

mojo-
as stated in my original post, i tested straight ro, ro mixed with salt, and the new saltwater 24 hours after a water change in the tank and the only one that showed a phos reading was the tank.

Yes Mike, please try and pay closer attention

.

Lotus, one of the problems with CC is that it can actually absorb phospohate. Now, in order for it to be released, some think that it takes a low PH, but IMO bacteria are quite capable of releasing it on their own.
Steve

mojoreef · 08-09-2004, 05:10 PM

LOL sorry Lotus I miss that part of your first post. My bad. How about additives?? anything else you add to the tank?? Carbon?? stuff like that.

Getting old Steve... just getting old

Mike

Lotus53 · 08-09-2004, 07:22 PM

what is IMO Bacteria? I havent been adding anything. no carbon. I need to get this fixed, i will have to start adding iron for my helio (they strip it out of the water for their calcification process). i don't want to loose another helio, it took me months to find this one.