phosphate Help!!

[Dominick]

ok iv been doing 50% PWCs and still cant get my phosphate down
there so high i cant read it on the card

tank water = over 10ppm
tap water = .5ppm

anyhelp is wanted

 

[Wizzard~Of~Ozz]

What type of food do you feed your fish? Perhaps New Life Spectrum would be a decent idea.

Also, how much are you feeding and how often?

Typically phosphates come from either the food or the tap.

 

[Dominick]

i seed them once a day in the morning
and i feed them tetramin

 

[fish_4_all]

Most foods have phosphorus in them, some more than others. If you have a heavy bioload, your PO4 may always read high. I deal with mine being 5ppm+ all the time. I just dose higher levels of NO3 and my tanks are starting to look cleaner and clearer than they have in a long time. I have also stopped dosing PO4 all together because of the foods I feed and the fact my tap water has .5ppm+ PO4 in it.

 

[Dominick]

ok thanks for the tib and here might be a realy realy stupid question
but
when should i dose ferts when the lights on or when they go off?

 

[Purrbox]

Whenever you remember them is fine. Ideally it would probably be best to dose around the time that the lights come on in the morning.

 

[7Enigma]

Do a serial dilution and find out exactly how high they are. That means take 1/2 tank water and 1/2 tap water, then take 1/2 of that water with 1/2 tap water, and so on until you get an accurate reading. Then multiply by 2 for how many dilutions you made and you will know about what your tank level is. I find it easiest to do this with shot glasses.

Also when you say a PWC, how much are we talking? 20%? or 75%? Obviously if you have over 10ppm phosphates, then a 20% PWC will not help the situation.

 

[Dominick]

50% water changes
and can you get this test messed up?

 

[fish_4_all]

Don't use tap water, I don't think anyway. If your tap has PO4 in it then it will be really hard, well at least require a lot more calculations, to determine your tank water PO4. Bottled water, you need 1 gallon or less and then dilute by 50% 3-5 times until you can read it, more if needed. The oly real way to mess it up is if your test kit is bad or you add the wrong amounts of each solution. I know it is hard but try to make sure that the drops are the same size for each solution.

Like 7enigma said, use shot glasses. Easy to use and won't use much water.

 

[7Enigma]

Is this the AP liquid reagent kit or another kit? For the AP kit you are to add the first bottle, shake vigorously for 5 seconds, then add the second bottle, and shake again for 5 seconds, then let sit for THREE minutes. This is one of the few AP tests where the tube will continue to "develop" after the 3 minutes.

If you are not doing any of those steps (specifically shaking the tube after the first addition), then yes, it might be inaccurate.

The fact is though that your reading is so high that I think even doing this incorrectly might not matter since your already getting a positive (unlike the nitrAte test where people see very low values if performed improperly).

And in this case with your tap water being 0.5ppm, I'd just use the tap. If your tank is ~10ppm or greater, using tap water that is 0.5ppm will not play much of a role. Now don't try to get the value down to below 1ppm (since obviously the tap water would constitute 50% of that), but aim for a definate 2-4ppm and then back track.

Again we really don't in fact CARE what the level is, it just needs to be lowered to between a 10:1 and 20:1 ratio of nitrAte to phosphate to prevent algae, but its always a good feeling to know your 50% PWC's are actually doing something.