Nitrates going through the roof....

Bored4ever86 · Apr 20, 2010

So I've got my 180 cycling (its been up for about 2months) with about 200lbs of live rock (from my 125 +more from another reefer), and 3 damsels. The ammonia rose and fell, the nitrite rose and fell, but the nitrates just keep rising.

I did a 12ish% water change last week, brought the nitrates down from around 100 (took some water to petco to waste their testing supplies and tested myself) to like 50 (not sure its been a while) then I retested a couple days ago (yesterday I retested again) and all seemed good as it was down to 5-10.

Today I retest expecting 0 or close to it... its back over 100. I did very little to the tank other than add some more top off water (rodi) and once a day feeding the damsels with formula 1 or 2, a small pinch of one or the other the small pellet kind. I'm not over feeding the tank, the damsels shouldn't be producing a ton of waste (2 are about 1in the other is about 1.75in), and the rocks came from established tanks. Other than changing the lights (went from 1 T-5 to 6 HO T-5's sunday night) nothing has really changed.

Anyone got any clues as to why the cycle is taking so much longer than my 125, and why the nitrates are skyrocketing?

BTW using api test kits, confirmed that they aren't bad by the petco tests (I'll prob have them reconfirmed by another source this week)

iroll253 · Apr 20, 2010

Faulty test kit?

thatguy559 · Apr 20, 2010

test your input water then test your water again 24 hours later after you added it to the tank. if thats good then i would do a 40% water change.

Bored4ever86 · Apr 20, 2010

Tested input water, 0 nitrates. I'll do a 55gal water change tomorrow

jrgilles · Apr 20, 2010

Well, its not coming from nowhere...

Maybe look through everything in your system, are there any filter pads that need cleaning? Sponges, etc in the sump? Canister filter have a nitrate trap? Anything in the overflows?

Did you use old sand/crushed coral from your other tanks and just transfer it over, where maybe that is dumping nitrates into the water? If it is recycled, maybe you want to either rinse really well or replace 90% of it?

Something large and dead in your tank that is out of sight, rotting and putting nitrates into the water? Something rotting in the sump?

Maybe mass plant die off dumping all their accumulated nitrates?

I'd carefully check all the tubes, chambers, etc. for anything that could be dead or acting as a nitrate trap. Remove all filter media, etc.

FreakinReefin · Apr 20, 2010

I can almost promise you that it is die off from your rocks. Live rock, as opposed to base rock, is more than likely going to have higher issues with nitrates during a move like that simply because they are "live." If any changes kill even just a small amount of the bacteria, or whatever else may be in the rock, than you are going to see huge spikes like that. Your best bet is doing consistent water changes(I hope you didn't just do one 12% change in 2 months) and using a good tank starting bacteria like MicroBacter to take the tank back down to a low-nutrient system. Trust me it works better than you can imagine.