Help me with my nitrites!!!

[New65Reefer]

So my 65H is almost five months old now and I added a new fish about two weeks ago. So I now have four fish, three of which have been in the tank for almost four months. There is also a shrimp, long spine urchin and a clean up crew. I have stuff popping up all over the 110 lbs of live rock that started the tank (worms, dusters, bivalves, tunicates...). Coralline growth is going well too. I feed three times a day using Formula I, frozen brine and SeaWeed Selects.

So I have had this ongoing nitrite problem. Using the higher sensitivity method on my Salifert NO2 kit, my nitrites have never gone to zero. They got close...0.04, but never zero. And now they are up to 0.1 after months at 0.04. Can anyone tell me what in the world is going on here? Will they ever go to zero? Will these low levels bother my tank's inhabitants?

Thanks

 

[Lunchbucket]

mine always reads a little. i don't think they would ever have to reach zero. some nitrates are good for corline and other critters growth. just don't let them get high and out of hand

if you are worried get a refugium started w/ some macro algea (calupra) that should eat up some nitrates

later
Lunchbucket

 

[Pirate]

Just out of curiosity have you tested with another brand of test kit ? I know that they vary greatly. I recently lost a few fish and purchased a new Salifert kit for ammonia. It has always read o. But when a fellow reefer tested with his Red Sea kit we found that the ammonia level was to deadly levels in my tank. I now use a variety of kits and take the average.

 

[New65Reefer]

Hey Lunch

My nitrates are fine at 1-2ppm. They fell from off the top end of the scale during the cycle to nearly zero.

But how about my NITRITES?

 

[reefworm]

New65,
Of what does your substrate consist? Are you skimming? 110# of liverock should certainly be sufficient. My only guess is not enough bacteria/sand fauna in the substrate, but that's only a guess. The heavy feeding you're doing - great for your inhabitants, might at this point be overloading your natural filtration. Part of my reasoning is also related to the fact that you added three fish after one month. That may have been a bit premature - it is hard to wait, isn't it

I would agree w/Lunchbucket that those levels are not worrisome, but I'm sure they are annoying, esp. when you see them going up. For now I would ease up on adding any new inhabitants and allow your natural filtration to continue growing. Things may resolve on their own. The refugium is not a bad idea.
HTH

regards,
rw

 

[New65Reefer]

I have CC substrate and an EV90 skimming the crap out.

I try not to over feed, but then the inhabitants do like it.

And I just had to add something to my tank full of rock. But that was like almost four months ago. Everything has tested fine since, except the nitrite.

So now I have made one recent addition and it should be the last. Can't see my 65H holding much more. My plan is to let the tank mature two or three more months then ease into corals or maybe an anenome. After I get flamed in this thread, I will probably be shamed into waiting longer.

 

[2poor2reef]

That sounds right to me. Feeding very heavily, overloading the filter all at once, and insufficient sand bed infauna to clean up after feeding will give you small persistent nitrite readings until something increases to soak up the nutrients. And you know what that is likely to be.

 

[2poor2reef]

Whoops, posted on top of you. Add to the list a cc substrate instead of sand bed. That makes it more difficult to clean up after feeding. IME it is very hard to feed heavily with a cc substrate without having the problem you mention.