[GoinSalt]

Just tested my water tonight.

Am 0
Trite 0
Trate 160!!!
PH 8.4
SG 1.025

I have a 100g with skimmer, 60 lbs LR. I also use a wet/dry filter. I clean out the filter pad every time I do a water change, 5% water changes every week, just did a water change Sunday.

What would cause such a spike? When I last tested (2-11) trates were around 20. I only have 5 chromis, 1 coral beauty (about 2-3 inches) and 3peppermint shrimp.

Ive lost a kole tang, yellow tang and regal tang over the past month, but they were relatively new additions and all my parameters were fine at the time.

Could high nitrates have killed the tangs? Can high nitrate trigger ich outbreak? (that's what did in the regal and yellow).

Some of the research I've done here says high nitrates don't kill fish, per se, but it can't be good to be that high.

Any advice/help is greatly appreciated.

Nate

[marxsman]

Thats a tough one, Reeflan would be the best one to answer this, In the past I had a fish die in the tank i did not find that resulted in this.
How old is the tank?
But first, do you have live rock in the tank?
Do you have a live sand bed?

Originally Posted by GoinSalt

Just tested my water tonight.

Am 0
Trite 0
Trate 160!!!
PH 8.4
SG 1.025

I have a 100g with skimmer, 60 lbs LR. I also use a wet/dry filter. I clean out the filter pad every time I do a water change, 5% water changes every week, just did a water change Sunday.

What would cause such a spike? When I last tested (2-11) trates were around 20. I only have 5 chromis, 1 coral beauty (about 2-3 inches) and 3peppermint shrimp.

Ive lost a kole tang, yellow tang and regal tang over the past month, but they were relatively new additions and all my parameters were fine at the time.

Could high nitrates have killed the tangs? Can high nitrate trigger ich outbreak? (that's what did in the regal and yellow).

Some of the research I've done here says high nitrates don't kill fish, per se, but it can't be good to be that high.

Any advice/help is greatly appreciated.

Nate

[GoinSalt]

It has about 60 lbs of LR but not a DSB.

I started the tank in May, crashed in Decemeber and restarted in January. All parameters were at zero -- except trates, which have averaged about 30. Like I said, just a week-and-a-half ago, trates were at 20.

Nate

[marxsman]

did you have any livestock die that you know of, fish or corals even other inverts?

that will cause a spike in trates.
if not you might want to check to see if there are dead animals. what is your feeding habits of the tank?
Cleaning that filter could also be a problem, if it is just the prefilter i don't see a problem but if you are cleaning all the filter you could be destroying all the bacterisa that breaks down the nitrates.

I do recomend doing another water swap but first what kind of water are you putting back in the tank?

Also before you change anything test the water again with clean tubes Etc.
if the test kits are old< i also found that they will result in a "false high reading" I use 2 different kits when I find a parameter off by that much

[GoinSalt]

No dead animals I can see. Like I said, only 5 chromis, coral beauty, 3 peppermint shrimp -- and 10 astrea snails. No corals.

Even if there were dead animals, shouldn't there be a spike in the ammonia and trite as well? A carcass would basically start the cycle over again, no?

I feed a bit of frozen in the morning and a pinch of flake in the evening -- although I've noticed that even the tiniest amount of flake looks like too much. It's a spirulina flake food and it's really finely cut.

All I do is clean the pre-filter, not the bio-balls -- although maybe I should wash off a section of them when I do a water change this weekend.

I use synthetic water with oceanic salt. No RO/DI water. The only other time I've had my trates this high was when my tank crashed and all the other parameters were off the charts.

I actually did re-test just to make sure and it came out the same.

[marxsman]

yes, with the dead animals, there should be an increase in ammonia. so that may not be the problem.

I do not recomend cleaning the bio-balls since the tank is so new. but I do recomend replacing the balls (SLOWLY, over time) with bits and pieces of live rock.

how big is the tank? the filter may not be sufficiant for your tank.

do another water swap if you have the ability tonight.

[GoinSalt]

Like I said, the tank has been running -- continuously -- since May. Even when i had the crash in late december, i still kept everything running. Basically, I've never cleaned the bio-balls in that time. At all.

100 gallon, acrylic tank. As I said earlier, I've never had a trate reading this high since starting the tank in May.

Basically, can you think of any reason for the trates to jump from 20 to 160 in 11 days?

[Reefland]

I'm not sure why they would jump that quickly but...

The bio-media is definitely a problem. The pourous filter media is a trap for waste and if not properly taken care of will lead to a problem just like your having. The problem with bio-media is that this waste build-up requires that they be cleaned, but when you clean them your also effecting the bacteria population that has developed on them. You can see where they are problematic.

If your liverock is of good quality (meaning you have enough liverock to sustain the biological filtration), I would slowly begin removing the bio-media until it was completely gone. The second thing to look at is the source water. Tap water can change quickly depending on what the water company does with it. This could be a problem as well.

[Ninong]

Just a couple of additional points I would like to throw in here:

Most fish will tolerate 100 ppm NO3 without problems but that much nitrate would certainly be detrimental to most corals and other inverts.

If something just recently died in your tank, it may not give you a reading on ammonia, depending on your test kit, because most test kits do not even measure ammonia below 0.5 ppm. Salifert's test kit, for example, does not measure ammonia below 0.5 ppm (believe it or not) -- you have to guess at it by assigning a value to whatever coloration you think you are seeing that is not clear. Their lowest measurement is <0.5 ppm.

So it's possible that if a good sized fish dies in your tank, you could have total ammonia of around 0.2 ppm for a few hours. The ammonia, however, should be very quickly converted to NO2 and NO3. If you're getting a reading of 100 ppm NO3, it's quite likely that your NO2 is at least 0.1 or 0.2 ppm.

If nothing 'large' has died in your tank in the past few days, then your 100 ppm NO3 (if accurate) is just a reflection of your filtration system. Even if you are running a fish-only aquarium, you will want to try to get this down below 40 ppm.

[GoinSalt]

would dirty bio-balls suddenly make the trate number spike within a couple of weeks? Wouldn't/shouldn't I notice a gradual increase?

Also, I notice at the bottom of the wet/dry there is an accumulation of "gunk" -- for lack of a better term. Does this need to be cleaned out? I talked to the lfs and he said it was fine. But you know what they say about lfs...

[GoinSalt]

I currently don't have enough LR to do without the wet/dry. Only about 60 lbs in a 100g tank.

I did a water change Sunday. Should i do another one and wash a portion of the bio-balls?

[Reefland]

60lbs in your 100 gallon tank should be enough liverock to cope with a light bio-load. I would remove the bio-mendia slowly and definitely clean up the detritus that has settled in your sump.

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by GoinSalt

It has about 60 lbs of LR but not a DSB.

Nate

Is the bottom of the tank completely bare or is there some sort of substrate: Crushed coral? Sand? Anything?

Originally Posted by GoinSalt

I currently don't have enough LR to do without the wet/dry. Only about 60 lbs in a 100g tank.

That's enough to do without the wet/dry.

Originally Posted by GoinSalt

I did a water change Sunday. Should i do another one and wash a portion of the bio-balls?

You could do another water change if you feel like it. You could also remove about 1/3 of the bioballs. Then you could remove another 1/3 two weeks later and the last 1/3 two weeks after that.

[GoinSalt]

I just examined the bioballs and there is no accumulation of matter. They look really clean. i do use a floss pad as kind of a prefilter before the overflow water reaches the bioballs. i clean out the pad when i do water changes. Can the pad eventually get so clogged that it could be the problem?

Also, I plan on adding more fish once I get this problem taken care of -- I'm looking at a couple of fire fish, couple of neon gobies, tomato clown, royal gramma and a six-line wrasse. Would that kind of bioload (along with the chromis, coral beauty) be too much for 60 lbs of LR to handle without more filtration?

I have just regular silica playsand on the bottom, about an inch, although on one end of the tank it has piled up in a mound due to the action of the power head. there is about a 4 inch mound and another about 3 inches. Should I smooth those out? could that be causing a problem?

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by GoinSalt

i clean out the pad when i do water changes. Can the pad eventually get so clogged that it could be the problem?

You may need to rinse out the pad twice a week.

Also, I plan on adding more fish once I get this problem taken care of -- I'm looking at a couple of fire fish, couple of neon gobies, tomato clown, royal gramma and a six-line wrasse. Would that kind of bioload (along with the chromis, coral beauty) be too much for 60 lbs of LR to handle without more filtration?

The neon gobies add practically nothing. The fire fish don't add much either. One tomato clown, once she matures, equals about the same as the royal gramma and the six-line put together. BTW, you might have problems putting a royal gramma and a six-line together.

I have just regular silica playsand on the bottom, about an inch, although on one end of the tank it has piled up in a mound due to the action of the power head. there is about a 4 inch mound and another about 3 inches. Should I smooth those out? could that be causing a problem?

I doubt that your sand bed is causing your problems but I'm not the one looking at it. If I were you, I think I would increase the depth of the sand bed so that it is at least 2.5" deep and add some more live rock. Both the sand bed and the live rock process nitrogen but you can't get much out of a 1" deep sand bed. Increase your sand bed to between two to three inches depth so that it can help your live rock with the denitrification chores. Add about 20 lbs more live rock. Gradually remove all of the bioballs.