High Nitrate

I can't find my bulb online for my chaeto, but I get mine from Walmart, and it's around $9 or something -- Brinks brand, 26W CLF flood bulb, equivalent to 100W (1400 lumens, 6400K). My chaeto grew like crazy when I put this in.


puttycat said:
Why not just leave the light on 24/7, it's only 23 watts.Bulb will last longer, the off/on kills the cf bulbs pretty quick. I'll toss you a carbon credit so its all good :Cheers:
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Actually, when I left it on 24/7, I would go through a bulb a month practically. When I switched to on/off, it lasted longer (I've used the same one for 6 months now since doing on/off). But having it go on/off did slow down the growth.
 
I'm on the same bulb for 18 months now, still growing like crazy. Everyone's experience seems to be different. I had a bunch of CF bulbs around the house that started to drive me crazy, I would turn on the light and is was like using a candle for about 10 minutes before it would fully light. am getting some new strange looking algae in the last month so I think it might be time to replace. the bulb.

Anyone try one of the LED spotlight type bulbs? They have them at Costco.
 
I also found that my sand bed may have something to do with it. Seems (and I knew this) that there is a point that the sand bed can be detrimental, meaning it is either not shallow enough, or not deep enough. Mine is about 2" deep. I was told by my LFS owner that I should go to a 4" deep bed, or down to about a 1/2" bed.
 
U4BOYZ said:
How did you get flow UNDER the rock?

I have a good size ball of chaeto. How long do you leave your grow light on for a day?

I also have 1 1/2 lbs of live rock per gallon...so I guess I'm all set there.

Question: I think I have my tank overstocked. Will getting more LR help? I could add some to the sump. Does extra LR help if you have too many fish? Thanks.
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I propped the LR up on small sections of PVC pipe so there is open space under the rock then I put a Koralia 1 in the back corner pushing water under the rock. If you do this ensure the rock is stable --you don't want a glass breaking avalanche.

I have two 20 watt halogens on my cheato about 10 to 12 hours a day. Warning -the halogens run hot.

LR is an excellent filter -add up to 2lbs per gallon of the tank's capacity.

You can overstock to the point that nothing will help you but you might try adding a good fractionating skimmer that has double or triple the capacity of your tank. Skimmers are pricey.
 
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Also, you could setup a really huge fuge! If you have a one hundred and add a one hundred fuge --you've doubled stocking capacity.
 
sen5241b said:
Also, you could setup a really huge fuge! If you have a one hundred and add a one hundred fuge --you've doubled stocking capacity.
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It's interesting you should say that. My LFS set-up my tank for me...and has yet to set up my fuge. He wants to do it now....but I've spent so much $ already, I was trying to wait. Maybe I should bite the bullet and do it now....? Hmmmmmm...Will it help bring my nitrates down?
 
if you grow macro algae in it, and if it's adding more volume to your tank, and you maybe even put in a DSB and/or some live rock.... yes.
 
fastrd400 said:
I also found that my sand bed may have something to do with it. Seems (and I knew this) that there is a point that the sand bed can be detrimental, meaning it is either not shallow enough, or not deep enough. Mine is about 2" deep. I was told by my LFS owner that I should go to a 4" deep bed, or down to about a 1/2" bed.
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This was acutally one of my nitrate problems in my fuge. It wasn't deep enough to be a DSB, and too deep to be an effective regular sand bed. One of the changes I made during my algae war was to remove most of that sand. My nitrates are better now. :twocents:
 
U4BOYZ said:
It's interesting you should say that. My LFS set-up my tank for me...and has yet to set up my fuge. He wants to do it now....but I've spent so much $ already, I was trying to wait. Maybe I should bite the bullet and do it now....? Hmmmmmm...Will it help bring my nitrates down?
Click to expand...


You could make your own fuge for cheap. Get a plastic bin at target and hang lights over it. My fuge is 10% the size of the main display and it does the job.
 
Well...I stirred up 1/2 of my sand bed...and my nitrates are now 25mg! What was my nitrate level before I stirred? I have no idea. Didn't think of it until later. :(
 
I use two 23 watt CFL bulbs over my fuge. They run 24/7, and have been running since August. Wonton, if yours burned out in a month, there is something wrong!
 
I forgot I did have one CF burn out prematurely but I dropped the light in the sump. One of my many blunders
 
Well after a week, I did change out my sump light. I put in a 23 watt CFL, and let her rip. Did my normal water change, this time vacuuming the sand bed. Tested the water after 4 days and the Nitrates are cut in half, down to 10. I did over the weekend pick up some Bio-Fuel and have been adding that since Monday. It is designed and supposed to help in the depletion of Nitrates, so we'll see. Oh, I also have a huge algae outbreak in my sump now due to the stronger light, LOL.
 
Yup, I just shut the light down for a couple days. Will start it back up on a reverse schedule tomorrow. Funny thing is my Phodphates tested out at 0. But as long as it stays were it is, I'm good with that.
 
they will show zero but most of the time that is becasue the alage use the po4 and nitrates within seconds of it being in the water so it is not that accurate of a test
 
Oh man, why you gotta go pissing in my Cherrios like that? I also had someone tell me that my sand bed was not deep enough, and that was the reason for the Nitrates always being as high as they were.
 
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