SPS really more difficult than LPS?

[FuriuzReef]

I have helped several starters, and recommended the all for reef to some.
They all liked it, and were using it for years.
Most of the time, people stop using it when they have too much consumers like large sps colonies, and switch to a 2,3 or 4 part dosing regimen to cut the cost, as they are generally cheaper per unit of Dkh.

In regards to water changes, you have to gauge that for yourself a bit.
Water changes for chemical balancing, one a month a 10-20% change should be ok when using All for reef.
Water changes as a means of keeping the tank clean can be necessary more frequently if your export systems are not good enough or you have a large fish load for the size tank.

I like it, thanks!

I will be looking into the all for reef for sure, Shall i just follow the instructions regarding dosing till there is a constant Kh of around 8? Do i test the values every day when i start dosing or is this weekly based?

 

[MrStoffel]

Depends on the amount of corals you have.
The guide on their website is pretty straightforward: https://www.tropic-marin-smartinfo.com/
Measure Kh
Start very conservatively, dose for 2-3 days.
Measure Kh again, preferably around same time as starting measurement.
If Kh has risen, reduce dose. If Kh has dropped, increase dose.
Once you achieve stability, measure weekly.

 

[FuriuzReef]

Depends on the amount of corals you have.
The guide on their website is pretty straightforward: https://www.tropic-marin-smartinfo.com/
Measure Kh
Start very conservatively, dose for 2-3 days.
Measure Kh again, preferably around same time as starting measurement.
If Kh has risen, reduce dose. If Kh has dropped, increase dose.
Once you achieve stability, measure weekly.

Thank you very very very much!!
Happy reefing!

 

[PotatoPig]

As a couple others have mentioned - some SPS are a lot less demanding than others, even some Acro species. My suggestion would be if you’re going to try SPS then these would be good places to start. The good news here is that because these particular SPS are hardy and tend to grow quickly and do well in aquaculture they’re also generally much cheaper, because they’re easy to produce in large quantities so there’s market saturation for them. Although some folks will warn against a couple species as they’re “too hardy and fast growing” - eg there are mixed opinions about the Red Monti Cap that’s readily and economically available.

Looking at your posts - you’re running a 20 gallon tank? This might be tricky. For one the low water volume will make it much harder to keep parameters stable once you get going. It’s also going to be a challenge if you want Soft/LPS also. The LPS will mostly want low light - think 100par for many species, sometimes lower even, and low flow that has them gently moving, while the SPS will mostly want high light - think 150-250 (or more) and high flow. There’s not a lot of space to do that in a 20 gallon. And if you’re successful the territory claiming strategy of a lot of SPS is to block out light so other corals can’t grow below, leaving you with somewhat limited options for where to put Soft/LPS corals in a smaller tank.

 

[SimbaAnto]

Some of the SPS are forgiving like you can start with Digitata, Bali green slimmers, torts.

Just start with Part A,B and C regimen from BRD balling or All for reef.

Just ensure your all swings are not huge and stays within .5 dkh/day. You should be good.
As long as your alk stays good sps are good.

 

[FuriuzReef]

Depends on the amount of corals you have.
The guide on their website is pretty straightforward: https://www.tropic-marin-smartinfo.com/
Measure Kh
Start very conservatively, dose for 2-3 days.
Measure Kh again, preferably around same time as starting measurement.
If Kh has risen, reduce dose. If Kh has dropped, increase dose.
Once you achieve stability, measure weekly.

Since you are pretty experienced & helpfull, can i ask you one more question?

My salinity tends to drop a bit troughout the weeks because of my skimmer skimming a little bit too wet.
I tried adjusting my skimmer to make it skim more dry, but it's at max (it's a tunze doc 9001).

Is there a simple trick to counter this "problem"? i allready tried adding salt to my top up water & that seem to work pretty well but is hard to control. (used a calculator website for it).

 

[MrStoffel]

Since you are pretty experienced & helpfull, can i ask you one more question?

My salinity tends to drop a bit troughout the weeks because of my skimmer skimming a little bit too wet.
I tried adjusting my skimmer to make it skim more dry, but it's at max (it's a tunze doc 9001).

Is there a simple trick to counter this "problem"? i allready tried adding salt to my top up water & that seem to work pretty well but is hard to control. (used a calculator website for it).

What you can do is make your fresh saltwater used for water changes a little bit elevated in salinity.
Try the app aquacalculator, you will find it has many great features, one is calculating the resulting salinity for what i described above.
Alternatively i have also used this calculator a lot:

Target Salinity Calculator

Aquarium calculator; Create a water-change schedule that can be used to reach a target salinity.

www.hamzasreef.com

Adding small quantities of salt to your sump will usually not harm anything either.
Adding it to your top up is a good idea as well.
But make sure to measure it with a reliable instrument, like a hydrometer or a properly calibrated refractormeter. Personally i only rely on my large trusty hydrometer.

 

[FuriuzReef]

What you can do is make your fresh saltwater used for water changes a little bit elevated in salinity.
Try the app aquacalculator, you will find it has many great features, one is calculating the resulting salinity for what i described above.
Alternatively i have also used this calculator a lot:

Target Salinity Calculator

Aquarium calculator; Create a water-change schedule that can be used to reach a target salinity.

www.hamzasreef.com

Adding small quantities of salt to your sump will usually not harm anything either.
Adding it to your top up is a good idea as well.
But make sure to measure it with a reliable instrument, like a hydrometer or a properly calibrated refractormeter. Personally i only rely on my large trusty hydrometer.

I used the hamza calculator too
I also use a large hydrometer!

Thanks for the help.

 

[GARRIGA]

SPS have higher light and flow requirements which means you need equipment capable of providing for them.

As the branches grow, they can create shading issues for coral around and below them. You may need multiple light fixtures or supplemental led bars or t5

As for difficulty….I wouldn’t say it’s harder but I would say they are more sensitive and less forgiving. If you have methods to keep your parameters stable and in normal range, you should be ok. However an alkalinity drop or other parameter going out of range can cause entire colonies to bleach or rtn and you can lose the entire thing overnight

Also, frags often do not look like the parent colonies until they are healed and have a solid base encrusted. They can be very dull due to stress. This is more true for the advanced / colorful species and is not true for all sps. Regardless, you need long term stability and patience

Don't forget some of us have high room co2 which means jumping through hoops just to get 7.8 pH. Fact is at my house going above 7.5 required a diy Fuge/ATS and that kept it only at 8.1 running it 24/7 and this was in test tank where I didn't have alkalinity being consumed. Sticks logistically not for everyone and might ultimately not be for me.

Combination of Kalk including slurry, outside feed lines and/or co2 scrubbed skimmer and other modifications which add to the complexity of maintaining stability need serious consideration. Calcium reactors to provide two components needed might also drop pH. PH swings what I've consider the most detrimental to all inhabitants.

 

[Reefering1]

My salinity tends to drop a bit troughout the weeks because of my skimmer skimming a little bit too wet.
I tried adjusting my skimmer to make it skim more dry, but it's at max (it's a tunze doc 9001).

You can put something under skimmer to raise it up a bit. Like acrylic or egg crate or something

 

[Bobbyvelvet]

Mixed tank is the hardest for sure.
Here is my tank

 

[JustAnotherNanoTank]

I can throw this in.

Depending on the size of your tank, limits how far which direction you can go.

For example, my current tank is purely for branching sps.

LPS will most likely die in the flow and light I have.

That being said, keeping acros and millies will be easier.

 

[Joe462]

No. many sps are super easy. monti caps are so easy they are hard to get rid of, one of my very first corals was a green monti cap, because some one had brought a bunch of chunks into the fish store and they gave me one for free. but like all the different types of coral some are really hard, like many acros, can be extremely temperamental.

 

[twentyleagues]

Do you use a digital tester for nitrate & phosphate?
The test kit from Salifert that i have is a pain in the butt for a half colour blind person like me lol

yes Hanna.

 

[apb03]

Personally, I think SPS is easier than LPS. While they require good management of the minor elements, that's not difficult nowadays. The same goes for lighting and flow.

I think LPS is a bit tougher. In general, LPS is far more sensitive to flow and lighting. It's a lot easier to crank flow and lighting for SPS than to fiddle with a little bit but not too much of both.

Even nutrients have no real impact on SPS contrary to popular belief.

Mixed Reef, now that's the most difficult.

 

[FernBluffReef]

Newer reef. 7 months back in after a 22 year hiatus. Can’t grow SPS at all even a green slimmer quickly dies. Light is there as my Ritteri that went in a day 30 from first wet is loving it and growing way too fast. Most LPS are doing fine. Had some losses but not a lot for a new tank from dry rock. Fleshy LPS such as Pectina are giving me problems also I assume from too much light but not sure

Never had all that many issues 22 yrs ago with real Fiji live rock and Fiji SPS and LPS. But this starting with dry rock. IDK. I’m not having to does phosphate and Nitrate anymore and starting to manage instead so maybe things will start to get better next time I get tempted to try another SPS.

 

[Roatan Reef]

I tried mixed reef for a while, some SPS did good others didn't, started focusing on SPS care, other LPS died...etc...so now, even though it's still technically a mixed reef, I'm all LPS now, and life is great.

In the future however, I would try a strictly SPS tank.

 

[FuriuzReef]

Currently i only have soft corals in my tank, my tank is small with moderate flow, i'm pretty sure i'm gonna have to make a choice between the 2 because of my tank size.
My choice will be LPS, because i really like the look of Euphylias moving in the flow

 

[Lavey29]

Hello, fellow belgian (i'm from belgium living in the netherlands for 5 years now haha)

I completely understand your point, my tank is pretty small so i hope to get away with weekly water changes and no need for dosing, but time will tell.

Long story short regarding your story is that the LPS was a little more sturdy/resistent than the SPS?

Small tanks need weekly water changes the most

 

[Naekuh]

from my experience... SPS is can be very unforgiving.

STN and RTN for example... it happens so fast, and so unexpectidly, and it will knock out the entire colony on top.
I don't think ive had a coral die so fast then a SPS undergoing RTN.
Its really heart crushing to watch something that pretty you grew for years, turn white and into a table top orniment in less then 24 hours.

You seriously do not even have enough time to ask for help on the forums, once RTN sets... Its you better start cracking and fragging that SPS FAST, before the RTN catches up, or its gone.

Totally agree on the mix reef being the hardest... due to the extreme ends each coral likes... its extremely tough to make all the Karens in your tank happy and not declare chemcial warfare on each other.