Probably not to the extent I want but I'm going to try a few ideas and welcome any suggestions. First my tank and most of the acros in there :
I do get good colouration and they definitely grow somewhere between painfully slow and at acceptable. The green acro started as a single branch that was well encrusted to a frag plug May 2017ish. The purple and green acro was a fresh cut cheapo frag September 2017. The lighter green acro has only been in since April 2018 and seems to be doing pretty well. Maricultured did not do well in the tank.
I get fast pocillopora growth (who doesn't), yet I get painfully slow birdsnest growth, and montiporas are hit and miss. My cap is the only coral that is not doing well in my tank hard or soft corals. I do have a setosa that is doing well though. You can check out my build thread for further details but overall my tank is doing great. I have probably way too many giant softies particularly leather corals that are no doubt inhibiting growth. I do run this system closer to an sps system then a softy system and get good colouration so maybe it's possible to increase growth. I have a few ideas which I will highlight below:
First system parameters :7.7 dkh ca 430 mg 1410 no3 2-5ppm po4 0.13 - this is close to the highest my phosphate tests at usually not lower than 0.05. All the other parameters are stable long term. I carbon dose (diy nopox) and dose acropower twice a week in addition to daily alk/cal with magnesium as needed typically monthly or so. Once a week all corals are target fed variety of foods.
Increased carbon usage - Since I only use a single chamber reactor I typically just run carbon about once a month in addition to high capacity gfo. I actually have a dual reactor somewhere which I will probably bring online. I don't have a big problem with yellow water so I don't think increased carbon will shock anything but I'll go slow. Every 2 weeks then every week, perhaps going even further then that. I bought 1 gallon of rox for the experiment. If I see any improvement I'll continue otherwise I'll go back to occasional water polishing. Increased flow, I actually only have 2 powerheads + return. I've been meaning to get some form of gyre but to be honest I'm pretty happy with my flow pattern. Since it's a bare bottom tank I see where everything settles and a good chunk of that is in the corner. Jeabo rw 15 - 3950gph I have this on the second highest setting so 3500+ gph and a tunze 6065 at 1700 gph + return. Given that I have a lot of soft corals there is a low of movement in the tank with flow. Increased lighting. I have 2 kessil a360s and 1 a350. A 4th kessil would be ideal but I also have a black box between 2 of the 360s where the acros are. Adding more light might overall help the tank but I don't think adding more would help the acros unless I was adding considerably more which isn't really on the table.
Removal of the worst offenders. Of course I don't know what this is so I'd have to guess. Are there certain soft corals that are considerably more toxic then the rest? This is perhaps the easiest answer but I still love my soft corals too! Removing a lot of them would leave the tank pretty bare.
Cabbage coral approaching plate size - this piece actually split into 2 so I'm thinking about removing one, it may be the ideal first candidate. Kenya tree - this one is a source of frustration for me. I bought it originally due to some blue in the coral which is pretty unique. It drops 3-10 frags a week and I have about 100 frags of it in my frag tank + I'm starting to add them to a nano reef. The big rock in the corner has a few dozen branches and I could replace that. The big neon green leather. I'm actually not sure if this is nepthia or sinularia. Probably sinularia. This coral is really outgrowing the tank but it's a nice centerpiece coral so tough choice there. Finally toadstools. There are 3 or 4 neon toadstools in the tank. I can never get these guys to be bigger than my first. They will split and I usually remove the frags although occasionally I let them attach to the rock work thus I have more then one.
It's a bit of a long post, maybe someone will have some other ideas. Maybe I should just wait for my next tank to have more sps.
I do get good colouration and they definitely grow somewhere between painfully slow and at acceptable. The green acro started as a single branch that was well encrusted to a frag plug May 2017ish. The purple and green acro was a fresh cut cheapo frag September 2017. The lighter green acro has only been in since April 2018 and seems to be doing pretty well. Maricultured did not do well in the tank.
I get fast pocillopora growth (who doesn't), yet I get painfully slow birdsnest growth, and montiporas are hit and miss. My cap is the only coral that is not doing well in my tank hard or soft corals. I do have a setosa that is doing well though. You can check out my build thread for further details but overall my tank is doing great. I have probably way too many giant softies particularly leather corals that are no doubt inhibiting growth. I do run this system closer to an sps system then a softy system and get good colouration so maybe it's possible to increase growth. I have a few ideas which I will highlight below:
First system parameters :7.7 dkh ca 430 mg 1410 no3 2-5ppm po4 0.13 - this is close to the highest my phosphate tests at usually not lower than 0.05. All the other parameters are stable long term. I carbon dose (diy nopox) and dose acropower twice a week in addition to daily alk/cal with magnesium as needed typically monthly or so. Once a week all corals are target fed variety of foods.
Increased carbon usage - Since I only use a single chamber reactor I typically just run carbon about once a month in addition to high capacity gfo. I actually have a dual reactor somewhere which I will probably bring online. I don't have a big problem with yellow water so I don't think increased carbon will shock anything but I'll go slow. Every 2 weeks then every week, perhaps going even further then that. I bought 1 gallon of rox for the experiment. If I see any improvement I'll continue otherwise I'll go back to occasional water polishing. Increased flow, I actually only have 2 powerheads + return. I've been meaning to get some form of gyre but to be honest I'm pretty happy with my flow pattern. Since it's a bare bottom tank I see where everything settles and a good chunk of that is in the corner. Jeabo rw 15 - 3950gph I have this on the second highest setting so 3500+ gph and a tunze 6065 at 1700 gph + return. Given that I have a lot of soft corals there is a low of movement in the tank with flow. Increased lighting. I have 2 kessil a360s and 1 a350. A 4th kessil would be ideal but I also have a black box between 2 of the 360s where the acros are. Adding more light might overall help the tank but I don't think adding more would help the acros unless I was adding considerably more which isn't really on the table.
Removal of the worst offenders. Of course I don't know what this is so I'd have to guess. Are there certain soft corals that are considerably more toxic then the rest? This is perhaps the easiest answer but I still love my soft corals too! Removing a lot of them would leave the tank pretty bare.
Cabbage coral approaching plate size - this piece actually split into 2 so I'm thinking about removing one, it may be the ideal first candidate. Kenya tree - this one is a source of frustration for me. I bought it originally due to some blue in the coral which is pretty unique. It drops 3-10 frags a week and I have about 100 frags of it in my frag tank + I'm starting to add them to a nano reef. The big rock in the corner has a few dozen branches and I could replace that. The big neon green leather. I'm actually not sure if this is nepthia or sinularia. Probably sinularia. This coral is really outgrowing the tank but it's a nice centerpiece coral so tough choice there. Finally toadstools. There are 3 or 4 neon toadstools in the tank. I can never get these guys to be bigger than my first. They will split and I usually remove the frags although occasionally I let them attach to the rock work thus I have more then one.
It's a bit of a long post, maybe someone will have some other ideas. Maybe I should just wait for my next tank to have more sps.
