I have a 100 gallon saltwater fish tank. Been having problems with the ammonia, nitrite, nitrates and PH. So went to war. I did a 20 percent water change. I add cycle everyday and put in a Sea-Lab block No. 28 as needed. A week has passed by run the test again and find out that the test that is still high is the Nitrate. Call the pet store where I do business and they tell me to check my protein skimmer. The protein skimmer is not producing the thick bubbles that in turn will produce the brown waste in the cup. The bubbles are very fine and they do not produced anything as far as waste in the collection cup of the protein skimmer. The brand of the protein skimmer is a Bubble-Manus. I went ahead and purchase at Smart Pet a chemical called Prime by Seachem. It claims it removes Chlorine, Chloramine, Ammonia, Detoxifies Nitrite and Nitrate and added a double dose for the time being. Have 1 blue velvet damsel and 2 dominoes damsels and they seem to be eating well and doing well. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank You
Nitrates and my Protein Skimmer
- Thread starter Rekon
- Start date
ErinCahir
Sausage Wrangler
How big is your tank? How long has it been set up? How often are you feeding?
ErinCahir
Sausage Wrangler
How much live rock do you have?
noy
Reefing newb
Rekon
with 100 lbs of live rock and a tank that's running for 6 months you should have 0 ammonia and nitrites. If you are getting levels - there is something wrong (like dead livestock). Nitrates is a different story.
Can you post your levels?
Prime is a water conditioner that people usually add to water for water changes (if they are not getting RO/DI) to react with the chlorine and chloramine. It also has the effect of binding ammonia/nitrates for a period of time - so its a bit of an emergency measure to keep livestock alive at high levels of ammonia/nitrite and nitrates. It gives you a bit of time (to do a WC for example) to fix the problem.
Your protein skimmer probably needs tuning - they work off a very basic principle so there is no way you shouldn't be skimming. You should be getting "foam" instead of just fine bubble floating to top. There are 3 parameters to adjust your skimmer - level of water in the sump (unless you have a HOB), air intake and water flow control. The air intake is the most important - there should be an adjustment to control the amount of air going into the pump - play with this until you get foaming. if the water level is too high - you may not have enough depth to get the foam going. Also, if you have too much water passing through - it may affect how the skimmer performs. Some of the real basic skimmers may not have a air intake control (think most BM skimmers do though) - you can put in a control valve (like they have for air pumps) to control the intake.
To reduce nitrates - you need some means to export it - like a refugium with macroalgae to consume it or some other bio/chemical means. Post your levels and we can see how much of a problem it is.
with 100 lbs of live rock and a tank that's running for 6 months you should have 0 ammonia and nitrites. If you are getting levels - there is something wrong (like dead livestock). Nitrates is a different story.
Can you post your levels?
Prime is a water conditioner that people usually add to water for water changes (if they are not getting RO/DI) to react with the chlorine and chloramine. It also has the effect of binding ammonia/nitrates for a period of time - so its a bit of an emergency measure to keep livestock alive at high levels of ammonia/nitrite and nitrates. It gives you a bit of time (to do a WC for example) to fix the problem.
Your protein skimmer probably needs tuning - they work off a very basic principle so there is no way you shouldn't be skimming. You should be getting "foam" instead of just fine bubble floating to top. There are 3 parameters to adjust your skimmer - level of water in the sump (unless you have a HOB), air intake and water flow control. The air intake is the most important - there should be an adjustment to control the amount of air going into the pump - play with this until you get foaming. if the water level is too high - you may not have enough depth to get the foam going. Also, if you have too much water passing through - it may affect how the skimmer performs. Some of the real basic skimmers may not have a air intake control (think most BM skimmers do though) - you can put in a control valve (like they have for air pumps) to control the intake.
To reduce nitrates - you need some means to export it - like a refugium with macroalgae to consume it or some other bio/chemical means. Post your levels and we can see how much of a problem it is.
