No test no dosing and pure fear

[notthatkindareefer]

Running a 15G cube (weekly 3 gallon water changes), have stuck to softies and “easy” coral (Blasto, duncan, mushrooms, xenia, zoas, toadstool) because they were easy to keep and cheaper. Don’t have any test kits or dosing equipment and today I bought a chalice and submarine favia … so should I order salifert Alk and Mag tests or is there something better? Is there anything else I should buy as well as backups like dosing liquids or anything?

P.S. I know this was not smart but if you saw the deal you would’ve just said take my money too!
P.P.S. I am a college student so that’s why it’s important for me to keep this process as cheap as possible (for now)

 

[Reefkeepers Archive]

What solution are you dosing? I use seachem fusion 1 and 2, which also supplements mag and other elements, I have no experience with salifert but i use red sea foundation pro which has calcium, alk and mag test kits, though it is $75 so idk if that's out of your budget.

 

[BairCorals]

Salifert is all I use. I'd get ph, mag, alk, Calc, nitrate, and phosphate. For dosing, get the brs 2 part kit. Cheap and effective. Doubt you'll need it if you keep up with your 3gallon weekly wc schedule. Test once a week and see how it goes, after wc would be best so you can see if it's keeping up with the demand (which will be low until they really grow). Worse comes to worse, you could just bypass dosing and just increase to 5gal wc and see if that keep up with demand.
Hope this helps!

 

[notthatkindareefer]

Salifert is all I use. I'd get ph, mag, alk, Calc, nitrate, and phosphate. For dosing, get the brs 2 part kit. Cheap and effective. Doubt you'll need it if you keep up with your 3gallon weekly wc schedule. Test once a week and see how it goes, after wc would be best so you can see if it's keeping up with the demand (which will be low until they really grow). Worse comes to worse, you could just bypass dosing and just increase to 5gal wc and see if that keep up with demand.
Hope this helps!

Thanks I was hoping to hear that. All of my corals are so tiny I highly doubt they are sucking up much nutrients from my water column and Im assuming since I will be moving this year, they never will. I haven’t been as strict with water changes as I should be, but tomorrow I am going to do a “before and after” test to see how my levels seem then. To be 100% honest I still have trouble even keeping my salinity at 1.025. So I really have a lot to learn about stability. But I do keep my water changed somewhat regularly and have had any massive algae issues or any true “pests” in my tank yet. Thanks!

 

[notthatkindareefer]

What solution are you dosing? I use seachem fusion 1 and 2, which also supplements mag and other elements, I have no experience with salifert but i use red sea foundation pro which has calcium, alk and mag test kits, though it is $75 so idk if that's out of your budget.

I am not dosing currently, hoping to just rely on water changes.

 

[BairCorals]

Thanks I was hoping to hear that. All of my corals are so tiny I highly doubt they are sucking up much nutrients from my water column and Im assuming since I will be moving this year, they never will. I haven’t been as strict with water changes as I should be, but tomorrow I am going to do a “before and after” test to see how my levels seem then. To be 100% honest I still have trouble even keeping my salinity at 1.025. So I really have a lot to learn about stability. But I do keep my water changed somewhat regularly and have had any massive algae issues or any true “pests” in my tank yet. Thanks!

Yeah Sal took me a while to get behind. And good work! Dip your corals! I just had a massive outbreak of red planeria flatworms and using flatworm exit took my acro and my cleaner wrasse tank looks amazing now but it's kinda sad I lost them just because I didn't qt or dip my corals.

Good luck, id imagine the wc will keep up with the demand no problem.

 

[notthatkindareefer]

Yeah Sal took me a while to get behind. And good work! Dip your corals! I just had a massive outbreak of red planeria flatworms and using flatworm exit took my acro and my cleaner wrasse tank looks amazing now but it's kinda sad I lost them just because I didn't qt or dip my corals.

Good luck, id imagine the wc will keep up with the demand no problem.

I bought a tiny little bottle of the seachem dip and ran out and added two coral without it but today I bought a big bottle of coral revive! Reading this made me even more glad that I did! Sorry to hear that man I know that’s got to suck. But at least you were able to bring it back to normal and keep some live stock!

 

[BairCorals]

I bought a tiny little bottle of the seachem dip and ran out and added two coral without it but today I bought a big bottle of coral revive! Reading this made me even more glad that I did! Sorry to hear that man I know that’s got to suck. But at least you were able to bring it back to normal and keep some live stock!

Yeah, surprised the tang amd everyone else didn't have an issue so made me think there might of been another issue before the treatment.

Yeah I got a big bottle of revive as well, right after those dang worms took over my tank lol. And set up another tank for qt of fish and corals. Should have listened to all those dang youtube streams.

 

[tnw50cal]

IM 10 (so really about 8 gallons)use Instant Ocean reef crystals and do 1 gallon water change once a week. I don't dose anything into it. There is quite a bit of SPS in he tank and it's been up and running for about 3.5 years. I think your going to be OK doing just what your doing.

 

[notthatkindareefer]

IM 10 (so really about 8 gallons)use Instant Ocean reef crystals and do 1 gallon water change once a week. I don't dose anything into it. There is quite a bit of SPS in he tank and it's been up and running for about 3.5 years. I think your going to be OK doing just what your doing.

Seeing that monster colony there made me feel “just fine” indeed! Sweet tank man, and thanks for the reply! Looks so cool!

 

[notthatkindareefer]

Yeah, surprised the tang amd everyone else didn't have an issue so made me think there might of been another issue before the treatment.

Yeah I got a big bottle of revive as well, right after those dang worms took over my tank lol. And set up another tank for qt of fish and corals. Should have listened to all those dang youtube streams.

I always get caught up worrying about the wrong things. It seems like in this hobby (like many others as well tbh) people try to make it seem like if you don’t have premium gear, everything will go wrong eventually. When in reality all that matters is stable maintenance mostly!

 

[BairCorals]

I always get caught up worrying about the wrong things. It seems like in this hobby (like many others as well tbh) people try to make it seem like if you don’t have premium gear, everything will go wrong eventually. When in reality all that matters is stable maintenance mostly!

No kidding, I setup my 60gal on a budget and it's doing just fine. No issues except the ones I could have stopped by having my qt tank setup. Pests just suck lol.

My 60 gal is just a 60breeder aqueon tank I drilled and made a sump out of a 20long and just have a carbon reactor and skimmer. My 10g qt is just a standard aqueon tank with a hob filter and an Amazon light lol. Just take care of your tank and it'll take care of you lol

 

[Badboyan93l]

15g? Well, I honestly would have test kits around but would be useless. It’ll be much easier to have a 5g of fresh saltwater ready for a weekly change. So the best kit would be a salinity checker lol

 

[Cichlid Dad]

Thanks I was hoping to hear that. All of my corals are so tiny I highly doubt they are sucking up much nutrients from my water column and Im assuming since I will be moving this year, they never will. I haven’t been as strict with water changes as I should be, but tomorrow I am going to do a “before and after” test to see how my levels seem then. To be 100% honest I still have trouble even keeping my salinity at 1.025. So I really have a lot to learn about stability. But I do keep my water changed somewhat regularly and have had any massive algae issues or any true “pests” in my tank yet. Thanks!

In a tank that small, water changes weekly should keep you in the good.

 

[dadnjesse]

Just keep doing the water changes and make sure the Salinity is correct.

 

[Tavero]

Running a 15G cube (weekly 3 gallon water changes), have stuck to softies and “easy” coral (Blasto, duncan, mushrooms, xenia, zoas, toadstool) because they were easy to keep and cheaper. Don’t have any test kits or dosing equipment and today I bought a chalice and submarine favia … so should I order salifert Alk and Mag tests or is there something better? Is there anything else I should buy as well as backups like dosing liquids or anything?

P.S. I know this was not smart but if you saw the deal you would’ve just said take my money too!
P.P.S. I am a college student so that’s why it’s important for me to keep this process as cheap as possible (for now)

Salifert alk and Ca test. There is no reason to buy more if you are on a tight budget and these are the most important ones. Mg isn't really necessary.

 

[SliceGolfer]

My most used and go to measurement tools are refractometer, temp, Alk, Nitrate, and Phosphate. Anything else is as needed or on a monthly basis.

 

[Reefkeepers Archive]

My most used and go to measurement tools are refractometer, temp, Alk, Nitrate, and Phosphate. Anything else is as needed or on a monthly basis.

Forgot calcium

 

[SliceGolfer]

Forgot calcium

Actually, no, I did not. For each 2.8dKH of Alk consumed in a reef tank, roughly 18-20ppm of Ca is consumed. One can determine the depletion rate of Ca to dKH consumption, which can be quite small. For example, I have a tank that consumes 0.5dKH daily. I dose an Alk supplement to keep up with the depletion. At 0.5dKH of Alk consumption per day, that means in 6 days my Ca has dropped 18-20ppm.

My point above is that Alk>Ca when it comes to testing. I do test Ca 2x monthly as I have taken steps to solve for depletion of both. In the OP's case, he asked what might be the best parameters to test. If he can swing all the test kits, then great! But if not, purchase the ones that matter most vs ones that get used 1x or 2x per month.

 

[Tavero]

Actually, no, I did not. For each 2.8dKH of Alk consumed in a reef tank, roughly 18-20ppm of Ca is consumed. One can determine the depletion rate of Ca to dKH consumption, which can be quite small. For example, I have a tank that consumes 0.5dKH daily. I dose an Alk supplement to keep up with the depletion. At 0.5dKH of Alk consumption per day, that means in 6 days my Ca has dropped 18-20ppm.

My point above is that Alk>Ca when it comes to testing. I do test Ca 2x monthly as I have taken steps to solve for depletion of both. In the OP's case, he asked what might be the best parameters to test. If he can swing all the test kits, then great! But if not, purchase the ones that matter most vs ones that get used 1x or 2x per month.

In that case phosphate and nitrate isn't really necessary either, UNLESS he is planning to dose it. Fully stocked Nano reef tanks are always lacking these nutrients and he is doing WC anyway so they are even lower.
But if you are dosing them you need to make sure not to overdo it and end up with record parameters.
So technically he can reduce it to a single alk test