Help with growing sps

[nickenayat]

Hey guys I have had my 24 gallon Reef tank up for almost 6 months now. Overall the experience has been great with growing corals and healthy fish, however I have constant terrible luck with sps (rainbow montipora) and my chalice coral. Ive placed the sps in different places, high/low for lighting and for flow, nothing seemed to work. I've been doing a 5gallon water change every week. I'll list my equipment and today's parameters along with some photos. Hope you guys take a look and have some advice. Thanks


Equipment-
Two AI prime hd (max out intensity at 40% for 2 hours then gradually comes back down)
IM skimmate skimmer
Santa Monica filtration .2 drop algae scrubber
IM desktop media reactor
Maxspect gyre 130

Salt-
HW Reef marine mix

Parameters-
PH:8.3
Temp: 79.0
Salinity: 1.023
Magnesium: 1240
Calcium: 410
Alk: 8.8
Phosphate: 0
Nitrate: 0
Nitrite: 0
Ammonia: 0

 

[Travis Stewart]

I've been having pretty good luck with mine. I run one ai prime on a 30 cube. I get my whites to 30% max. I will attach my lighting schedule. IMO I wound have green start polyps that high but instead sps. I also lowered mine to about 7-8" off the water stuface

 

[reeferfoxx]

Hey guys I have had my 24 gallon Reef tank up for almost 6 months now. Overall the experience has been great with growing corals and healthy fish, however I have constant terrible luck with sps (rainbow montipora) and my chalice coral. Ive placed the sps in different places, high/low for lighting and for flow, nothing seemed to work. I've been doing a 5gallon water change every week. I'll list my equipment and today's parameters along with some photos. Hope you guys take a look and have some advice. Thanks


Equipment-
Two AI prime hd (max out intensity at 40% for 2 hours then gradually comes back down)
IM skimmate skimmer
Santa Monica filtration .2 drop algae scrubber
IM desktop media reactor
Maxspect gyre 130

Salt-
HW Reef marine mix

Parameters-
PH:8.3
Temp: 79.0
Salinity: 1.023
Magnesium: 1240
Calcium: 410
Alk: 8.8
Phosphate: 0
Nitrate: 0
Nitrite: 0
Ammonia: 0

Not sure what you're are running in your reactors but your tank needs po4 and no3. According to your parameters, you have neither. I would work on getting po4 up to 0.01-0.04ppm. Then get NO3 up to the 5-10 range.

 

[Oscar47f]

I would be feeding fairly well because you don't have phosphates and nitrates and corals do need some level of nutrients typically nitrates 5ppm and phosphates at <.2 ppm i believe now you don't have to increase these nutrients by reducing your filtration but you can dose corals food and stuff very slowly and minimally at first? A lot of people keep SPS tanks at 1.026 or 35ppt of salt but I've seen tanks grow sps without that.

 

[nickenayat]

Not sure what you're are running in your reactors but your tank needs po4 and no3. According to your parameters, you have neither. I would work on getting po4 up to 0.01-0.04ppm. Then get NO3 up to the 5-10 range.

Just running carbon in the reactor. Should I do a water Chang every two weeks? Turn off the reactor? Increase feeding? How would recommend increasing the nutrients?

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Not sure what you're are running in your reactors but your tank needs po4 and no3. According to your parameters, you have neither.

+1. The tank does look darned good though.
The other thing to check is good flow. a med strong laminar is easy to find. And acclimation to light should be considered.

 

[nickenayat]

I've been having pretty good luck with mine. I run one ai prime on a 30 cube. I get my whites to 30% max. I will attach my lighting schedule. IMO I wound have green start polyps that high but instead sps. I also lowered mine to about 7-8" off the water stuface

I see you have your UV at 100%. I was afraid of burning it everything because it's only 12" deep. I have the chalice right next to the GSP and it seems to be turning brown or light brown going white. Also I had the rainbow month closer to the light and that's when it lost all the color and started to bleach out. That's what I don't get. Can they turn white by not getting enough light?

 

[Donovan Joannes]

Reduce your white channel & UV to 30-40%. Bring the other colors except blue to much lower setting, probably less than 10%. Bleaching happens due to intense light. Very low nutrients will escalate the issue further. Once coral health improved then you can readjust your lighting to suite your taste, but I always advise my buddy to max out white & UV at 60%, colors less than 5% as rough estimation if they can't get a light meter.

 

[reeferfoxx]

Just running carbon in the reactor. Should I do a water Chang every two weeks? Turn off the reactor? Increase feeding? How would recommend increasing the nutrients?

You could put the algae scrubber on pause for awhile since you are skimming. Fine particulate foods such as reef-roids, phyto feast, coral frenzy are a good way to help increase po4. Adding more fish and increasing frozen foods will help with no3. If that doesn't cut it, dosing KNO3 or seachems nitrate is a quicker way. Also, your magnesium is on the low side. Your LPS would love it around 1300-1350 range.

 

[Travis Stewart]

I Agree with everyone, but I don't believe you have 0 phosphates or nitrates. That's not an easy task to accomplish

 

[Donovan Joannes]

I will start with the light for sure. I would rather let it browning due to inadequate light instead of losing it due to bleaching and starvation. Feeding can start immediately after you turn down the light intensity.

 

[reeferfoxx]

I Agree with everyone, but I don't believe you have 0 phosphates or nitrates. That's not an easy task to accomplish

Thats true. However we want nutrients in the water column and not locked in the rocks, sand bed, or also in this case the algae scrubber.

 

[Travis Stewart]

I would slowly bring my salinity up and increase magnesium as well.

 

[Travis Stewart]

Thats true. However we want nutrients in the water column and not locked in the rocks, sand bed, or also in this case the algae scrubber.

I agree with this also. But I got 0 phosphates on all test kits also until I got the hanna checker and my 0 went to .2. I know that higher PO4 also plays a role in decoloration of coral..

 

[nickenayat]

Thanks for all the help guys. I may increase my feeding or take the algae scrubber offline for the time being. My nitrates and phosphates were at 0, however I using an API test kit so I could be not 100% accurate. I'll try to adjust the lighting as well. I'll update with some photos or changes. Any help is good help in this hobby.

 

[nickenayat]

Idk if I mentioned this, but this is the 3rd rainbow montipora attempt I've had. Each time the coral bleaches out and I have been trying different things but always kept the nitrates and phosphates low because I thought sps don't like them. Maybe I was killing everyone :(

I wasn't sure because every other coral does great. I've just had a constant battle with any montipora or sps or my chalice

 

[nickenayat]

I would slowly bring my salinity up and increase magnesium as well.

Thanks. Would you say 1.025 is a better salinity to shoot for? I'll try to bring the mag up to 1350

 

[Travis Stewart]

Yea I would try to get closer to 1.025-1.026. Also really take tournament time with it because coral is really sensitive to salinity change

 

[Best Fish-Jake]

Where are you placing them in the tank? Make sure they're receiving high amounts of flow, as well as light. You may want to dose/target feed with a product similar to 'phytoplex' or 'microvert' for all your sps and filter feeders... I dose phytoplex broadband in my tank twice per week

 

[Best Fish-Jake]

The ideal salinity for a reef is going to be 1.025. I have my tank at 1.024, then it slowly climbs to >1.026 with evaporation