Nitrate

Dude, You're being a d**k. The guy asked how to reduce high nitrates. Several of us offered ways to do it. He did not ask for anyone's opinoin as to if his level was too high or not. It's up to him to decide if he wants to take action or not. Get off you high horse.

First of all, you aren't even a member so don't try to come at a paying member of 10+ years when you are too cheap to pay $20 to support the club.

Not knowing if there is a problem before giving "solutions" is absurd. Not surprising given what I read in some other threads. I'll probably go back to mainly lurking like 95% of the members here that actually know what they are doing.

Your vinegar dosing advice was great! Sure, the OP said he had high nitrates - even though after all of this we still don't even know if he does - but he said nothing of phosphates...so YOUR advice of vinegar dosing was particularly bad since it won't do anything for nitrates without enough phosphates.

Finally, the OP was also advised to go and purchase new equipment by someone else before we even know if he has high nitrates.

I know reading comprehension is difficult, but I never said giving the solution to high nitrate was a problem. I said that telling someone to take action on a potential problem we don't even know exists is irresponsible. The OP started taking action based on this advice, which could cause more problems. Then some snowflakes were triggered for being called irresponsible - which they were, and now here we are...and we still don't know what his nitrate level is!

P.S. You say it's up to the OP to decide whether he wants to take action or not...that is true. But since he recently joined the forum and based on his question, one might deduce he is newer to the hobby, although we don't know. Again, it's irresponsible for more experienced people to dole out advice before knowing if there is a problem because a newer person will often defer to someone with more experience. This just bolsters my argument that we should have waited for an answer on what the nitrate levels are.
 
I totally agree with getting a specific number for the nitrates before getting advice that's why I asked up front. A FOWLR can handle a pretty high nitrate level and it might be totally fine if the fish and everything look fine. I was running a "successful" reef tank at a nitrate reading of 20-30 when it was brand new and at one point had a FOWLR with something like a nitrate reading of 80-100 with no issues...
 
For a fish only tank, nitrate level is not that critical. So fish only tank can have nitrate up to 200 ppm without issue for the fish. Normally algae becomes a problem with high nitrate tank.
If the nitrate is below 50 ppm for a fish only tank and there is no algae problem, I would say hust leave it alone.


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I suggest dose Chateau Margaux 2010 Bordeaux, it is more effective.


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Your vinegar dosing advice was great! Sure, the OP said he had high nitrates - even though after all of this we still don't even know if he does - but he said nothing of phosphates...so YOUR advice of vinegar dosing was particularly bad since it won't do anything for nitrates without enough phosphates.
.

This has not been my experience in the 12 years that I have been using this method. It also contradicts all the white papers that I can find regarding the subject. Can you please enlighten me on this? At what value do phosphates levels start to interfere the with the effectiveness of carbon dosing?
 
This has not been my experience in the 12 years that I have been using this method. It also contradicts all the white papers that I can find regarding the subject. Can you please enlighten me on this? At what value do phosphates levels start to interfere the with the effectiveness of carbon dosing?

Because we don't know the levels of nitrate or phosphate, we don't know whether or not vinegar dosing will work or be beneficial. If the OP has truly zero phosphate - however unlikely that may be, but again, we don't know - the carbon dosing isn't going to be very effective, is it? Maybe I am wrong. Perhaps you can forward the white papers you claim to have read so I can look at them. Or maybe the PhD chemist that's in the thread can critique and analyze them.

But for the 800th time, the criticism was giving about giving advice to reduce nitrate before knowing the actual nitrate levels.

Carbon dosing isn't exactly risk-free either, which is why you don't do it when there isn't a problem. You don't introduce the potential for harm when you don't know if there is a corresponding benefit that outweighs the risk. If you can't grasp this concept, you aren't worth having a discussion with because it won't be reasonable.

Other people have subsequently agreed that we should actually wait for data - extremely experienced reefers and aquarists.

You should probably just let this go.
 
Here is a Ph.D's writing on the subject: http://www.reefedition.com/phosphate-in-the-reef-aquarium-by-randy-holmes-farley/

His methodology is here: http://reefkeeping.com/joomla/index...ar-dosing-methodology-for-the-marine-aquarium

He has several other papers published that go into greater detail. Some even that agree with the statement that fish can handle well over 100ppm of nitrate. Interestingly enough, the same paper speaks of the long-term toxicity effects on metabolism in fish with nitrates levels as low as 50ppm here: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-06/rhf/index.php

It really doesn't matter if the OP's level is, based on your opinion, too high or not. If he decides to lower the level, carbon dosing will lower nitrate, regardless of phosphate concentration.

Stating the opinion, and concern, that you felt more comfortable providing information once numbers were provided, would have been respected. Berating those providing information, but not in a manner that you deemed fit, is merely arrogance. Furthermore, spewing misinformation as "fact" is the true irresponsible act.

To pontificate while trying to decry others only discredits your reputation.
 
In theory you could be starved of phosphate and have accumulating nitrate in which case phosphate would become the limiting factor and dosing carbon (vinegar) would not work to reduce anything.

I kind of doubt the above scenario has ever actually happened, but in theory.....
 
That's a well thought out theory. In fact there is a group of nitrate reducing bacteria, referred to as poly phosphate reducing bacteria, that certainly does require phosphates in order to consume nitrate.

These strains consume nitrate and phosphate in an approximate 16:1 ratio. If phosphate where to drop to absolute zero the bacteria would no longer be able to consume nitrate. Fortunately, some of these strains also release phosphate back into the water. So that should never occur.

Mother nature has habit if cover her behind and also created sulfate reducing bacteria that also consumes nitrate. Sulfate level in sea water is in the 900 ppm range, so unless you have zero nitrate levels in the parts per thousand range(>1000ppm) and no new sulfates introduced into the water, You will never run out of bacteria.

Now my theory is that Mother is even smarter than given credit to and probably has a few other bacteria strains as backup.
 
In theory you could be starved of phosphate and have accumulating nitrate in which case phosphate would become the limiting factor and dosing carbon (vinegar) would not work to reduce anything.

I kind of doubt the above scenario has ever actually happened, but in theory.....

Indeed!


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Here is a Ph.D's writing on the subject: http://www.reefedition.com/phosphate-in-the-reef-aquarium-by-randy-holmes-farley/

His methodology is here: http://reefkeeping.com/joomla/index...ar-dosing-methodology-for-the-marine-aquarium

He has several other papers published that go into greater detail. Some even that agree with the statement that fish can handle well over 100ppm of nitrate. Interestingly enough, the same paper speaks of the long-term toxicity effects on metabolism in fish with nitrates levels as low as 50ppm here: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-06/rhf/index.php

It really doesn't matter if the OP's level is, based on your opinion, too high or not. If he decides to lower the level, carbon dosing will lower nitrate, regardless of phosphate concentration.

Stating the opinion, and concern, that you felt more comfortable providing information once numbers were provided, would have been respected. Berating those providing information, but not in a manner that you deemed fit, is merely arrogance. Furthermore, spewing misinformation as "fact" is the true irresponsible act.

To pontificate while trying to decry others only discredits your reputation.

Congratulations on changing your avatar from your selfie to Andy Dick. Since logic, intelligence, reading comprehension, and grit aren't your strongest attributes, at least you can claim to be mildly clever.

While I am not discounting the contributions to the hobby from Randy or arguing his conclusions, these hardly qualify as white papers. I asked for the white papers that you claim to have read. I was not shocked when you provided articles instead of white papers, none of which contradict my point that if phosphate were truly zero, vinegar (carbon) dosing is unlikely to work very well, however unlikely that may be.

Additionally, you said:

"He has several other papers published that go into greater detail. Some even that agree with the statement that fish can handle well over 100ppm of nitrate. Interestingly enough, the same paper speaks of the long-term toxicity effects on metabolism in fish with nitrates levels as low as 50ppm here: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-06/rhf/index.php"

Umm, did you even read this? It's a discussion of nitrite - with an "I" - not nitrate. In fact, let's quote the article in larger context regarding the exact point you think you are making:

"For the reason described above, nitrite is considerably more toxic to many freshwater fish (Table 1) than it is to most marine species (Table 2). The data in these tables are primarily the LC50, which is the concentration at which 50% of the test organisms die (24-h LC50 is the concentration that kills half of the tested organisms within 24 hours). As Table 1 shows, some freshwater fish can die at nitrite levels below 1 ppm. This toxicity is the reason many aquarists worry about nitrite in aquaria. It can be a significant problem in freshwater aquaria. Tests in marine species, however, showed the toxicity to be much lower. None of the thirteen marine fish species for which I could find nitrite toxicity data had LC50 values below 100 ppm, and half had LC50 values of 1,000 - 3,000 ppm or more.

Death is, of course, a very crude indicator of toxicity. An aquarium's nitrite level should not come anywhere close to the LC50 value, because less severe toxicity can occur even at levels below that. In the previous section, I showed data on one marine species in which biochemical effects could be detected at levels well below concentrations that caused death. We saw, for example, a rise in methemoglobin at values as low as 46 ppm nitrite. However, the point remains valid that marine species are orders of magnitude less susceptible to the effects of nitrite than are many freshwater species. The marine aquaculture industry often uses a rough guideline that the safe rearing level of many compounds is a factor of 10 or less than their LC50.30"

This is where you got your point from, even though you grossly misinterpreted what it is actually saying even if it did refer to nitrAte, which it doesn't...it's talking about nitrIte. Nice job.

Next point of yours:

"It really doesn't matter if the OP's level is, based on your opinion, too high or not. If he decides to lower the level, carbon dosing will lower nitrate, regardless of phosphate concentration."

I didn't base anything off of my opinion - you are simply making this up. My entire original post was about waiting for data, i.e. facts, until recommending a course of action. And again, if phosphates are truly zero, carbon dosing may have some effect, but that doesn't mean it it likely to be effective. Huge difference.

Next point:

"Stating the opinion, and concern, that you felt more comfortable providing information once numbers were provided, would have been respected. Berating those providing information, but not in a manner that you deemed fit, is merely arrogance. Furthermore, spewing misinformation as "fact" is the true irresponsible act."

I called some people irresponsible for telling someone to take action against a "problem" that may not exist. This IS irresponsible. And it's hardly berating. If you can't handle that, you aren't going to do well in life. And again, I haven't "spewed misinformation" at all, it's just that you are incapable of understanding the point I am making. That's your problem, not mine.
 
That's a well thought out theory. In fact there is a group of nitrate reducing bacteria, referred to as poly phosphate reducing bacteria, that certainly does require phosphates in order to consume nitrate.

These strains consume nitrate and phosphate in an approximate 16:1 ratio. If phosphate where to drop to absolute zero the bacteria would no longer be able to consume nitrate. Fortunately, some of these strains also release phosphate back into the water. So that should never occur.

Mother nature has habit if cover her behind and also created sulfate reducing bacteria that also consumes nitrate. Sulfate level in sea water is in the 900 ppm range, so unless you have zero nitrate levels in the parts per thousand range(>1000ppm) and no new sulfates introduced into the water, You will never run out of bacteria.

Now my theory is that Mother is even smarter than given credit to and probably has a few other bacteria strains as backup.

And that is exactly what I said above. If phosphate were truly zero, that carbon dosing is unlikely to work well (or at all) to reduce nitrate in that scenario, however unlikely it may be. You don't seem to be reading very carefully. Let me quote myself:

"Because we don't know the levels of nitrate or phosphate, we don't know whether or not vinegar dosing will work or be beneficial. If the OP has truly zero phosphate - however unlikely that may be, but again, we don't know - the carbon dosing isn't going to be very effective, is it?"

That is saying the exact same thing as John K said above, which you called "a well thought out theory." Can you please make up your mind?
 
Let’s not get personal attacks. There are discussions and then there are arguments and it seems like this has turned into an argument.

Please keep all contributions to the original question civil.


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Let’s not get personal attacks. There are discussions and then there are arguments and it seems like this has turned into an argument.

Please keep all contributions to the original question civil.

Don't make me take out the moderator beating stick!!!
 
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