# PO4 the factor?



## fedge (Mar 4, 2004)

I am currently over-run with hair and some green spot and green slime algae in my 20L

I am TRYING desperatly to achieve a balance of macro nutrients.. but am not sure really what I am doing right or wrong.

This article ( http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Fertilizer/sears-conlin.html ) suggests that I should not dose any phosphates at all.. or minimal(depending on my feeding habits, since phosphate are in fish food). I dose a tiny bit of phosphate (approximately .25 of 1 ml of fleet enema) when the phosphate in Red Sea test kit says .1 or .2... I try to keep Nitrates at about 5.0 or lower.. and JUST started dosing K..(Seachems).. Nitrates bottomed out to 0 for the past two days and I dosed 2 ml about.. of my Kno3 mix (100ml of h20 to 2tsp of kno3)

Should i just ignore the phosphate(let it zero out)and let my baby platies kill and eat the algae to release the phosphate they have in their structures.. or continue to dose it.

I got high light (med high i guess over a 20L) and 20 ppm of CO2...


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## cich (Aug 5, 2003)

no... keep the phosphates between I think it is... 0.5 to 1ppm. It's also part of the important nutrient ballance. Believe it or not, part of my aglea war actually included dosing PO4 heh (along with others to _try_ to get the perfect balance). Letting it reach zero would IMHO create just another imbalance.

--cich


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## amanda huggenkiss (Mar 3, 2004)

I agree with Cich, but you also need to get your nitrates up to 10-20ppm. That, combined with phosphates around .5ppm should help clear up the algae. Or so I hear -- I'm still trying to keep my nitrates up too :icon_conf


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## trenac (Feb 15, 2004)

fedge...You need to keep your readings at a steady 10ppm & 1ppm. You will have to test your readings daily intil you find out how often you need to dose to keep steady amounts of P04/N03. I have to dose N03 every 3 days to keep mine around 10ppm. I have never had to dose P04 mine stays around 1ppm.


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## fedge (Mar 4, 2004)

Well .. ok .. how often do you test for your chems in your tanks..

I really hate doing DAILY tests.. I am starting to get a clue about how the chems are used them WHAM.. it changes and things don't drop off at same rate... this leads me to think that of the macros are getting used more than the other, probably one you can't easily test for I.E. ...K , Ca, Mg or something.. similar

Now.. when my tank grows in more andmore this all will change... I don't like to spend 40 dollars on a bunch of test kits and use them up in 3-4 months .. 

I am HOPING that eventually I can just TELL by looking what my plants need.. Do any of you do this??? and just test once in a while??


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## George Willms (Jul 25, 2003)

I almost never test my water anymore. I found a dosing schedule that works for me and I usually stick with it unless I notice things getting a little whacky and then I'll test.


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## aquaverde (Apr 15, 2003)

Fedge, now is the time when you really will need to do some testing. Once you have found out how to balance your tank and have gotten success, you may not need to, just as George doesn't need to now. But until then, you have your work cut out for you.

What is your current maintenance schedule?


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## trenac (Feb 15, 2004)

Fedge... When I first started dosing nitrates I tested every day intill I found that the nitrates decreased on the 3rd or 4th day. Now I know dosing every 3 days keeps my nitrtaes between 10-12ppm. So at this point I only test maybe once or twice a month for N03.


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## tommyboy22481 (Mar 24, 2004)

Man I must be doing something wrong, I always have tons of nitrate. I can get it to go down if I do a bunch of water changes but 2-3 a week is a little to high maintence for me. Right now I am doing water changes about once a week and my Nitrates are usually around 40ppm.


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## trenac (Feb 15, 2004)

Tommyboy... There is a product called Algone (all natural) that removes nitrate. I have used it in the past and it works great, maybe you should give it a try.


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## tommyboy22481 (Mar 24, 2004)

Humm I might have to look into that. I just removed two black skirt tetras from the tank trying to reduce the bio-load. I might start feeding every other day instead of once a day to see if that helps too. I have 2 medium angels, 2 black skirt tetras and a couple cories in the tank right now, does that sound like an okay stocking level for a 20 gal? (sorry if i'm hijacking this thread!)


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## Geo (May 30, 2003)

Doesn't sound like overstocking to me at all!

In my 7 gallon I have: 5 Pygmy Cories, 2 Ottos, 1 Bamboo Shrimp, 2 Licorice Gouramis, 1 endler and 12 brigittae rasboras.

Nitrates always very low to me, 0-5ppm when I test usually. I don't tend to dose any ferts either. Everytime I do ... algae always rears its ugly head. When I don't dose anything ... that's when all the algae goes away.


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## aquaverde (Apr 15, 2003)

Have you checked your nitrate level out of the tap?


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## trenac (Feb 15, 2004)

Tommyboy... Your stocking levels are fine.


Geo...Thats a lot of fish for a 7G tank. Even one Otto needs at least 10 gallons.


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## tommyboy22481 (Mar 24, 2004)

Yeah should have mentioned that, its under 5ppm. I also use 50/50 tap and RO water for water changes so actual Nitrates added to the tank is pretty low. I use just RO for topoff.


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## corigan (Feb 22, 2004)

trenac said:


> Geo...Thats a lot of fish for a 7G tank. Even one Otto needs at least 10 gallons.


 I have an otto in a 5g and it's got a big belly on it.  It was extremely small and skinny when I added it too. Active all day and does fine.

Matt


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