ok- well ive had 5 different tanks over 30 years of reefing. ive tried it all. The most success ive ever had, especially with calcium/alkalinity consuming creatures llike corals and coralline algae, is with higher ph, stable alkalinity and dosing kalk. OP was asking about coralline. You seem to know it all cuz you had one crappy tank for 2 years.
There are many people on this forum who have had great success with tanks for a long time. If you want some honest advice that will really help you:Hi guys, lots to cover so I thought I’d ask some questions to the pros in the hopes that myself and others fairly new to reefing can get a sort of reefing 102 class after a tank is established and just over six months old. Stepping it up, so to speak.
my tank is a biocube 32. I thought I’d start here in the hobby in hopes to step it up considerably after one year and go big with another 100 plus tank after learning the ropes from you all.
current set up:
Biocube 32 with AI Prime light upgrade and top lid removed. Upgraded 365 pump. Filter is top fine media, middle course media, carbon bag and chemi pure elite. Bottom is bio balls. I’m running the barely useful stock protein skimmer 100% of the time and a UV sterilizer 100% of the time. I have a DIY co2 scrubber in-line with the skimmer because of lower PH issues and it’s helped a lot since installing. An upgraded led display heater system and added wave maker.
I do 20% water changes every week but recently switched to every two weeks. The tank is mostly LPS and soft corals that are all doing well and growing. Others are two nems. A long tent. And a BTA. Both are doing well but have their days of not looking the. Way and I chalk this up to the age of the tank. It’s six months old but was started this all live sand, water and 15 year old live rock. The tank cycled at the beginning in 72 hours so got a good jump start of that.
there’s a healthy CUC of crabs, snails and a diamond goby on some kind of drugs because he never stops working and keeps everything sparkling.
5 small reef safe fish and one clown who has hosted both nems.
parameters and notes on them:
sal- 1.0255
temp 79F
Ph. Runs betweeen 7.9 and 8.1. Water changes and co2 scrubber help keep it as balanced as possible. I do dose 8.3 buffer a little when it drops and the alc can handle the bump.
KH. Tends to range from 9-11.
Cal. Dose to 440 with water changes as it drops to about 380-400 in the week or so between the water changes.
nitrates. 10 after water changes and up to around 15 right before I do the water change.
phos. Always seems to sit at .25ppm no matter what I do.
I am dosing iodine and Kent’s essential trace elements as well.
feeding- fish:
I feed once a day a mixture of rods food breeders blend and my own blended mixture of fresh shrimp, oysters, salmon, clams, brine and MySis shrimp.
corals and nems:
I feed the nems once a week a small piece of fresh shrimp. The corals get targeted feeding of a mixture of reef rods and reef plankton.
questions:
The tank has gone through the ugly stage and seems to be primarily green algae on the rocks. Any reason why I don’t see really any purple coralline algae yet? Is dosing live coralline worth trying?
does anyone have advise on my current set up and see any room for improvement or change?
I’ve added a picture with white light only for reference.
thank you all in advance for your thoughts and help. This community of amazing people are the reason Ive come this far and strive to keep learning.
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