Can snails crash calcium level?

[Qckslvr]

I am not sure what is going on. My tank has no corals, no fish, only 7 snails. Three trochus, two turbo, and two nassarius. The capacity of my tank is 32 gallons, more likely has 28ish due to rocks and such. My calcium level is normally 390ish, and last night it tested at 60 - 70 ppm! I was a bit shocked and tested it 2 more times (Red Sea Calcium test kit) and the results were the same each time. It was a bit late so I couldn't run over to LFS for a water test to make sure it really had crashed. All my other levels are pretty average, phosphates are up from .06 to .12 but I did feed the tank that morning.

So bad test kit? or did my snails intake that much calcium?

 

[Rocks reef]

Snails do not uptake that much calcium. Something else is going on, I think it is your test kit.

 

[bobnicaragua]

Calcium tests are known for being inaccurate. I wouldn’t worry about it until you add corals. Even at that point, most people focus on testing alkalinity.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

If 40 ppm calcium was consumed by a snail, or anything else, it would necessarily also consume about 5 dKH of alk.

 

[Qckslvr]

my Alkalinity has been very stable at 6.2 for the last two weeks as my tank goes through it's startup cycle. I have some BRS soda ash and plan on dosing the tank seeing as everything else is looking ready for corals and fish.

 

[bushdoc]

Snails would be very unlikely culprit.
I think it is a test, otherwise I can only think of about coralline algae, but it Would have to be massive growth.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

If alk and salinity did not decline or get dosed, then a calcium change is test error.

 

[BeanAnimal]

If 40 ppm calcium was consumed by a snail, or anything else, it would necessarily also consume about 5 dKH of alk.

and be a fossil