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I have a little problem with high phosphates I'm running into, and I'm hoping someone can help me out?
I just stated my system in late march, so its been up for a while, I didnt test any parameters for the first few weeks, but now that I have I'm getting a phosphate reading of 0.48 on the hanna ppb. Nitrates (RedSea test kit) are reading "zero". There is nothing living in the tank, no fish, no coral, not a thing. I'm not even ghost feeding the tank, its completely empty in that regard. I have a 1 inch sand bed of aragonite special grade, and I used 65-70lbs of dry rock I cycled twice before going into the tank (the second time with a dose of bleach!).
I started dosing kalkwasser to the tank a few days ago to get the phosphates down and now the reading is down to 0.15. I tested my RODI and the hanna gave me a reading of 0.00 PPM. So I'm left to assume that it is my dry rock that is leaching phosphates into the water? There has a been a little grey hair algae, I think that's what it is anyway. Some parts of the rock are now showing small circles of green algae.
my question is, shouldn't the Zeovit have eaten up the phosphates? as I understood that is what this system was intended to accomplish? so how is it that the phosphates are so high?
I should also mention, that when I started the system I used the KZ product guide to dose my tank:
Day 1 dosing - ZB: 5ml per 100 Litres (25ml on day one); ZS: 10ml per 100 Litres (50ml on day one).
Dosing thereafter - ZB: 1 drop per 100 litres once or twice a week (5 drops once a week); ZS: 2ml per 1000 litres (1ml per day).
However, once I tested the phosphates I thought something was wrong so I watched a few YouTube videos and realized I should have been dosing according to the actual KZ guide (the pdf version) and I've since changed my dosing to follow it. It's been two weeks since I've switched to correct dosing methods, also changed out the zeolites at the same time.
Finally, I also included the necessary carbon in one of the sump baffles (the zeovit product guide said not to include the carbon until fish went into the tank).
I'm at a loss to understand how and why the zeovit didnt eat up the phosphates from the beginning? so maybe it was because I did not start the dosing correctly from the beginning? but, I've also noticed that in the last week the phosphate level has only gone down when I dose kalkwasser, it doesnt seem to me that even with the right dosing the zeovit is having any effect on the phosphate level?
thank you!
I just stated my system in late march, so its been up for a while, I didnt test any parameters for the first few weeks, but now that I have I'm getting a phosphate reading of 0.48 on the hanna ppb. Nitrates (RedSea test kit) are reading "zero". There is nothing living in the tank, no fish, no coral, not a thing. I'm not even ghost feeding the tank, its completely empty in that regard. I have a 1 inch sand bed of aragonite special grade, and I used 65-70lbs of dry rock I cycled twice before going into the tank (the second time with a dose of bleach!).
I started dosing kalkwasser to the tank a few days ago to get the phosphates down and now the reading is down to 0.15. I tested my RODI and the hanna gave me a reading of 0.00 PPM. So I'm left to assume that it is my dry rock that is leaching phosphates into the water? There has a been a little grey hair algae, I think that's what it is anyway. Some parts of the rock are now showing small circles of green algae.
my question is, shouldn't the Zeovit have eaten up the phosphates? as I understood that is what this system was intended to accomplish? so how is it that the phosphates are so high?
I should also mention, that when I started the system I used the KZ product guide to dose my tank:
Day 1 dosing - ZB: 5ml per 100 Litres (25ml on day one); ZS: 10ml per 100 Litres (50ml on day one).
Dosing thereafter - ZB: 1 drop per 100 litres once or twice a week (5 drops once a week); ZS: 2ml per 1000 litres (1ml per day).
However, once I tested the phosphates I thought something was wrong so I watched a few YouTube videos and realized I should have been dosing according to the actual KZ guide (the pdf version) and I've since changed my dosing to follow it. It's been two weeks since I've switched to correct dosing methods, also changed out the zeolites at the same time.
Finally, I also included the necessary carbon in one of the sump baffles (the zeovit product guide said not to include the carbon until fish went into the tank).
I'm at a loss to understand how and why the zeovit didnt eat up the phosphates from the beginning? so maybe it was because I did not start the dosing correctly from the beginning? but, I've also noticed that in the last week the phosphate level has only gone down when I dose kalkwasser, it doesnt seem to me that even with the right dosing the zeovit is having any effect on the phosphate level?
thank you!
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