Lobo advice

[ahiggins]

I also turned my heater down 1 degree and programmed my apex to turn off at 78. I'll bring it down 1 degree per day for the next couple of days. I don't want to bring it down too much, so I'll start with 2 degrees and see how everyone reacts.

I think thats smart-I have all my aquariums set to 78. Just seems like a happy medium lol
good luck

 

[kashman100]

I have a 360we and par readings at 22 inches and 100% intensity are around 150-175 par. I think it's not getting strong enough light since it only ramps up to 40% for a few hours a day and your depth is 28 inches. I bet if you slowly turn up the light for the next few weeks the color will come back

 

[stevo01]

I bought from Pacific east aquaculture and it did look healthy.

I recently started dosing, and having some issues keeping parameters stable. Calcium was going up too much, and alk was good, so it's been fluctuating, maybe that's why?

Anyway, I'm dosing alk again to bring it back up. Not sure if that swing is going to cause issues. It shouldn't go up by more than .5 dkh per day right now. I'll take another reading.

On water temp, I keep between 78-79. So obviously there's a big difference. I can work at bringing that down, but not sure what affect that'll have on the rest if my inhabitants who are doing fine?

I dont think higher Ca wouldnt be an issue, 77-78 degrees should be fine for everything, get alk to 8-10, and start spot feeding it 2 times a week. Keep an eye on it daily, and if tissue continue to receed I would do a dip and continue to stay on track.

 

[ytsejam02]

I have a 360we and par readings at 22 inches and 100% intensity are around 150-175 par. I think it's not getting strong enough light since it only ramps up to 40% for a few hours a day and your depth is 28 inches. I bet if you slowly turn up the light for the next few weeks the color will come back

Sorry, let me clarify, it's 20" water with light 8" above.

I'm slowly bringing up the intensity because the lights are new the last few weeks.

 

[ytsejam02]

Also, I intended to stop bumping intensity once I reached 50%.

Do you think I need to do more?

 

[oneofmany]

How are your corals responding to the bump? (if at all)

 

[ytsejam02]

How are your corals responding to the bump? (if at all)

They all seem to be happy. Wellso is doing great, gets huge during the day, I think he might be up to 8" across at this point. my lepto is growing, trumpet coral plumps up (doesn't seem like it's going to split any heads any time soon), my acans/micromussas all plump up, favia seems fine, tho doesn't appear to be growing at all..., my frogspawn looks great, the short tentacled plate looks good, most obviously eat, the less obvious ones (favia and lepto) all seem fine.

I also have a montipora that I bought at the fragfest, my first and only SPS at the moment. Far as I can tell, it's fine

My softies are all fine.

So, yeah, long answer for what is essentially "Everyone appears happy!"

 

[ytsejam02]

This is the entire tank. You can see the lobo towards the bottom on the right side.

 

[ytsejam02]

FWIW sometimes the best thing to do is nothing at all... A simple "routine" might be all that is required.

That has been my thought for the past two weeks, along with denial that anything was wrong... :-D

 

[kashman100]

Between 90-115 PAR is where you want it for Lobos. Hard to guess on Par but at 28 inches from light to coral is pretty far so at 40-50% intensity seems pretty low. The seneye reef is on sale right now and would be a good idea so you aren't guessing. You don't have to use the slides to get PAR readings. Also maybe you could contact the person you bought it from to see what lighting they used.

 

[ytsejam02]

Between 90-115 PAR is where you want it for Lobos. Hard to guess on Par but at 28 inches from light to coral is pretty far so at 40-50% intensity seems pretty low. The seneye reef is on sale right now and would be a good idea so you aren't guessing. You don't have to use the slides to get PAR readings. Also maybe you could contact the person you bought it from to see what lighting they used.

It's 20" inches of water and the light is 8 above. Pacific east had them under the same Kessil s at the fragfest. I think at much higher intensity. But again, I don't want to burn my other corals, so I'm going slow.

I'm assuming it makes a difference that 8 of the 28" is air, right? Par drops a ton thru water, right?

 

[kashman100]

Yeah mine is similar with 20 inches of water. Feeding and once you get your light stronger it will come back

 

[ytsejam02]

Yeah mine is similar with 20 inches of water. Feeding and once you get your light stronger it will come back

Thx, I'll keep my fingers crossed!

 

[scobeyra]

+1 to raising alk levels. What's your magnesium level? If it's low you'll have a hard time keeping your cal / alk levels stable.

 

[ytsejam02]

+1 to raising alk levels. What's your magnesium level? If it's low you'll have a hard time keeping your cal / alk levels stable.

I haven't actually been testing. It's not that I've had a hard time keeping it stable. At least I don't think it is. My tank is not consuming much calcium. So my regiment brought alk up, but even with small calcium doses, my calcium was getting too high. Like over 500 with alk at 9. So I'm trying to get alk back to 9 and not dose calcium right now.

Long story, but that's why I'm not dosing/testing mag yet. Maybe not a good reason, but aside from calcium absorption, I don't feel like I'm having a hard time keeping it stable yet.

 

[scobeyra]

I don't fully understand the chemistry involved, but from what I've heard, magnesium acts as an important binding agent for calcium. Can really affect the absorption rate. It's just as important as testing / dosing ca and alk.
Could be a reason your calcium levels skyrocket

 

[ytsejam02]

I don't fully understand the chemistry involved, but from what I've heard, magnesium acts as an important binding agent for calcium. Can really affect the absorption rate. It's just as important as testing / dosing ca and alk.
Could be a reason your calcium levels skyrocket

Yeah, that seems to make sense. I'm ordering a red sea mag test as I type this.

I gave my corals some reef roids last night for the first time. The response was a crazier than I expected! The polyps on my wellso, plate coral, and lobo all opened up bigger than I've ever seen.

So, i'll repeat that process every few days.

As of yesterday morning my Alk was up to 8dKH. I am targeting 9, so still a ways to go. My dialy regiment is 8ml of BRS soda ash. As I mentioned, I'm not dosing Cal since the last time I measured, it was 450. I'll be measuring again tonight.

I also moved my lobo to the back right corner of my tank where it get much less flow. The downside is it'll likely get much less PAR as well, but I'm still in the process of bumping my kessil's up. They currently max at 42%. Targeting 50 there. Also plan to make it so that it ramps to 50% faster. Right now it gets there at 1pm and stays there for about 2.5 hours. I don't have a PAR meter, so I'm making somewhat educated guesses at the moment.

 

[scobeyra]

Nice. I have 2 Lobos that are fairly high up in my tank. They get medium to soft flow but pretty strong light. They're pretty fat and happy there it seems.

 

[ytsejam02]

Nice. I have 2 Lobos that are fairly high up in my tank. They get medium to soft flow but pretty strong light. They're pretty fat and happy there it seems.

Hm, for some reason I didn't really think to elevate him in the tank.... Not sure where I'd put him, but that would be a temporary solution to the lighting issue. I think it would be exposed to increased flow tho...

I hate the idea of moving him around too much. I did that once with a torch coral early in my reef career, and it died surprisingly fast. Obviously this guy ain't happy, but if I can kill a happy coral by messing with it too much, it stands to reason that I can kill a poor coral even faster.

My light is currently at 44%. My temp hovers between 76.5 and 77.5, I also dipped it prior to the move. It seemed to respond great to the reef roids... I think I'm in a wait and see mode right now.

I really appreciate all the input everyone has given me!

 

[ytsejam02]

I don't know, he really doesn't look very good. :-( There's a brown fleshy ridge around his entire edge that just seems to be receding on all sides at this point.

On top of which I lost my swales swissguard basslet. He was always antisocial, hidden 99% of the time. The last week it was 100% of the time, and I was worried, and sure enough this morning the body finally floated where I could see him.