# Help nitrate peak in marine tank, what do i do?



## Theresa marine (Apr 18, 2005)

Hi
I am running a juwel rio 240 marine setup, last weekend i was offered about 20kg of live rock and 15 fish which i added to my aquarium. The water tests were fine early in the week but today my nitrate is nearly 60 and ammonia is creeping up. The nitrite and ph is fine. My annenome and mushroom coral is looking fairly poorly and im very concerned incase i have a wipeout. Iv'e only been doing marine a few weeks and don't know what is best to do. Can anyone offer any advice or help? I will be very gratefull for any info on what to do as i dont want to see the fish die because of something iv'e done.


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## Fishfirst (Jan 24, 2005)

Well it sounds as if you did too much too soon. Remember this hobby takes tons of patients! 15 fish added at once will cause an ammonia spike as well as an impending nitrite spike. The coral and anemone will be the most sensitive so that is why they are dying first. To determine the best coarse of action we need tank stats... what types of fish? how large the tank is? how long you have had it running? and if you cycled the tank or not? also what do you have for lighting on the tank? because the anemone and corals are photosynthetic


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## redpaulhus (Jan 18, 2005)

Lots of water changes !!!
A jewel 240 is about 63 US gallons I believe - with a fairly small surface area (about 5 sq ft I think).
Hopefully those are 15 small fish that will stay small - otherwise you're going to have huge problems even after you get the ammonia and nitrate down.

The nitrates and ammonia are stressing the inverts, they should rebound once things become stable.

I'd try waterchanges of about 50% daily for about a week, then maybe 25% every few days.
Then see if your nitrates stay reasonable - hopefully you can get into a more managable routine (maybe 20% a week or so).
If you can't keep the nitrates down with that routine, or you want a less labor intensive tank (or these are fish that will hit 10cm) - remove 
a bunch of the fish.

I generally put about one fish per month in a newly setup tank of that size, and I generally plan/recommend about one 3-5" fish per sq ft of surface area.

Oh - a big protein skimmer would definately help and would cut down on the water change protocol, as would a macroalgae refugium with DSB.

Fishfirst had a great point about lighting - if this is the same 'standard' Jewel system that I've seen, it probably has two 40w flourescent lights - not nearly enough light for most anemones, and pretty low even for shrooms.


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