ICP Results - All For Reef only and no water changes for 1 year

[DanTheReefer]

I am the biggest advocate of water changes and credit them for 15 years of success in the hobby.

That said, we built a house and following multiple delays our planned 3 month stay with a relative turned into 10, followed by 2 months to get the reef tank moved and set up. The logistics for running RO at the relative’s were a pain, ended up connecting RO to hose spigot outside, so I decided to top off only, keep an eye on my indicator corals, and act quickly if things headed south. My tank was a 75 gallon mixed reef heavy with Monti caps, established almost 3 years when this started.

All of the coral and fish did well, no losses over the course of the year and many doubled in sized despite giving out large chunks to the local reef club. Only new additions were bumblebee snails to control vermatid snails.

I typically dose 30 ml A4R daily by hand during feeding, I like to maintain alk a little lower, 7 dKH or so, to slow the coral growth. I had been maintaining the reef at the relative’s across town for 2 months and unfortunately the last couple weeks I was not able to go buy as much so levels definitely dipped, I should have done the ICP test before things got really hectic.

FTS shortly after no water changes started:


FTS last day of tank




ICP results (ICP Analysis)


My biggest take aways are to up the salinity, and also that montis do seem to be resilient to imperfect chemistry, I will leave the number chasing to other reefers.





Here’s everyone in the new tank after the defacto 100% water change, glad life and reefing are back to normal

 

[Reefahholic]

I should have done the ICP test before things got really hectic.

If you had caught it sooner, what was your backup plan?

 

[taricha]

I would definitely make sure I have some way to measure salinity independently of that ICP report before changing the salinity. Looking at the report, I don't see anything that's clear to me is bad except values that could all be from low salinity.

 

[DanTheReefer]

I would definitely make sure I have some way to measure salinity independently of that ICP report before changing the salinity. Looking at the report, I don't see anything that's clear to me is bad except values that could all be from low salinity.

I agree I think people have concerns that A4R can cause chemistry to move out of proportion, it’s probably true over long time spans but in my experience over the past year the stony corals thrived and the params are low in somewhat correct proportions