Unfortunately I have 2 mandarins who require the TDO pellets - before purchasing those I only fed mysis and never had a nutrient issue and actually had the opposite problem where I couldnt get phosphates, so this whole thing kinda stems from balancing feeding tdo pellets and phosphate control, which is clearly a real battle on my hands lol
Not sure, I have ran cuprasorb and it did not pull iron out. Do you do weekly water changes?
I do and the major elements have always been stable as a result (calc, mag, etc) - but the traces have been tricky. I dose iodine a couple times a week but thats the only dosing i do.
A quality salt mix should replenish trace elements fine with weekly changes major elements too unless you have a full stock of corals then alk and cal might need to be dosed but never trace with weekly water changes. Based on your ICP, I would dose like 10ml of chaeto gro per week to balance your trace numbers.
I run BRS Rox carbon - I change it out biweekly 3-4 Tbsp in 20 gal
Okay - I will give that a shot. My hunch is maybe polyfilter is stripping all metals and thats why I cant get zinc to measure. Is it better to do the chaeto gro or individually dose the element with an ATI Zinc bottle? I get nervous blanket dosing, Ive heard of some elements getting overdosed because of it.
With absolutely all due respect, please don't take this with the wrong tone as it's not intended as such. But, without a thought in my mind, a swing in phosphate absolutely will tick LPS off, especially euphyllia. Euphyllia does not tolerate swings in most vital parameters, and phosphates are one.
Also on the advice of my LFS I just added 16 grams of Rowaphos to the back chamber to try to get the phos controlled around 0.1
Haha story of my life too - I will definitely take this as a learning experience. We’ll see in time just how expensive of a learning experience this ends up being.
Any all in one for trace will help but use sparingly over like 3 weeks to get trace numbers corrected. I was using chaeto gro once or twice a week but I also have a fuge but my ICP always had very good trace results so chaeto gro helped that but it doesn't contain iodine. As stated though once you have used it over a few weeks, stop and just let your weekly water changes manage your trace replenish.
I've never used it so can't comment. I use phosguard regularly and a bag of chemipure blue. You could use chemipure elite which has GFO in it for phosphate control. Your problem is the pellet feeding you have to do.
Recession it is and often due to stress. The stress mentioned can be:I am in trouble. Had a thriving tank up until I did an ICP test and noticed phosphates were out of control at 2.1ppm - ended up dropping it to 0.3ppm with phosguard over the span of about 50 days, and some type of process in dropping the phosphates seems to be killing my LPS. Tank is a year and a half old and here are parameters.
My only theory is potentially the alkalinity plummeted due to either the Phosguard or dropping phos. Tank normally runs at 8.7 dkh and the phosguard treatment seemed to have dropped it to 7.9 dkh. After a small water change it went back up to 8.3 dkh last night. Could this swinging be what is causing my issues or is it maybe something else entirely? At a loss trying to figure this out.
Salinity 33.91 PSU 35.00 PSU -1.09 PSU 
View Carbonate hardness 7.13 °dKH 7.50 °dKH -0.37 °dKH View Major elements Chloride 18982 mg/l 18983 mg/l -1.60 mg/l View Sodium 10547 mg/l 10546 mg/l +0.90 mg/l View Magnesium 1302 mg/l 1261 mg/l +40.92 mg/l View Sulfur 977.6 mg/l 882.1 mg/l +95.54 mg/l View Calcium 420.1 mg/l 403.6 mg/l +16.49 mg/l View Potassium 431.1 mg/l 391.2 mg/l +39.95 mg/l View Bromine 51.40 mg/l 64.24 mg/l -12.84 mg/l View Strontium 8.69 mg/l 7.67 mg/l +1.02 mg/l View Boron 4.75 mg/l 4.22 mg/l +0.54 mg/l View Fluorine 1.04 mg/l 1.25 mg/l -0.21 mg/l View Minor elements Lithium 81.07 µg/l 163.0 µg/l -81.92 µg/l 
View Silicon 101.7 µg/l 95.88 µg/l +5.82 µg/l View Iodine 37.67 µg/l 62.32 µg/l -24.65 µg/l View Barium 64.45 µg/l 9.59 µg/l +54.86 µg/l 
View Molybdenum 10.93 µg/l 11.51 µg/l -0.57 µg/l View Nickel u. 0.48 µg/l -0.48 µg/l View Manganese u. 0.96 µg/l -0.96 µg/l View Arsenic u. 1.44 µg/l -1.44 µg/l View Beryllium u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Chrome u. 0.48 µg/l -0.48 µg/l View Cobalt u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Iron u. 0.48 µg/l -0.48 µg/l View Copper u. 0.48 µg/l -0.48 µg/l View Selenium u. 0.48 µg/l -0.48 µg/l View Silver u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Vanadium u. 1.44 µg/l -1.44 µg/l View Zinc u. 1.92 µg/l -1.92 µg/l View Tin u. 0.48 µg/l -0.48 µg/l View Nutrients Nitrate 24.21 mg/l 2.00 mg/l +22.21 mg/l View Phosphorus 99.41 µg/l 14.38 µg/l +85.03 µg/l 
View Phosphate 0.30 mg/l 0.04 mg/l +0.26 mg/l View Pollutants Aluminium 52.46 µg/l 0.10 µg/l +52.36 µg/l View Antimony u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Bismuth u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Lead u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Cadmium u. 0.19 µg/l -0.19 µg/l View Lanthanum u. 0 µg/l +0 µg/l View Thallium u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Titanium u. 0.10 µg/l -0.10 µg/l View Tungsten u. 0 µg/l +0 µg/l View Mercury u. 0 µg/l +0 µg/l
Yeah its tricky for sure - pellets are the only thing that works with mandarins since they will sit on the rocks long enough for them to eat it. Plus I have 7 other fish who also enjoy the pellets so I have to feed a little more than Id like to ensure they get some. Its a hassle but I really do love these mandarins so I cant justify losing em.
I think I can rule out flow and light because they have thrived in the tank for so long. Salinity should be dialed in and I routinely calibrate with solution (Hanna checker).
Yes phos is slightly up. In particular, the euphyllia shows the most stress. Euphyllia requires Stable tank conditions, and is intolerant to major swings in water quality, and is sensitive to almost any level of copper in the water. Since they are a large polyp stony coral, calcium and alkalinity are two very important water parameters that will affect the growth of your coral. This coral will start to die off if the calcium levels are too low. A calcium level of about 400 ppm is just right.
journals.biologists.com
Par is somewhere in the 90-100 range for the euphyllia. I have my lights around 60% blue 10% white. They’ve been fine up until I started dropping the phos so I think the light was okay.
