Hi guys; I am hoping some of the experts here will help me troubleshoot a few issues I am experiencing with my SPS dominated reef. For the most part, my sps are growing well, and I’ve lost only a single frag over the past year + of reefing. The issue is with color. The problem in a nut shell = I tinker with my system till I get awesome colors out of my sps, but then, a few weeks later, they staring fading to brown again! The cycle has repeated itself a few times, which is very frustrating and perplexing. I hope you can help me brain storm some solutions… I will show you what I mean with a picture diary and a summary of my notes on the tank over the past 15 month, below.
But first, setup:
Redsea Reefer 250L tank (55 gal display + 10 gal sump). Display has about 35 lbs of pukani rock , 3” of Fiji sand (I love my sand-dwelling wrasses). Lights: 3xEcotech Radion XR-15 running SPS AB+ program. Seneye Par meter. Circulation in the tank is 50X tank volume, provided by 2 x ecotech Mp10 running near full capacity + return, which is a Vectra M1. In the sump, I have an oversized skimmer (bubbleking mini 160), 2 liters of siporax, a small fuge that is slowly growing chaeto, and a small phosban reactor that is typically only running seachem matrix carbon (changed out every 3 month), and in the early days of the tank, a small amount of rowaphos, to deal with the initial algae outbreak phase. I have a tunze ATO. The tank is set to 79F, but sometimes drifts to 80F on warm days. To maintain ‘core parameters’, I add 2 tablespoons of kalkwasser in my 5 gallon ATO jug which gets used up in 4 days. I supplement this with daily dosing of redsea foundation buffer A (calcium), b (alkalinity) and c (magnisum). These core parameters have been kept fairly steady over most of the period where I noticed fluctuations in color: Alk between 8.3 and 9.3 dkh; Ca between 430 to 480 ppm, Magnesium between 1280 and 1350. (the ranges represents the extremes; they are typically stable from week to week). Salinity is at 35 ppt, I’ve used instant ocean salt in the first 8 month and recently switched over to seachem vibrant salt (the color issues didn’t coincide with the change in salt). I have a medium to heavy bioload with 2 clowns, 2 wrasses, a small kole tang, 3 chromis, 1 first fish, and 1 goby; cleaner shimp, a bunch of torchus, cerith, nassrius sanils; tuxedo urchin, cleaner shrimp, a few hermit crabs, and an emerald crab. I typically feed my fish 3 times a day (2x frozen, 1x pellets).
Ok, lets get to the history, after cycling.
First 4 month: Did 10% weekly water changes, didn’t feed corals, had low bioload; undetectable nitrates and phosphates, PAR over sps was about 200; sps were growing but looked very pale….
Decided that the water was too clean…
Month 5 to 7. Stopped doing water changes, nitrates started building up, from 0, to 2 to 5 (phosphates = 0); the sps frags started to look better and color up
Month 8. Nitrates hit 10 ppm (phosphates = 0) and about ½ of my sps frags starting browning out. I suspected it was the high nitrates, so I started doing 10% weekly water changes, added the 2 liters of siporax, and started cleaning my sand bed. [now I wonder if it wasn’t the high nitrates, but the depletion of trace elements that caused this brown out… more at the end].
Month 9; the water change schedule helped reduce nitrates from 10 to about 5 (phosphates = 0). SPS started looking good again. Here is an example of my pink lemonade frag
Month 10; keeping weekly water changes, nitrate levels are the same but added a third light that I slowly ramped up over the next two month to the same intensity as the other two.
Month 11; still doing weekly water changes, nitrate levels mysteriously dropped to zero (phosphates still 0). SPS are looking great!
Month 12; first week, still doing water changes and the SPS have never looked better; PAR over the sps is about 280 to 320 now.
A week later though, SPS started fading again!
Based on my notes, I decide that my sps looked best at 5 ppm nitrate. My tank is now having undetectable nitrates, so I decided to dirty up the water again… but how… overfeeding? I thought that this can elevate phosphates too much. After a bit of research, I decided on dosing nitrates, in the form of Potassium nitrate (kno3). I also decided to stop water changes (as it seems like my water change routine was too efficient at cleaning the water). I started dosing very slow, and gradually increased the nitrates levels up to 5 ppm.
Month 12.5 to 14; no water changes, dosing KNo3, nitrates 5 (phosphates = 0); sps looking good
By the end of Month 14, the sps are showing the best color I’ve ever seen … I feel like ‘Tenurepro, first of his name, master of the SPS and protector of the reef realm’… look at these beauties!
But bliss is so fleeting… A week after the best SPS colors ever, the dang things started to fade and brown.
At this point, i have no clear idea of what’s going on. My thoughts are
1) Kno3 dosing elevated potassium too much; this idea has merit as potassium was at 380 ppm before dosing, and it climbed to 460 ppm when the corals started to brown.
2) No water changes over the past 2.5 month led to a depletion of trace elements, which caused the fading. I like this idea… it may also explain why my sps faded around month 8. I sent my water for triton testing to potentially corroborate this.
3) Some contaminate build-up? But what? Kalkwasser solids?
4) Light is not strong enough? Par is about 300, and they did look good at this par before!
Going on the lack of trace elements hypothesis -> I went back to 10% water changes, and started dosing red sea’s coral and trace element additives… I haven’t noticed any changes yet.
The frustrating part is that I know the corals can look great in my setup, and I’ve managed to have them look great, but it only lasts for so long, leaving me unsure of what works and what doesn’t. I am hoping the experts can chime in with some advice on how to deal with these inconsistencies.
Thanks!!!
But first, setup:
Redsea Reefer 250L tank (55 gal display + 10 gal sump). Display has about 35 lbs of pukani rock , 3” of Fiji sand (I love my sand-dwelling wrasses). Lights: 3xEcotech Radion XR-15 running SPS AB+ program. Seneye Par meter. Circulation in the tank is 50X tank volume, provided by 2 x ecotech Mp10 running near full capacity + return, which is a Vectra M1. In the sump, I have an oversized skimmer (bubbleking mini 160), 2 liters of siporax, a small fuge that is slowly growing chaeto, and a small phosban reactor that is typically only running seachem matrix carbon (changed out every 3 month), and in the early days of the tank, a small amount of rowaphos, to deal with the initial algae outbreak phase. I have a tunze ATO. The tank is set to 79F, but sometimes drifts to 80F on warm days. To maintain ‘core parameters’, I add 2 tablespoons of kalkwasser in my 5 gallon ATO jug which gets used up in 4 days. I supplement this with daily dosing of redsea foundation buffer A (calcium), b (alkalinity) and c (magnisum). These core parameters have been kept fairly steady over most of the period where I noticed fluctuations in color: Alk between 8.3 and 9.3 dkh; Ca between 430 to 480 ppm, Magnesium between 1280 and 1350. (the ranges represents the extremes; they are typically stable from week to week). Salinity is at 35 ppt, I’ve used instant ocean salt in the first 8 month and recently switched over to seachem vibrant salt (the color issues didn’t coincide with the change in salt). I have a medium to heavy bioload with 2 clowns, 2 wrasses, a small kole tang, 3 chromis, 1 first fish, and 1 goby; cleaner shimp, a bunch of torchus, cerith, nassrius sanils; tuxedo urchin, cleaner shrimp, a few hermit crabs, and an emerald crab. I typically feed my fish 3 times a day (2x frozen, 1x pellets).
Ok, lets get to the history, after cycling.
First 4 month: Did 10% weekly water changes, didn’t feed corals, had low bioload; undetectable nitrates and phosphates, PAR over sps was about 200; sps were growing but looked very pale….
Decided that the water was too clean…
Month 5 to 7. Stopped doing water changes, nitrates started building up, from 0, to 2 to 5 (phosphates = 0); the sps frags started to look better and color up
Month 8. Nitrates hit 10 ppm (phosphates = 0) and about ½ of my sps frags starting browning out. I suspected it was the high nitrates, so I started doing 10% weekly water changes, added the 2 liters of siporax, and started cleaning my sand bed. [now I wonder if it wasn’t the high nitrates, but the depletion of trace elements that caused this brown out… more at the end].
Month 9; the water change schedule helped reduce nitrates from 10 to about 5 (phosphates = 0). SPS started looking good again. Here is an example of my pink lemonade frag
Month 10; keeping weekly water changes, nitrate levels are the same but added a third light that I slowly ramped up over the next two month to the same intensity as the other two.
Month 11; still doing weekly water changes, nitrate levels mysteriously dropped to zero (phosphates still 0). SPS are looking great!
Month 12; first week, still doing water changes and the SPS have never looked better; PAR over the sps is about 280 to 320 now.
A week later though, SPS started fading again!
Based on my notes, I decide that my sps looked best at 5 ppm nitrate. My tank is now having undetectable nitrates, so I decided to dirty up the water again… but how… overfeeding? I thought that this can elevate phosphates too much. After a bit of research, I decided on dosing nitrates, in the form of Potassium nitrate (kno3). I also decided to stop water changes (as it seems like my water change routine was too efficient at cleaning the water). I started dosing very slow, and gradually increased the nitrates levels up to 5 ppm.
Month 12.5 to 14; no water changes, dosing KNo3, nitrates 5 (phosphates = 0); sps looking good
By the end of Month 14, the sps are showing the best color I’ve ever seen … I feel like ‘Tenurepro, first of his name, master of the SPS and protector of the reef realm’… look at these beauties!
But bliss is so fleeting… A week after the best SPS colors ever, the dang things started to fade and brown.
At this point, i have no clear idea of what’s going on. My thoughts are
1) Kno3 dosing elevated potassium too much; this idea has merit as potassium was at 380 ppm before dosing, and it climbed to 460 ppm when the corals started to brown.
2) No water changes over the past 2.5 month led to a depletion of trace elements, which caused the fading. I like this idea… it may also explain why my sps faded around month 8. I sent my water for triton testing to potentially corroborate this.
3) Some contaminate build-up? But what? Kalkwasser solids?
4) Light is not strong enough? Par is about 300, and they did look good at this par before!
Going on the lack of trace elements hypothesis -> I went back to 10% water changes, and started dosing red sea’s coral and trace element additives… I haven’t noticed any changes yet.
The frustrating part is that I know the corals can look great in my setup, and I’ve managed to have them look great, but it only lasts for so long, leaving me unsure of what works and what doesn’t. I am hoping the experts can chime in with some advice on how to deal with these inconsistencies.
Thanks!!!
. I'll mention that this episodic 'browning' doesn't influence all SPS... only about 25 to 50% of the frags. Most susceptible tend to be red planet, pink lemonade, cold water acro, slimmer and shockaholic
