It’s been a while - 120 gallon

pdiehm

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It’s been a while that posted about my 120. This thing finished cycling early September I guess. Truth be told I am not opposed to selling it with all the equipment and livestock.

that said, it was really ugly. I wasn’t paying attention to it except to feed the fish every other day. I went downstairs one day and noticed the algae was gone. Literally. The rocks were that aged grey color. The coralline has exploded...more than any previous time I tried to set this tank up. The stylophora is doing outstanding and I was certain this thing was going to die like all the other corals did in the holding tank (What this means is I have no way to keep corals in QT). I put this in the tank thinking within a few weeks it will die. It has encrusted and growing. Crazy!?!? Seems like the less I do, the better the tank does!

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I also have a yellow watchman goby in QT doing well. Going into the biocube on Monday.

and I have about 40-50 lbs of Pukani sitting around doing nothing so I decided to toss it in the 40 breeder and cycle it. Will probably toss in a damsel in there in a few weeks.

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tamanning

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I can't tell you how many people have told me to keep my hands out of my tank that it will do better if I just leave it alone.
 
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pdiehm

pdiehm

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I can't tell you how many people have told me to keep my hands out of my tank that it will do better if I just leave it alone.

right? But I literally ignored this tank. No water changes for 7-9 weeks. Alk had dropped to 6.3...it was just weird and then it just *poof* looked good
 

tamanning

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I have not done a water change in going on 5 years. I dose calcwasser and magnesium
 

tamanning

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corals and bio adjust. it's amazing the amount of different tanks with parameters all over the scale that defy logic.
 

Victor_C3

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That’s the thing, even if you temporarily lose focus and enthusiasm on your tank and just keep up with the minimum feeding and ATO that’s things tend to work out.

Now go and add a few SPS frags to the tank and get yourself into the habit of adding a scoop of Tropic Marin Carbocalcium every other day and watch growth take off.

Before you do that, monitor you calcium usage for a few weeks and you’ll notice that your tank “eats” calcium at very consistent rate.

That’s all I did when I used to have a SPS dominated 30 gallon nano and it looked amazing right up until I lost my job and had to move back in 2009.
 
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pdiehm

pdiehm

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That’s the thing, even if you temporarily lose focus and enthusiasm on your tank and just keep up with the minimum feeding and ATO that’s things tend to work out.

Now go and add a few SPS frags to the tank and get yourself into the habit of adding a scoop of Tropic Marin Carbocalcium every other day and watch growth take off.

Before you do that, monitor you calcium usage for a few weeks and you’ll notice that your tank “eats” calcium at very consistent rate.

That’s all I did when I used to have a SPS dominated 30 gallon nano and it looked amazing right up until I lost my job and had to move back in 2009.

I haven’t quite gotten the hang of this dosing thing. I test at 7.7, dose to 8.0. Come back and the next day it’s 8.2, come back the next day it’s 7.4...so clearly I am doing something wrong
 

tamanning

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I haven’t quite gotten the hang of this dosing thing. I test at 7.7, dose to 8.0. Come back and the next day it’s 8.2, come back the next day it’s 7.4...so clearly I am doing something wrong
I'm guessing your talking about dkh? if it's swinging that much check your magnesium. if it's low your calcium can precipitate and your number will drop.
 
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pdiehm

pdiehm

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I'm guessing your talking about dkh? if it's swinging that much check your magnesium. if it's low your calcium can precipitate and your number will drop.

mag is 1350 per Aquaforest
 

Victor_C3

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I gotta say I’m good at being lazy. I only ever tested my Ca levels and dosed the one-part calcium solution I mentioned in my previous post to match the calcium consumption. The other parameters, I ignored them.

I can’t guarantee success for you, but it worked just fine for me. Once you get the hang of dosing calcium and how much you need to add, you almost won’t need to test but every week or two. Ca consumption gets to be extremely constant.
 

A worm with high fashion and practical utility: Have you ever kept feather dusters in your reef aquarium?

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