Am I being impatient? 6 month old reef struggles

[Hemmbone20]

There is nothing wrong with trying SPS in a 6 month old tank.

1st thing I would do is stop buying LFS RO water. Get your own system; you can get systems which hook up directly to your sink faucet so no plumbing required. This will allow you so do weekly water changes.

Your params look good, so my next thought would be lighting. For SPS, I would CRANK those bad boys up so you are getting 350-400 at the top. If you can’t achieve this, consider adding some T5 supplementation.

Add in some white.

Seriatopora and Montipora digitata will be your easiest SPS to start with. Get as big of a frag or colony as you can. Grown is exponential if they have the space.

LPS just grow very slowly in general. That is why so often they are fragged from wild colonies unlike SPs and softies.

I was hesitant to crank up my lights because I thought that might add stress to an already stressed out coral.. by looking at my stressed Monti Digi, you think it would benefit from more light?

As for the RO.. I would like to get it set up at home but my space is limited. Us Floridians don’t have basements!
I’d probably have to set up a water mixing station in my garage and the LFS is 5 min away from my house..

 

[Hemmbone20]

deleted double post

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Nearly every comment here is contradicted by someone’s experience in the other thread. There is just no clear cut answer why, or even whether it is true in general.

 

[thedon986]

I was hesitant to crank up my lights because I thought that might add stress to an already stressed out coral.. by looking at my stressed Monti Digi, you think it would benefit from more light?

As for the RO.. I would like to get it set up at home but my space is limited. Us Floridians don’t have basements!
I’d probably have to set up a water mixing station in my garage and the LFS is 5 min away from my house..

Do you know the par at the frag rack? Are you placing any SPS before they die? I know my frag rack on the glass gets half the par on the rocks at about 140 vs 350. If you are 200/250 on the rocks your frag rack could be sub 100.

 

[Northern Flicker]

I was hesitant to crank up my lights because I thought that might add stress to an already stressed out coral.. by looking at my stressed Monti Digi, you think it would benefit from more light?

As for the RO.. I would like to get it set up at home but my space is limited. Us Floridians don’t have basements!
I’d probably have to set up a water mixing station in my garage and the LFS is 5 min away from my house.

I think 200 won’t be enough light for most SPS, and I’d even say that’s a bit low for LPS.

You can slowly add light, doesn’t have to be a one day change.

Based on your params, I am guessing lighting is the biggest issue. You have enough height that you can still maintain lower PAR areas lower for the LPS.

 

[skey44]

Do you know the par at the frag rack? Are you placing any SPS before they die? I know my frag rack on the glass gets half the par on the rocks at about 140 vs 350. If you are 200/250 on the rocks your frag rack could be sub 100.

This… where are you putting your frags? The frag rack? I like to glue my corals straight to the rock where I want it on day 1. Try to get the right flow and light for the species immediately.
Tank looks good, parameters look good as long as they’re stable. I keep my alk pegged on 8 with A4R. And hear low phosphates are one of the worst thing for acropora. Hang in there. I don’t think it’s your setup.
I make my own RO but from what I see LFS water can vary widely. The LFS I shop at does regular icp testing of their ro/di water. The one across town sells “filtered” water that is trash, Not even RO.
Now I’m going to have to check out this other thread about tank age. It fascinates me the whole tank age talk and how old a tank has to be for something.

FWIW my tank is 6 months old and have around 50 frags now. I also have 13 fish. I’ve only lost one coral so far (probably too aggressive with the dip). Stony corals only. From caulastrea to acropora. I don’t even know what my par is but it’s probably kinda low. I am obsessive with my tank parameters and observing though. And I have had struggles from Dinos to having most nuisance algaes somewhere in my tank but maintained. My corals are definitely growing well and it’s noticeable. I wouldn’t call it slow. Acropora show signs of encrusting within the week if they’re healthy when I get them.

Growth shot, id have to look for the timeline but im feeling lazy regarding that atm, less than 6 months for sure

Don’t let the age of your system limit you. It looks like it should support Acropora from your pictures.

 

[Jimbo327]

Makes sense. Mine was all dry rock in the DT with live rock in the sump. I've heard of some folks that keep frag plugs seeding in the sump. They say it helps the frags encrust. Makes sense I suppose since it would be like a small piece of live rock vs dry.

I do keep some frag plugs in my sump. Not sure if it helps it encrust because my acros usually doesn't encrust that quickly. But I can see the bright white plugs get a brown coating before resolving, so I rather have some plugs cooking in the sump and well seasoned.

 

[Hemmbone20]

For those asking, the par at the frag rack is about 150. I aim to slowly ramp up the par for newly added corals.

 

[Hemmbone20]

This… where are you putting your frags? The frag rack? I like to glue my corals straight to the rock where I want it on day 1. Try to get the right flow and light for the species immediately.
Tank looks good, parameters look good as long as they’re stable. I keep my alk pegged on 8 with A4R. And hear low phosphates are one of the worst thing for acropora. Hang in there. I don’t think it’s your setup.
I make my own RO but from what I see LFS water can vary widely. The LFS I shop at does regular icp testing of their ro/di water. The one across town sells “filtered” water that is trash, Not even RO.
Now I’m going to have to check out this other thread about tank age. It fascinates me the whole tank age talk and how old a tank has to be for something.

FWIW my tank is 6 months old and have around 50 frags now. I also have 13 fish. I’ve only lost one coral so far (probably too aggressive with the dip). Stony corals only. From caulastrea to acropora. I don’t even know what my par is but it’s probably kinda low. I am obsessive with my tank parameters and observing though. And I have had struggles from Dinos to having most nuisance algaes somewhere in my tank but maintained. My corals are definitely growing well and it’s noticeable. I wouldn’t call it slow. Acropora show signs of encrusting within the week if they’re healthy when I get them.

Growth shot, id have to look for the timeline but im feeling lazy regarding that atm, less than 6 months for sure

Don’t let the age of your system limit you. It looks like it should support Acropora from your pictures.

Your tank looks great! When did you start adding SPS? The growth you have on that one acro is impressive for a 6mo old tank.
I’m going to go read your build thread now..

 

[sfin52]

Of course they grow slow… I totally understand that.. but it’s easy to tell when I coral is growing ZERO. I attached that pic of a Favia frag to show how the edges are slowly dying.
I figured after a few months I would be able to notice tiny improvements but it seems stagnant.

Do you feed the duncans. Duncans are a fast growing coral.

 

[Hemmbone20]

Do you feed the duncans. Duncans are a fast growing coral.

Ya I feed the Duncans. They look healthy but no new heads yet.
I feed mysis to the acans and Duncan, AB+ to the rest.

 

[sfin52]

Ya I feed the Duncans. They look healthy but no new heads yet.
I feed mysis to the acans and Duncan, AB+ to the rest.

There will be little heads under the full polyps.