if youre going to have corals you need to check alk every 2-3 days, nitrates and phosphates once per week, unless you have a problem, then every other day till its under control. you absolutely need to at least dose alk, if its not stable, and because your corals dont have skeletons, you can prob skip dosing calcium and magnesium if you just keep up on your water changes. but alk not only gets used by corals but keeps your ph in check. You should order a kit that can test ALK,calc,mag,ph, nitrates, phosphates. these are the big 5. if there is a problem in the tank its usually one of those. other issues are flow and lighting.
I am here to learn so it’s not taken as critical! I use a siphon to suck up sand and then pinch it off so the sand falls back down and I get the detritus up!
you can do as you wish, but i personally dont see how cleaning that back area out would solve a issue if the issue is with the water itself. i still recomend testing all the paramters, and or water changes.
Thank you so much. I will lean in this advice and follow it. You all have been so extremely helpful and I am very grateful for it. Thank you all again so muchOne quick advice, it takes time for a reef tank to go from good to bad and to fix it you should also go slow.
Don’t rush, corals are in equilibrium with the water so you want to do changes slowly so corals can adapt to the new environment.
Also corals don’t lie, if they are unhappy something is wrong.
From my experience 80% it is water related and the other 20% is light/ flow etc…
In your case I would go back to basics, how do you check salinity? You state it is 36PSU, are you sure? You want 35PSU and you want to keep it there.
I use this:
I only depend on it for salinity.
Next I would monitor Alk and PO4. Your PO4 is elevated but I would do nothing unless it jumps to 0.5 and it keeps going up. PO4 are important for the coral.
You can measure NO3 but I find it irrelevant and as long as the value is 1ppm you are good.
Calcium and Mg testing will confuse you and honestly not required for your tank yet.
As I mentioned before I would do four 20% water changes over a week period (one every other day) and that will reset your water column. With this you are changing about 70% of your water.
After that observe for a week or two and see if things improve.
Next consider small amount of carbon dosing, you can try 0.2ml of TM Bacto Ballance or something similar.
Next adjust lights and flow etc… I prefer 12k-14k profile, in the evening you can use the 18k on low power for viewing.
Make small changes and see if things improve.
Is this the correct one?One quick advice, it takes time for a reef tank to go from good to bad and to fix it you should also go slow.
Don’t rush, corals are in equilibrium with the water so you want to do changes slowly so corals can adapt to the new environment.
Also corals don’t lie, if they are unhappy something is wrong.
From my experience 80% it is water related and the other 20% is light/ flow etc…
In your case I would go back to basics, how do you check salinity? You state it is 36PSU, are you sure? You want 35PSU and you want to keep it there.
I use this:
I only depend on it for salinity.
Next I would monitor Alk and PO4. Your PO4 is elevated but I would do nothing unless it jumps to 0.5 and it keeps going up. PO4 are important for the coral.
You can measure NO3 but I find it irrelevant and as long as the value is 1ppm you are good.
Calcium and Mg testing will confuse you and honestly not required for your tank yet.
As I mentioned before I would do four 20% water changes over a week period (one every other day) and that will reset your water column. With this you are changing about 70% of your water.
After that observe for a week or two and see if things improve.
Next consider small amount of carbon dosing, you can try 0.2ml of TM Bacto Ballance or something similar.
Next adjust lights and flow etc… I prefer 12k-14k profile, in the evening you can use the 18k on low power for viewing.
Make small changes and see if things improve.
www.bulkreefsupply.com
That is the correct carbon dosing product I use. The idea is that it feeds the bacteria and in turn corals feed on the bacteria. It is another food source for corals.
That is possibility. I never had Kenya so I am not sure what happy one looks like.
Wow your corals are beautiful! I’m uploading a video to show the flow with the Kenya’s, waving hands, and the rod. I just took the video now as my lights are coming on. Down to 12k at 60%. I don’t have a nice filter for my phone to take better pictures and videos sorry haha.That is the correct carbon dosing product I use. The idea is that it feeds the bacteria and in turn corals feed on the bacteria. It is another food source for corals.
If you decide to use it just use 0.2ml a day, this is not to control nutrients etc… There are other carbon sources even vinegar will work but I am not sure how much to use. I only recommend what I tried and I found out it worked.
Anyways this is the recipe I follow:
I started using this in my early days when I only had white sticks, melting Zoas to look at. Flow is important to acros.
If you do the water changes (4x20%) you will not need to add other things. Also if you do 20% weekly water change you will be ok for now. Once your corals take off and your Alk drops you might want to dose something like TM AFR, only when Alk is being used up.
From my experience Iodine is critical but too much is as bad as too little. Perhaps drop a day will be ok. For the record I do dose Iodine, it is part of my 2 part Fauna Marine Balling Light system and if I get low reading on ICP I will add it.
That is possibility. I never had Kenya so I am not sure what happy one looks like.
In my reef I have soft corals and acros all mixed. So I use GAC and only about 2 tablespoons that I change every 4 weeks. In your system I would use 1 tablespoon, if you use too much corals will be unhappy.
Few more pictures:
Good luck,
Yeah I was trying to understand this as well. I know it tank is a bit ugly but as the day goes on the Kenya’s do open up and do well in the flow. It’s dropped a few drags too that I have placed in other parts of the rock. When the lights are off it closes up and kind of limps over like a sad tree some days, but stands right up when the lights come on
My interpretation is that the coral was not happy so it released chemicals and poison the tank. From my experience some soft corals like orange Yuma, green mushroom are very aggressive. They will kill anything in their path.
