Hey all! Thank you for taking the time to check out my thread here and any advice you could give me going forward.
A little background first: I'm new to the hobby and this is my first saltwater tank. Like many new people to the hobby, the information about testing numbers and all things involved can be a bit overwhelming. This is a small tank, an Innovative Marine 30L (30Gallon aio), I have had water, rock, and sand in for about 5 months now. I have had lights off until last week and right now the only livestock are a couple of clownfish (in the tank for about a month) and a firefish that I added last week. No corals at all, but I hope to add corals once things in the tank start to settle down. Right now I'm dealing with the "ugly stage" and have a nasty diatom outbreak. A clean up crew from ReefCleaners.org is on the way and should be here later in the week.
In the meantime, I'm trying to get my parameters ready so I can start to add coral. I've been testing salinity and nitrate regularly for awhile now (basically since adding water 5 months ago). I've also tested alkalinity and Ph in the past, but haven't been too concerned with that since there have been no coral in the tank.
Today I tested for the major parameters and I'd like to share those numbers, get some advice and speculation on them, and hopefully some advice on how to get the numbers within acceptable hobby range.
Salinity (using a BRS refractometer)-1.026
Temp-78
Nitrate (Salifert) is ~5ppm
Ph (Salifert)is 8.2
Phosphate (Hanna)is .15
Alkalinity (Hanna)is 6.4
Calcium (RedSea) is ~490
Magnesium (Nyos)is ~1380
Currently I'm using water from my LFS and topping off with RODI water I make at home using the BRS 4-stage kit reading 0TDS coming out.
I feel temp, salinity, nitrate, and Ph are fine. But the Alkalinity and Phosphate are WAY off it seems and most concerning to me. Also, the calcium and magnesium seem to be quite a bit higher than acceptable.
What are yall's thoughts on the numbers? And how would yall go about getting magnesium, calcium, alkalinity, and phosphate to normal range.
Thank you all for any and all help.
A little background first: I'm new to the hobby and this is my first saltwater tank. Like many new people to the hobby, the information about testing numbers and all things involved can be a bit overwhelming. This is a small tank, an Innovative Marine 30L (30Gallon aio), I have had water, rock, and sand in for about 5 months now. I have had lights off until last week and right now the only livestock are a couple of clownfish (in the tank for about a month) and a firefish that I added last week. No corals at all, but I hope to add corals once things in the tank start to settle down. Right now I'm dealing with the "ugly stage" and have a nasty diatom outbreak. A clean up crew from ReefCleaners.org is on the way and should be here later in the week.
In the meantime, I'm trying to get my parameters ready so I can start to add coral. I've been testing salinity and nitrate regularly for awhile now (basically since adding water 5 months ago). I've also tested alkalinity and Ph in the past, but haven't been too concerned with that since there have been no coral in the tank.
Today I tested for the major parameters and I'd like to share those numbers, get some advice and speculation on them, and hopefully some advice on how to get the numbers within acceptable hobby range.
Salinity (using a BRS refractometer)-1.026
Temp-78
Nitrate (Salifert) is ~5ppm
Ph (Salifert)is 8.2
Phosphate (Hanna)is .15
Alkalinity (Hanna)is 6.4
Calcium (RedSea) is ~490
Magnesium (Nyos)is ~1380
Currently I'm using water from my LFS and topping off with RODI water I make at home using the BRS 4-stage kit reading 0TDS coming out.
I feel temp, salinity, nitrate, and Ph are fine. But the Alkalinity and Phosphate are WAY off it seems and most concerning to me. Also, the calcium and magnesium seem to be quite a bit higher than acceptable.
What are yall's thoughts on the numbers? And how would yall go about getting magnesium, calcium, alkalinity, and phosphate to normal range.
Thank you all for any and all help.