A Water Change A Day...

[TimSc2013]

I use Salifert for mag and Red Sea for phos. I also have a Salifert and Hanna for phos.

 

[TimSc2013]

Out of curiosity, tested PO4 with three different kits to see how they compared as the weekly results with Red Sea stayed the same after daily water changes:
Red Sea=0.04
Salifert =0.0
Hanna=0.09 & 0.0
Average would be 0.03 so things look good for my SPS!

 

[mcarroll]

Water change #28!

-Matt

 

[glb]

Water change #28!

-Matt

Are you burned out yet? Lol

 

[mcarroll]

Nah...making them so quick and so easy helps a lot. Still finding it challenging to get to 5 days a week though!

I've really gotta cringe-bust this fragging session I need to do though. It would really take the pressure off the water change regiment and let me do away with manual dosing (again).

-Matt

 

[bknapp]

These small quick water changes are nice, even if daily. I'm liking this new regiment.

 

[mcarroll]

Water change #29!

-Matt

 

[mcarroll]

Water change #30!

Definitely seeing colors continue to brighten...red Monti has that metallic look back, green is getting there - it's newer growth looks fantastic. I don't often see Monti caps display this detail of coloration in other tanks...always good-looking, but in a much more flat/drab version of the color. This is how my tank has been too for around the last 12 months, so this is a VERY welcome change - would be nice as a trend! M. cap. really is one of the most beautiful corals IMO when it looks like this, plus its swirling, plating architecture. Beautiful!

Will see if I can capture any worth photos of the metallic-ness later when the lights are all the way up. (You can see it somewhat in older photos.)

-Matt

 

[glb]

This is so interesting to follow!!

 

[mcarroll]

The metallic is in the photo, but not sure how clear....the photo is a terrible rendition of the coral. I missed my window for peak light on the green...will try again tomorrow.

I may have to dig out the old canon point-n-shoot....

-Matt

 

[mcarroll]

This turned out much better.

(Looks a lot more blue now that I see it on a big screen...that rim is pure white and the green is screaming green. The little nodules between polyps appear to be where the "metallic" look is coming from. Will have to adjust the white-point later and repost the pic.)

-Matt

 

[TimSc2013]

Another week down resulting in the following test results:
Ca=440; Mg=1440; Alk=9.0 & pH=8.1
No3=0.25; Po4=0.04
Fe=0.0; I2=0.09; K=419

 

[mcarroll]

Water change #31!

Keeping a pretty decent pace so far! I think I should have clocked 25 water changes by now, so I'm "ahead" by a good margin!

I'm also out of salt earlier than predicted. Heheh. Time to order...will have a break for a few days

-Matt

 

[Throttle]

Wow very interesting but wouldn't more frequent & smaller WC's consume more time? I didn't read all of these posts lol...

 

[mcarroll]

Time is relative of course, but I can complete a whole water change from setup through cleanup without even hurrying now in less time that it would take me to set up for a "complete" water change before.

-Matt

 

[glb]

Time is relative of course, but I can complete a whole water change from setup through cleanup without even hurrying now in less time that it would take me to set up for a "complete" water change before.

-Matt

I agree. Smaller water changes are easier. Plus your tank is happier. Sounds like a great combination!

 

[mcarroll]

Retested:

alk: 2.11 meq/L
Ca: 400 ppm

So roughly speaking, in 6-days' time, my system failed to provide a necessary additional .89 meq/L of alkalinity and 20 ppm of calcium that it would have needed to have stable levels. Actually not that bad!!

That calculates to corrective doses of about 410 mL of calcium and 350 mL of alkalinity according to Recipe 2.

For the time being I will have to try to dose at least twice a week....still hoping to make time to frag in order to make a reduction in demand too.

-Matt

 

[mcarroll]

Not really trying to turn this into my test log, but figured I'd post some since another adjustment is needed and my new box of salt is not here yet.

alk 2.68 meq/L
Ca 430 ppm

It looks to me like I should have only dosed 350 mL of each in spite of the test results. Gonna make a small 20 mL addition of alk to re-balance and then retest again within a day or two.

-Matt

 

[mcarroll]

So much for a day or two....barely had time to hang out here at all.

One more set of measurements to see if I'm still on track for my dosage rate:

s.g. 1.025
alk 1.93 meq/L
Ca 396 ppm

This is what happens in (another) 6 days - this time without water changes or dosing.....just the kalk reactor left in charge. Salt should be here tomorrow so the party can continue.

Looks like I should have been dosing about 72 mL per day of Recipe 2 if I could go back and dose daily like I guess I should be.

I also see about the same apparent imbalance with Ca and alk in the test numbers as last time...basing my dose on the alkalinity number (it's smaller) and dosing the same quantity of both parts. We'll see.

Last observation...I really can't believe my alkalinity is below 2 meq/L again and I'm seeing virtually no side-effects on any coral. In the past (years ago, admittedly) I've seen STN on multiple occasions when alk dipped to just below 2.5 meq/L. Wonder if my elevated CO2 levels are messing with my test result and alk is not really quite that low?

-Matt

 

[revhtree]

This is so great.