randy holmes-farley

Hi ,my reef tank is 9 months old and been dino infested ever since ,my tank is a 18inch nano cube with a 16gal sump,it hold a total of 100 litres of water in total, so ever since my tank was 3-4 month old it have been infested with dinos ,the rock work,sand and glass ,forming thick rusted red...

Hello, fellow reefers, I have made a gradual transition to Tropic Marin and all of their items/programs, but currently still have some Red Sea items in use (NOPOX) on an auto doser. I recently purchased the NP-Bacto-Balance, along with the Tropic Plus-NP, and honestly wanted to know if that is...

Ok so I have a 250 gallon fowler tank I've always had high nitrates tank has been up for 3 years. I started running with a bashsea bio pellet reactor in the middle of October I added 1 cup the first week another cup a week later the 2 more. I haven't seen any drops in nitrates. The tank has been...

This is more of a curiosity question, but one that got me thinking after I got a PH controller and started dosing kalk - is there a chemical link between PH and DKH? Conventional wisdom, in my case, says that as DKH is consumed (along with other chemicals), the PH will drop, in turn telling the...

Hello, Relatively new reefer here and I was hoping you all could help me figure out the best way to bring up my nitrates without messing with my Phosphates. Some background: a few weeks back my phosphates zeroed out. I have subsequently increased my feeding to usually 4x a day, which has helped...

Alright here it goes! I just bought an apex a couple days ago (This is relevant later) I had been dosing/ testing alk with my Hanna checker for a couple weeks. I’ve been dosing 0.2ml after the lights go off and my alk stays at 7.4/7.5. I would like to raise my to around 9 since that’s where my...

Hello friends, So last night I decided to take a look at my Dragon Eye Zoas after lights out and realized I have what looks like brown eggs of some sort all over them. I remember seeing them when I got the frag a month ago but being new to this hobby (and having poor eye sight) thought it was...

Just after Christmas I lost all my fish but a naso tang to velvet maybe ich but I'm sure it was velvet so I have left my tank fallow to eradicate it i purchased all the fish I lost and I have completed the treatment of seachem cupramine at a consistent therapeutic level for 30 days mid way I...

So my tank alkalinity is in the higher range so i decided to reduce it with Sodium bisulfate. But the guy at the chemical shop has given me Sodium Metabisulfite. I didn't notice the error till much later. So i used this and my Alkalinity is about 11 now. it was in 12 range. I'm targeting at 8.5...

Hello. I’m setting up a 1 doser for silicates . I have 1L containers. Should I dilute water glass with rodi water ? How much should I dilute & dose inside a 5 gallon tank (without measuring rock.) I have my rodi water station so my water doesn’t have silicates. Plz don’t ask why. Thanks have a...

Can I use Silica gel to dose silicate In reef tank?

So I'm just getting started with my tank. Still cycling but getting my additive supply stocked up. I plan on keeping SPS & LPS. I want stunning corals (who doesn't) but I really want to focus on dosing some chemails I have not used in the past to help achieve optimal results. I have a 15 gallon...

Hi all, Using Randy’s2 part recipe I can’t find the magnesium chloride hexahydrate sold by the Dead Sea works company. What other options do people use? Thanks!

Na3PO4 Dosing. Can I safely dose the attached? Some background info: I am running a new lightly stocked tank with some small LPS which is +-4 months old. I ran into some nasty issues and discovered Nitrates @ 0 & Phosphate @ 0 several times using a Red Sea test kit. During my journey switched...

Hello Randy, i wanted to ask you about your #2 2Part, since it is in cups and Gallons. i want to make the mix in 2 Liter container i do not have a better opition. how can i do it exactly to have the mixed balanced. and the part of the magnesium how much grams to mix? i am attaching 2 pictures...

Hello y'all, So i got a triton test result back today with high level of SN, so as the tittle says my question is what is SN and how is it affect your tank and how to get rid of that? Thanks

At precisely 2:45 every afternoon I get a sharp dip in ORP & pH as seen on the Apex. I use 2 Dos pumps that dose Calcium and Alkalinity and the other does transition elements and Acro power. None of the pumps are dosing at that time in the day as checked in the apex log. Does anyone have any...

Since my calcium reactor cant seem to keep up with my alkalinity needs, would it be feasible to dump some kalk into my saltwater container? I've implemented automatic water change of about 7500ml/day. Would there be issues like clogging the lines, burning up my DOS, screwing up the chemistry?

Randy I notice my used Lime Soda I used that was purple turn back to white when sitting out overnight. I didn’t have time to toss it so I left it out in an open container. Does this mean it can rejuvenated itself by sitting out?

Two weeks ago I replaced a broken needle wheel shaft on my skimmer. While I had the skimmer taken apart, I put Teflon tape on the venturis’s threads to prevent micro bubble escape. So now, loads of bubbles but no skimmate. Could the tape be releasing compounds that are preventing foam production??

hi everyone, I have notice recently when I added same amount of two parts (dosing pump checked), my alk is descreaing and cal is increasing. Any thought? Week 1 Alk 7.7 ( correct back to 8.5 by dosing 30ml of alk) Cal 460 Week 2 Alk 7.7 Cal 470

I just tested my Alk and it came up 12.2 dKH, I normally run it at 8.0 and it stayed there up until the middle of November. I did a water change with red sea salt and I turned my doser to 2ml every other day and that was about two weeks ago but now like I said before 12.2, before the water...

Why am I seeing such a low measure of Alk? I measured it at 5.6 today. The Alk was struggling to stay over 7 the last 2-3 weeks. Last year, I had to watch things or the Alk would jump over 10! I'm running a calcium reactor AND a Kalk reactor so this really made me scratch my head. I've...

Hello Everyone, What a great forum! I received my test results back from ICP- Analysis Friday. I would like some input from the Forum about the results. Especially look forward to feed back from Randy Holmes- Farley. In readying the Forums over the last few months. I find your input to very...

I have the Milwaukee Mi412 for low phosphate testing. I have 50+ packets of phosphate reagent that expired on 6/2017. Should I toss it or can I get a few more months out of it? Thanks