New to R2R needs some encouragement

[Dburr1014]

Hello fellow reefers my name is Joey from ft Myers Florida and I’ve been in the hobby 4 years now. I’ve been through several ups and downs over the short few years but here lately I’ve been mentally down and out… I’ve always enjoyed the ocean and having a piece of it in my home has been great but here lately I’ve been battling hard with instability in my water chemistry and it has been severely frustrating. I joined this forum in hopes to learn and better understand reefing and make it less frustrating and stressful. I hear most are positive and encouraging here so I was hoping for a little bit of that. I’ve never been one to change things up but as for the last year I’ve been keeping a mixed reef and trying to keep a more sps dominated tank. My current set up has been up and running for about 3 years now with no major issues but here lately I’ve been struggling with parameter swings and it is something I’ve never dealt with until recently. I’m very old school and do everything manually besides having and auto top off and a protein skimmer. I have a custom built 70g all in one peninsula and the reason I went all in one is because at the time my children were very young and I was worried they would get into the sump one day so I decided on the all in one. Fast forward 3 years theyre bigger and know better than to mess with daddy’s tank so I have heavy regrets on not going with a sump system. With that being said my tank went A year or so very stable growing sps dosing only fusion 1 and 2 for alk and cal and ions for mag I dosed the same every day and never had issues until the last two months I’ve started to have coral slowly die off or pale out due to swings… I’ve been dosing more but it has made it far more inconsistent than it’s ever been and I’ve been pulling my hair out. I’ve never been good with figuring out the chemistry behind it all and it’s starting to get a bit overwhelming. I don’t want to be a sis and give up because I’ve never been that type but lately it’s been giving me a run for my money. I would love some tips and positive encouragement to keep me from going mad… attached are some photos from a month or so ago will post updated photos tomorrow

70g, 2 ice cap gyres, protein skimmer, reef breeders photon v2, ato

Welcome to the best reef forum in the world.

Let's try to break down your system and get it back to the glory you want.

You dose manually and have an ATO and skimmer. ATO is great.

Can you tell us what the water parameters are?
What test kits?
I also run the Photon V2, love that light. What are your settings?
How about flow, what powerheads do you run? Flow is just as important as lights to feed and get the waste out from the coral as they grow.

 

[Sophie"s mom]

Welcome to R2R! Yes you came to the right place. People here are very willing to help. Some may occasionally seem a little short, but all mean well and want to help. I am just learning the whole dosing thing, so I am not much help. I have purchased an auto dosing pump, but not yet hooked up. Stay strong folks here will help get you through this.

 

[Brisk]

Welcome!

 

[Buckster]

Hello Joey and Welcome to R2R! I want say anything as some have already informed you of what avenue you should take at this point.

 

[lowandslowjoe]

Welcome!

Your tank and even the room its in looks fantastic! Make sure to kick off a build thread so we can follow along.

New to this stuff how do I start a tank thread? Thank you very much!

Welcome to the best reef forum in the world.

Let's try to break down your system and get it back to the glory you want.

You dose manually and have an ATO and skimmer. ATO is great.

Can you tell us what the water parameters are?
What test kits?
I also run the Photon V2, love that light. What are your settings?
How about flow, what powerheads do you run? Flow is just as important as lights to feed and get the waste out from the coral as they grow.

my parameters are ever changing as of now
Sal 1.025
Alk 9.6
Calcium 450
Ph 7.8
Phos .05
Nitrates 5
Mag 1300 I believe around there haven’t tested mag in awhile

As far as other trace elements I have no earthly idea…

I run two ice cap 2k gyres one one each end of the tank on a random flow from 75-100 percent range

Lights are on a 10h schedule with a 5 hour peak I believe I can’t remember off the top of my head but my blues are 80% whites 1% red green and purple are 10% maybe I’ll have to check later to be sure. I slowly increased intensity by 5% over a period of 3 months starting at 65% blues and 8% whites and they’re 19in above the water line

I do know one of my biggest struggles is being a very busy working man in hvac On top of that I am married with two kids my daughter is a cheerleader and my wife and I are both cheer coaches so needless to say I am always busy and never really have the time for the husbandry of the reef as I wish I did

 

[lowandslowjoe]

As corals grow, and as corals are added, the amount you dose will need to change

You may want to look into All for Reef - it’s an all in one additive that maintains / replenishes Alk, Ca, Magnesium, and trace elements, all in a single liquid

You get all your param good…then figure out your daily alk drop, then use that to figure out the AFR daily dosage

Then you just test weekly or monthly and see if your dosage is correct. If numbers are slowly going up/down you adjust the dosage and you will find your sweeet spot that keeps everything stable and good

I have been looking into the all for reef for sometime now and I was torn between getting the levels right and using all for Reef or switching my dosing from part one and two to kalkwasser all together as I do have PH swings as well

 

[kevgib67]

Welcome Joey, glad you are here!

 

[AlyciaMarie]

Welcome to R2R, Joey! You've come to the right place. Reefing is not for the faint of heart, but your tank is beautiful, and with the help of some of these amazing members, I'm sure you can get your zeal back! Since chemistry and stability are giving you issues right now, Reef Chemistry by Randy Holmes-Farley Forum will be an asset to you! You can also post there if you have specific questions. Good luck, and glad you've found us!

Go ahead and start a tank thread as well, so we have a good trail of updates as you move along! There is a link on how to do that in my signature.

 

[VintageReefer]

I have been looking into the all for reef for sometime now and I was torn between getting the levels right and using all for Reef or switching my dosing from part one and two to kalkwasser all together as I do have PH swings as well

What’s your ph swing range and do you know why it happens?

 

[1112-425XL]

 

[lowandslowjoe]

What’s your ph swing range and do you know why it happens?

Swings from 7.6-7.9 can’t ever get it to that 8.4 most it’s been was 8.0 and it is recently happened I feel because it is summertime in Florida and I don’t open up the doors and windows as much as I used to because of how hot it is I’ve had air stones in the filtration the whole Time of its life and just recently I’ve had to dose balance to keep the pH up

 

[lowandslowjoe]

Welcome to R2R, Joey! You've come to the right place. Reefing is not for the faint of heart, but your tank is beautiful, and with the help of some of these amazing members, I'm sure you can get your zeal back! Since chemistry and stability are giving you issues right now, Reef Chemistry by Randy Holmes-Farley Forum will be an asset to you! You can also post there if you have specific questions. Good luck, and glad you've found us!

Go ahead and start a tank thread as well, so we have a good trail of updates as you move along! There is a link on how to do that in my signature.

Thank you very much I believe I successfully posted a team thread, Definitely excited to get feedback and learn a few things and get back in the groove of happy successful easy reef keeping

 

[lowandslowjoe]

Welcome Joey, glad you are here!

Thank you very much!

 

[Formulator]

Welcome to R2R!

 

[lowandslowjoe]

Welcome to R2R!

Thank you!

 

[Dburr1014]

New to this stuff how do I start a tank thread? Thank you very much!

my parameters are ever changing as of now
Sal 1.025
Alk 9.6
Calcium 450
Ph 7.8
Phos .05
Nitrates 5
Mag 1300 I believe around there haven’t tested mag in awhile

As far as other trace elements I have no earthly idea…

I run two ice cap 2k gyres one one each end of the tank on a random flow from 75-100 percent range

Lights are on a 10h schedule with a 5 hour peak I believe I can’t remember off the top of my head but my blues are 80% whites 1% red green and purple are 10% maybe I’ll have to check later to be sure. I slowly increased intensity by 5% over a period of 3 months starting at 65% blues and 8% whites and they’re 19in above the water line

I do know one of my biggest struggles is being a very busy working man in hvac On top of that I am married with two kids my daughter is a cheerleader and my wife and I are both cheer coaches so needless to say I am always busy and never really have the time for the husbandry of the reef as I wish I did

One thing that stands out to me,
Alkalinity approaching 10dkh and your po4/no3 is kinda low.

Generally speaking, it's better to have higher nutrients with higher alkalinity and lower nutrients with lower alkalinity. Of coarse you can have higher nutrients with lower alkalinity but my point is, low nutrients with high alkalinity is not the best way to go. They grow fast with high alk but there may not be enough food to go around to support the growth.

 

[Jimbhoy13]

Welcome to R2R joey. Your tank looks good.

 

[lowandslowjoe]

One thing that stands out to me,
Alkalinity approaching 10dkh and your po4/no3 is kinda low.

Generally speaking, it's better to have higher nutrients with higher alkalinity and lower nutrients with lower alkalinity. Of coarse you can have higher nutrients with lower alkalinity but my point is, low nutrients with high alkalinity is not the best way to go. They grow fast with high alk but there may not be enough food to go around to support the growth.

My skimmer is turned down also I’ve tried feeding more but then my phosphates elevate so I’m thinking about turning the skimmer off for awhile would this be a good idea and just use it when needed to export?

 

[Glenner’sreef]

Hi Joey, and welcome! Over the past 5 years I’ve maintained 100s of tanks in the Phoenix metro area. Hot here also! I’ve been in the hobby since I was 10. So I have a feel for things. Sometimes our chemistry comes from sources outside of what we put into our tanks. Our salt, our additives, dosing, food choices etc. are all things that we can control even manually (as opposed to electronic controllers) Anyhow I find myself sharing this true story about twice a year on r2r because I feel it might be applicable.

I was called out to an account at a home. Nice home. 30g AIO with two large 7 year old pair of Ocellaris Clownfish. It was an easy tank to maintain. One of our other technicians had been there a week earlier. Filled out the appropriate maintenance form and left. Three days later the 2 Clowns unexpectedly died. I was sent out to see if there was a problem. The maintenance form looked to be in good order. Everything done, testing, cleaning, water change etc. by the book. Finally, I asked if any chemicals had been sprayed in or around the room or tank. The people then remembered their new puppy had popped on the rug in the same room and a carpet cleaning company came out to clean it. Then after cleaning it the sprayed the room with an aerosol. The people remembered it was the day before the fish has died. They also had a protein skimmer, taking in air from the room all day, all night. That made quite an impression on me even regarding my own fish tank. And any external “chemistry” that could find its way into my tank.
Point being made. Do you have any cleaning people, bug or insect control people coming into your fish room cleaning and spraying? Affecting coral growth in a room that gets little ventilation? Something to think about.
Your Ph is 7.6 to 7.9 as you well know bringing fresh air from outside would probably take those numbers well over 8. Our protein skimmers without question can be an important part of maintaining our tanks. But……..

 

[lowandslowjoe]

Hi Joey, and welcome! Over the past 5 years I’ve maintained 100s of tanks in the Phoenix metro area. Hot here also! I’ve been in the hobby since I was 10. So I have a feel for things. Sometimes our chemistry comes from sources outside of what we put into our tanks. Our salt, our additives, dosing, food choices etc. are all things that we can control even manually (as opposed to electronic controllers) Anyhow I find myself sharing this true story about twice a year on r2r because I feel it might be applicable.

I was called out to an account at a home. Nice home. 30g AIO with two large 7 year old pair of Ocellaris Clownfish. It was an easy tank to maintain. One of our other technicians had been there a week earlier. Filled out the appropriate maintenance form and left. Three days later the 2 Clowns unexpectedly died. I was sent out to see if there was a problem. The maintenance form looked to be in good order. Everything done, testing, cleaning, water change etc. by the book. Finally, I asked if any chemicals had been sprayed in or around the room or tank. The people then remembered their new puppy had popped on the rug in the same room and a carpet cleaning company came out to clean it. Then after cleaning it the sprayed the room with an aerosol. The people remembered it was the day before the fish has died. They also had a protein skimmer, taking in air from the room all day, all night. That made quite an impression on me even regarding my own fish tank. And any external “chemistry” that could find its way into my tank.
Point being made. Do you have any cleaning people, bug or insect control people coming into your fish room cleaning and spraying? Affecting coral growth in a room that gets little ventilation? Something to think about.
Your Ph is 7.6 to 7.9 as you well know bringing fresh air from outside would probably take those numbers well over 8. Our protein skimmers without question can be an important part of maintaining our tanks. But……..

No we don’t have cleaning people other than ourselves and we don’t believe in sprays because we fear it could harm our dogs the most I use is pinesol to mop the floors but nothing aerosol and I only use fresh ro water in a spray bottle to clean the glass with I have a skimmer and thought of maybe hooking one of my air pump lines to the skimmer directly I even placed the air pump outside of the stand to try and pick up more fresh air. I open the French doors in my office for a few hours a day on the weekends when we are home but sometimes it just gets too hot and humid in the house and my ac runs like crazy. I will have to pay more attention to maybe even the candles we light in the house? Would this cause a problem also? Thank you very much for you feed back it’s much appreciated!