How to successfully keep SPS Corals!

[974REUNION]

 

[Jimbo662]

Amazing thread...glad I found it. Just switched over to focus on SPS and got all my parameters stable and in good range.

 

[gettaReef]

Wow very beautiful. If you can understand, could you share your intensity schedule using those Evergrow LED? I am just curious

 

[974REUNION]

I privilègié blue 100% and 40% of white and max peak of 100% on both channels for 1 hour .
With 12 éclairag

 

[gettaReef]

Thank you!

 

[Adkins]

"I privilègié blue 100% and 40% of white and max peak of 100% on Both channels for 1 hour. 12h with lighting"

So, they start at blue @ 100% and white 40%. Then white ramp up to 100% for 1 hour?

Is that what your getting from this gettaReef?

 

[Adkins]

I have been struggling with acros for about 6 months and trying to keep them. When introduced they start doing good and fade away after 3 weeks i test weekly. And everything is stable so confused monti's do well
My parameters are 480ca 1400mg alk 12.5,phos.2-.5. Temp 79-80 ,ph7.8 night. Day ph 8.09 feed mysis once a day any suggestions

Are they getting pale, turning brown, or turning white?

 

[974REUNION]

Are they getting pale, turning brown, or turning white?

Tu as trop de p04 !

 

[974REUNION]

[QUOTE = "Adkins, poste: 2972484, membre: 48848"] ". Je privilègié bleu 100% et 40% du pic blanc et maximum de 100% sur les deux canaux pendant 1 heure à 12h avec l'éclairage"

Donc, ils commencent à bleu @ 100% et blanc de 40%. Puis blanc rampe jusqu'à 100% pendant 1 heure?

Est-ce que ce que votre obtenir de cette gettaReef? [/ QUOTE]
I am always 100% on the blue and white I gradually rises from 0 to 40% max.

100% with a peak on the two channels for 1 hour.

 

[Jizu Puentes]

Hello everyone! some update of my 120g tank.

I see that a lot of your rock surface area has slimy green on it, does that mean your phosphates are higher? I'm getting that on my rocks as well but my sps look great

 

[974REUNION]

Your corals are beautiful!

 

[helldiver]

Are they getting pale, turning brown, or turning white?

My parameters are like adkins and they turn with my lights run at 40% i need help also please help

 

[Projecttrinh]

Hi guys, love the tanks in this thread. I'm still bit new to hobby and I'm really interested in the ones that have a minimalist look and not much live rock. But my question is for such big 200+ gallon tanks, I thought would need more live rock for bio filter. Or are these systems running something else to do this successfully?

These were ones posted years ago from start of this thread.

 

[Adkins]

You can always run live rock in the sump.

 

[Fercho]

I have been struggling with acros for about 6 months and trying to keep them. When introduced they start doing good and fade away after 3 weeks i test weekly. And everything is stable so confused monti's do well
My parameters are 480ca 1400mg alk 12.5,phos.2-.5. Temp 79-80 ,ph7.8 night. Day ph 8.09 feed mysis once a day any suggestions

Just follow Elegant Coral's recomendation.
Use gfo, do wc and all he said.
I had same problem you have and did this.
I couldn't be happier with the positive results.
I see colors getting better and acros have crazy polip extension. They also started to grow.

About the alk issue, since stability is key here, I personally recomend using a salt mix that has the same alk level you want to have in your reef when mixed with ro water. This way, your corals wont get shocked or stresses when you do your water changes with a salt mix that contains higher alk levels than what your reef alk levels are.
(Remember we are trying to match water parameters and temp when doing a wc)

For example, i was shooting for my alk to be at around 8dkh. But i was using red sea pro salt mix (black bucket)which has high alk levels of 12.2dkh.
Every time i did my water change i noticed my acros would get upset due to the new water having high, unmatched alk levels. I was not happy about that. So i checked online the alk levels of the red sea salt mix (blue bucket) and saw it had an alk level of 7.7dkh. Very close to the dkh i was aiming for, which is 8dkh.
So long story short, i switched salk mix that had alk level of 12dkh to another salt mix level that has alk level of 7.7dkh wich nearly matches the dkh8 level i want to have. This way, my sps wont get shocked when doing a wc.

 

[Jizu Puentes]

90 gallon standard tank sps dominated

Dkh-11
Ph-7.8-8.1
Po4-.04
No3- undetectable
Calcium-400
Temp 77-79F
Magnesium 1250ppm
Salinity 1.026

Lighthing single ati blue plus 48" t5
Two chinese 120w $80 fixtures non dimmable
Two viaqua 150 titanium heaters
35gallon sump with 6 gallon refugium lit by a cree 18w led standard houshold bulb at 5000k in a clamp lamp refugium has deep sand bed LR and cheato as well as a leafy macro
A chinese gfo reactor i run brs regular gfo at 1 cup i change 1 tablespoon of gfo weekly
I also run a biopellet reactor with TRopic marin pellets 3 cups i add a tablespoon a month or so to top off
2 koralias
1 mp10 vortech
350gph return
Aqua c Ev180 skimmer

I feed very heavily 4-5 times daily with new life spectrum, macro marine algea and mysis

My bio load is large i have 4 tangs 3 clowns chromis manderins matted filefish shrimp linkia stars hermits snails mini serpents, astrias ect.

I have stylophora montipora acropora poccilipora seriatapora millepora lps and a couple soft corals gorgonians and nps corals. Loaded and growing strong.

The key to growing sps is simple keep whatever parameters u have stable especially alkalinity I dose nothing but kalkwasser mixed with vinegar and change 5 gallons of water every sunday using redsea cp, i do not use rodi nor have i ever this is not recommended by me it is just how i do it i have good tap spring water this tank is a little over a year old and has had tremendous growth on a light budget and very stable the trick to stability is just to do every thing you do slowly lots of tiny water changes rather than less frequent big ones change media small portions at a time and let things mature keep your hands out of the water and dont make big changes. Ive had sps lps soft reefs for 12 years now. Biggest issues i ever had was trying to introduce coral to a imature tank my tank is not a low nutrient system and ive found alk ranges from 10-12dkh work well in this tank in lower nutrient tanks ive had with small bioloads i prefer to be in the 7.5-9dkh range. Its also not easy at this point to find a stable consistent salt at those ranges ive used tropic marin pro reef regular and bio actif as well as io. rc, rscp, brightwell aquaforest and and oceanic. I picked the rscp due to its consistent dkh reading. I will be trying salinity for the next bucket as ive heard positive things about it. Ive found corals and fish do better at 1.026sg or 35ppt salinity. Also helps get full potential of the calcium concentration in the salt. Ive run calcium reactors balling method and dosing two part with limited success i prefer kalkwasser mixed at 5 gallons water 8 teaspoons kalk 150 ml white distilled vinegar in ato my pump chamber holds less than a gallon so the ato runs alot again lots of small doses are better than one big dose.....

Do you have a picture of your tank? I also run kalkwasser, through a dosing pump now instead of ATO, and my Dkh is around 11 as well with my CA being at 470. I've seen the calcium alkalinity ratio calculator and from the Ca level that a lot of people run at a higher Alk is called for. The majority of the people on this thread have their Alk around 7 or 8 though.

 

[Browner20]

I have been struggling with acros for about 6 months and trying to keep them. When introduced they start doing good and fade away after 3 weeks i test weekly. And everything is stable so confused monti's do well
My parameters are 480ca 1400mg alk 12.5,phos.2-.5. Temp 79-80 ,ph7.8 night. Day ph 8.09 feed mysis once a day any suggestions

@helldiver - what are your nitrates at? With that high of alk and no nutrients SPS will basically try and grow themselves to death. @Russ265 - I think it was you who said that it is like feeding the bone structure but not adding any flesh and muscle - no fat in the diet.

looks like @stingman might be having similar issues with the undetectable nitrate levels and high alk. I started back in the hobby after taking about 15 years off and all I could think is nitrates = bad so I designed my system to have undetectable traces of nitrates. However, equipment and tactics, mainly skimmers and tank turnover, has gotten so advanced that it removes too much nitrate which is basically the carbs/fat of an SPS diet, mainly the zooxanthellae need the nitrate for photosynthesis. As we all do SPS need a balanced diet. My Monti's do well also but I think they may not be as reliant on zooxanth as other SPS corals - this is an assumption so somebody chime in if this is false.

There are a bunch of articles on this site about dosing nitrates which may be your issue.

 

[Russ265]

@helldiver - what are your nitrates at? With that high of alk and no nutrients SPS will basically try and grow themselves to death. @Russ265 - I think it was you who said that it is like feeding the bone structure but not adding any flesh and muscle - no fat in the diet.

looks like @stingman might be having similar issues with the undetectable nitrate levels and high alk. I started back in the hobby after taking about 15 years off and all I could think is nitrates = bad so I designed my system to have undetectable traces of nitrates. However, equipment and tactics, mainly skimmers and tank turnover, has gotten so advanced that it removes too much nitrate which is basically the carbs/fat of an SPS diet, mainly the zooxanthellae need the nitrate for photosynthesis. As we all do SPS need a balanced diet. My Monti's do well also but I think they may not be as reliant on zooxanth as other SPS corals - this is an assumption so somebody chime in if this is false.

There are a bunch of articles on this site about dosing nitrates which may be your issue.

correct

 

[Jizu Puentes]

90 gallon standard tank sps dominated

Dkh-11
Ph-7.8-8.1
Po4-.04
No3- undetectable
Calcium-400
Temp 77-79F
Magnesium 1250ppm
Salinity 1.026

Lighthing single ati blue plus 48" t5
Two chinese 120w $80 fixtures non dimmable
Two viaqua 150 titanium heaters
35gallon sump with 6 gallon refugium lit by a cree 18w led standard houshold bulb at 5000k in a clamp lamp refugium has deep sand bed LR and cheato as well as a leafy macro
A chinese gfo reactor i run brs regular gfo at 1 cup i change 1 tablespoon of gfo weekly
I also run a biopellet reactor with TRopic marin pellets 3 cups i add a tablespoon a month or so to top off
2 koralias
1 mp10 vortech
350gph return
Aqua c Ev180 skimmer

I feed very heavily 4-5 times daily with new life spectrum, macro marine algea and mysis

My bio load is large i have 4 tangs 3 clowns chromis manderins matted filefish shrimp linkia stars hermits snails mini serpents, astrias ect.

I have stylophora montipora acropora poccilipora seriatapora millepora lps and a couple soft corals gorgonians and nps corals. Loaded and growing strong.

The key to growing sps is simple keep whatever parameters u have stable especially alkalinity I dose nothing but kalkwasser mixed with vinegar and change 5 gallons of water every sunday using redsea cp, i do not use rodi nor have i ever this is not recommended by me it is just how i do it i have good tap spring water this tank is a little over a year old and has had tremendous growth on a light budget and very stable the trick to stability is just to do every thing you do slowly lots of tiny water changes rather than less frequent big ones change media small portions at a time and let things mature keep your hands out of the water and dont make big changes. Ive had sps lps soft reefs for 12 years now. Biggest issues i ever had was trying to introduce coral to a imature tank my tank is not a low nutrient system and ive found alk ranges from 10-12dkh work well in this tank in lower nutrient tanks ive had with small bioloads i prefer to be in the 7.5-9dkh range. Its also not easy at this point to find a stable consistent salt at those ranges ive used tropic marin pro reef regular and bio actif as well as io. rc, rscp, brightwell aquaforest and and oceanic. I picked the rscp due to its consistent dkh reading. I will be trying salinity for the next bucket as ive heard positive things about it. Ive found corals and fish do better at 1.026sg or 35ppt salinity. Also helps get full potential of the calcium concentration in the salt. Ive run calcium reactors balling method and dosing two part with limited success i prefer kalkwasser mixed at 5 gallons water 8 teaspoons kalk 150 ml white distilled vinegar in ato my pump chamber holds less than a gallon so the ato runs alot again lots of small doses are better than one big dose.....

Do you have a picture of your tank? I also run kalkwasser, through a dosing pump now instead of ATO, and my Dkh is around 11 as well with my CA being at 470. I've seen the calcium alkalinity ratio calculator and from the Ca level that a lot of people run at a higher Alk is called for. The majority of the people on this thread have their Alk around 7 or 8 though.

 

[Mandrew]

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