NoPox Help

[Jackooze]

Looking for some advice using this product.

I’ve been dosing Nopox now for two months with great results but haven’t been able to fine tune it yet. My No3 have gone down to .75 and Po4 is at .16. Right now I am dosing 1ml daily and not sure what dosage I should continue using. I have a sps only tank Which requires No3 to be 5-10ppm and Po4 should be 0. So here’s my question, if I increase dosage it will decrease my nitrates and phosphates but how do I get nitrates to stay at 5 and reduce phosphates to 0 ?

[Uncle99]

NoPox increases beneficial bacteria which reduces nitrate. It does the same on phosphate but I have found in the last year it does seem to have a great effect on phosphates.
If your nitrates are now to low, then you could increase feeding or reduce the NoPox dose, but if you go this way....change real slow.

I use ROWA GFO to manage phosphates to undectable, took a week, but the stuff ain't cheap.

The goal of NoPox ( or any other carbon dosing) is to "manage" nitrate levels, .75 is real low, so maybe you need only 1/2ml, or maybe not at all now. Just be careful, your playing with your bacteria so make real small changes.

When my nitrate finally got to 15ppm, I went from 10ml to 11ml and now I am back at 5ppm.

[bertoni]

I am not sure that the phosphate level should be at zero, or that the nitrate level needs to be that high, but you can lower it with a bit of GFO. Alternatively, you could dose nitrate to try to increase the rate of bacterial uptake. That'd also help raise the nitrate level, potentially.

[sixty_reefer]

I wouldn’t bring the po4 to 0 is asking for trouble, dinoflagellates and cyano trive in those conditions. Personally I would aim for 0.05 on phosphate and 1 for nitrates and would use gfo to do the final tune on it.


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[mcgyvr]

Your nitrate and phosphate levels are totally acceptable IMO..
All recommendations in Red Seas products must be taken with a grain of salt..

Both nitrates and phosphates are required nutrients needed by all marine life..
I would not attempt to shoot for any "perfect" (perfect by Red Seas BS only) number..

I would just stick with a low maintenance dose and see how your tank does and adapt as needed.. If numbers start to creep up.. add a bit more.. Drop too more.. reduce the dose a bit.. plain and simple..

[Jackooze]

Thanks guys for all the advice. So let me see if I am understanding this, NoPox does not work entirely on its own and needs to be supplemented. I etheir have to dose something to raise nitrates or to lower phosphates in order to maintain a certain level.If I lower my dosage for NoPox to .5ml that would increase my nitrates and phosphates as together. Therefore If i use GFO to lower my phosphates and get .05 do I remove GFO?
Do I continue to dose NoPox .5ml ?

[ReefWreak]

NoPox works entirely on its own, but it uses up nitrates and phosphates at consistent levels together (though I'm not sure what the ratio of nitrate to phosphate is, but I believe it's pretty high nitrate to low phosphate, something like 30ppm:1ppm but that's entirely a random number for an example).

The point is that you've used up your nitrate in bringing down your phosphate. If you want to bring phosphate to zero, the you'd have to add nitrate so that the ratio can match and be lowered. I would not recommend that route in a nano, even with a nice big skimmer like you have.

If you want to continue lowering phosphates, you have 2 phosban reactors, just use more phosban or use RowaPhos as mentioned.

The real question is, why are you worried about your levels at all? coral receeding? algae issues? My tank currently has 20ppm or so of nitrate and corals are generally doing okay, but I have zero algae in my tank (tank is pretty new, and new SPS frags are browned out slightly, but still doing okay). I haven't tested phosphate because I don't have any algae. I attribute my lack of algae more to the grazing snails than lack of nutrients. I've heard from reefers much more experienced than myself with much nicer tanks than I have that they are fine with high levels of nitrate and phosphate, and they manage alage with herbivores.

I recognize and appreciate the challenges with herbivores in a nano (I ran a 29g biocube with amazing SPS growth, but it got overtaken by bubble algae that needed manual removal), so I know it is tough, but if you're not having algae problems, then I wouldn't waste time and money chasing them to zero, particularly because you'll end up trying to figure out how to raise them to improve coral coloration down the line.

[Jackooze]

NoPox works entirely on its own, but it uses up nitrates and phosphates at consistent levels together (though I'm not sure what the ratio of nitrate to phosphate is, but I believe it's pretty high nitrate to low phosphate, something like 30ppm:1ppm but that's entirely a random number for an example).

The point is that you've used up your nitrate in bringing down your phosphate. If you want to bring phosphate to zero, the you'd have to add nitrate so that the ratio can match and be lowered. I would not recommend that route in a nano, even with a nice big skimmer like you have.

If you want to continue lowering phosphates, you have 2 phosban reactors, just use more phosban or use RowaPhos as mentioned.

The real question is, why are you worried about your levels at all? coral receeding? algae issues? My tank currently has 20ppm or so of nitrate and corals are generally doing okay, but I have zero algae in my tank (tank is pretty new, and new SPS frags are browned out slightly, but still doing okay). I haven't tested phosphate because I don't have any algae. I attribute my lack of algae more to the grazing snails than lack of nutrients. I've heard from reefers much more experienced than myself with much nicer tanks than I have that they are fine with high levels of nitrate and phosphate, and they manage alage with herbivores.

I recognize and appreciate the challenges with herbivores in a nano (I ran a 29g biocube with amazing SPS growth, but it got overtaken by bubble algae that needed manual removal), so I know it is tough, but if you're not having algae problems, then I wouldn't waste time and money chasing them to zero, particularly because you'll end up trying to figure out how to raise them to improve coral coloration down the line.

I actually upgraded to a reefer 250 in order to have sps only tank. I’ve been doing research on how to keep sps healthy. From what I read everyone says that you need to have higher nitrates and lower phosphates for them to grow well. Right now all my sps look healthy but aren’t growing.

[ReefWreak]

They'll grow well if you provide consistency and stability over time. I genuinely wouldn't chase the growth dragon. Keep the tank stable, stop playing with it, changing supplements, moving things around, upgrading equipment, and you'll have growth before you know it. The first year to 18 months is the hardest part (and I know because I'm there again and it's so hard to take your own advice!).

Keep nitrates and phosphates low to zero for the first year or two, manage algae and leave lots of room for corals to grow in. The less you mess with things and experiment, the faster things will grow if the normal parameters are kept consistent.

[Jackooze]

They'll grow well if you provide consistency and stability over time. I genuinely wouldn't chase the growth dragon. Keep the tank stable, stop playing with it, changing supplements, moving things around, upgrading equipment, and you'll have growth before you know it. The first year to 18 months is the hardest part (and I know because I'm there again and it's so hard to take your own advice!).

Keep nitrates and phosphates low to zero for the first year or two, manage algae and leave lots of room for corals to grow in. The less you mess with things and experiment, the faster things will grow if the normal parameters are kept consistent.

My sump is capable of adding compartment for refugium now do you think it’s a good idea to chaeto to help NoPox to control Nitrate ?

[reefgeezer]

They'll grow well if you provide consistency and stability over time. I genuinely wouldn't chase the growth dragon. Keep the tank stable, stop playing with it, changing supplements, moving things around, upgrading equipment, and you'll have growth before you know it. The first year to 18 months is the hardest part...

+1... You'll have to do enough to keep things from getting out of hand until the tank matures, but your goal should be to try to change as little as possible. IMO, if 1 ml/day of Nopox keeps nitrates below 1 ppm, you probably don't need it. If you system will maintain nitrates below a reasonable level you shouldn't sweat it. A little GFO might be in order to drop you phosphates to <.1 ppm and maintain it there, but not so much that phosphates are reduced to 0.

SPS corals can show no growth for months and then suddenly just seem to take off. Trying to make them grow is always a losing proposition.

[Uncle99]

They'll grow well if you provide consistency and stability over time. I genuinely wouldn't chase the growth dragon. Keep the tank stable, stop playing with it, changing supplements, moving things around, upgrading equipment, and you'll have growth before you know it. The first year to 18 months is the hardest part (and I know because I'm there again and it's so hard to take your own advice!).

Keep nitrates and phosphates low to zero for the first year or two, manage algae and leave lots of room for corals to grow in. The less you mess with things and experiment, the faster things will grow if the normal parameters are kept consistent.

^^^^^^This^^^^^^^ great on point advice!
Someone gave me this same advice 2 years ago, man were they ever right!

[bertoni]

I agree that NOPOx removes more nitrate than phosphate in terms of ppm per unit dosed. Some tanks are fine with its removal ratio. Others require a bit of help.