High nitrates and ph in a mature tank-confused

[Greenstarfish03]

This tank is a mixed LPS and softie tank mainly. It is about 5 years old but the system is Maybe 11 years old I moved to a new display about 5 years ago

100g display
60g of water in sump
Reef octopus skimmer
Refuge
Live rock and sand in the fuge.
Apex neptune with ph probe and temp
Aquaforest -Mg
Salifent - Manual PH
Red Sea-Ca
Hanna testers for - Nitrates, Alk, Phos


The tank is really stable so I get lazy sometimes and don't test as often as I should and I had been traveling a fair amount for work so it was even worse then normal. I came home and noticed some of the corals wernt looking so good (some of these are 15 year old colonies). I went to test and found out that my nitrates were really high for me higher then I've very seen them, my ph has been hanging pretty high (per my probe) ,and I ran out of calcium solution. I dose 2 part. One bucket of calcium chloride and the other baking soda not cooked. My calcium was low so I filled that up and started dosing again but if anything I woukd think that would lower my ph not raise it.

Tank is ok but not as it should be. A little hair algae here and there not over run or anything but more then I like and like I said corals generaly are receeding a bit and not looking good.

Measurements two weeks ago:

ALK - 13.89
CA - 290
MG -1350
Nitrate - 61
Phos - .04
salinity 1.028
PH - Probe has ran between 8.59 and 8.69 for a while now. I did a manual test and sicne its color based its hard to be accurate but it seemed to be between 8.3 and 8.5 when my probe read 8.64. I calibrated my probe no change. My PH is often on the high side but this is too high I believe.


I have never had nitrates this high in many years and I haven't gotten better or worse and water changes etc. Usualy I run between 5 and 15 and high means it hits 20. Its only been slightly above 20 twice in the last 3 years. ALK is a bit high I'm usaly about 11.9, and CA is low I stay pretty consisently between 350 and 435 unless I run out of colution and don't notice. Overall things are pretty out of whack and I'm not sure what to do to fix it.

Done so far:

Started dosing microclean, and added a microxport block seeded w/ microbacter7, did two ~30% water changes. Decreased my ALK dose time, filled mu CA solution and did a one time dose, calibrated my ph probe, changed sediment filter, added an airstone to sump to increase oxegnation.

I don't ever feed heavy if anything my fish are closer to starving then getting fat. I don't have a ton of fish.

1-Purple Tang
2 Medium clowns
1 bicolor butterfly
1 antheia

a fair amount of corals and live rock. The tank is fairly full.

I'm good at doing what I have always doen and it usualy works. Now that soemthing is out of whack I'm not sure what to do to fix it. Is there anything else I'm overlooking?

Measurements last night:
ALK - 14.06
CA - 330
MG - 1350
Nitrate - 29.9
Phos - .04
Salinity - 1.026

A little better but still not right and my alk actualy went up a bit. I backed my dose time off a lot last night well from 4:45 minutes per hour to 4:00 per hour. I usualy don't change this more then a few seconds one way or the other.

Thanks

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Reduction of nitrate by consumption will boost alk a bit.

I suspect the pH is in error. In a reef tank like yours not using high pH alk additives, a simple rule of thumb is pH is never too high.

Maybe the calibration fluids are off (they absorb CO2, which makes pH read too high), or perhaps the APEX is messed up in terms of temp corrections or other issues related to pH.

 

[arking_mark]

You probably already know this, but nothing goods happen fast in a reef aquarium. So slowly bring it back to your target parameters. If you can, keep up the larger 30% water changes...almost always safe and slow.