nitrate has been a serious debatable issue to many reefer...even to the amount of acceptable range within the reef tank. recently just wanna upgrade my skimmer and some equipment so that my reef will improve , my main aim is to control my nitrate .i always wonder is it possible to do so . wow , some reefer states their nitrate level is zero , i am always aiming for that .
nitrates , IMO , is even more critical in nano tank since the water vol is small , the parameter can be unstable .
yes , 1) using macro algae , 2) powerful skimmer , 3) Berlin style , 4) az-no3 , 5) sugar ?? 6) water change, 7)DSB , all the above can control nitrate significantly but just to share that a reliable test kit too is important.
just bought a NO2/NO3 tropic marine test kit from petmart and my NO3 level is between the range of <1ppm to 5 ppm ... the colour range is too near... i was of course rejoicing over the result and just wanna share some of the stuff that i do to my nano to control my nitrates. i used to use tetra ...
a) reliable salt mix is impt . i change from redsea to corallife to marine environment ... expensive salt but great solubility and result .
prizm skimmer . just enough for 2 feet and below ., skim wet
c) use distill water .( since water vol is small , and i dun want to inverse in RO/DI unit )
d)biohome (1.5kg) in my eheim canister 2215
e) weekly water change of 20%
f) ya, i clean my canister weekly or fornightly.
g) i have rocks to the max to how much my main tank can hold .
my sandbed is just just a covering to make it look more natural, no sugar and no az no3 employ. yup no sump too due to cabinet design and constraint. but the reading is taken after months when my tank really settle .
tank mate :
2x cleaner shrimp
1x purple tang
1x flame angel
1x true perc
1x bicolour dottyback
ya the purple tang shouldnt really be in a 2 feet tank , but aquamarine 2 feet also has one , just couldnt resist the temptation , so bought one from there too . hee hee.
just some sharing .
enjoy reefing .