Reef tank consultant?

[BigAl07]

While I'm sure 6 months seems like FOREVER when you're setting up your first tank, that tank is still very new to say the least.

The shrimp picking didn't kill your Euphyllia but they did take advantage of a dead/dying coral and exploit it before someone else did.

I'd suggest pumping the brakes a pinch and letting the tank stabilize and grow for a few months. Then after things have been stable for a couple of months (not just a couple of months from now but exhibiting a stabilized pattern) add some of the easier coral and go slow from there.

One thing that Reefing will teach us is you must have a high degree of patience. The only fast things in a reef tank are the BAD things.

 

[ArowanaLover1902]

See if your LFS has a PAR meter you can rent, check your lighting levels.

 

[BigAl07]

I wish there was a service like this. I am having such a hard time trying to keep corals, and second guessing coral placement. I am too scared to glue anything to my rockwork because who knows if the coral is happy or not?

I don't know where the status of it is now but at one time one of our members , @melev was potentially going to offer "Reef Tank Consulting" as an online service. His knowledge and experience are pretty much phenomenal (IMHO). It might be worth looking him up on his website:

http://www.melevsreef.com/

 

[lewisriverfisherman]

If you are not keeping sps you can have your nitrates a bit higher, I would keep them below 10 though. Corals need food to I keeps sps and I try to keep my nitrates between 5 and 10. Kinda sounds like a light issue as others have stated. Not all peppermint shrimp are created equal some like Lps and eat them some don't. Caught mine eating a brand new to my tank frogspawn in the middle of the night.

 

[reefwiser]

Thanks reefwiser, I appreciate that. I am located in Albany, NY. So in regards to filtration, I guess i should stop dosing NOPOX as well huh? I started my tank with the red sea pro kit cycling method so I just continued dosing nopox thinking it was what I was supposed to do. Probably what is causing my dinos to take off. I am just scared of my nitrates getting too high

https://masna.org/membership/directory/masnaclub

Check out a local
Club. Find people in your area that can come to your home and help you out. Many times people will read forums and see people using all these different pieces of equipment and chemicals and think if others are using them it must be good for me. When in many cases it isn’t the best coarse of action. Just start removing all the add ones and get back to simple.

 

[Tikosyn]

A few shots, hopefully this is what you guys need for my light settings? Thanks for the advice everyone, I’ll be stopping Nopox tonight for starters. And taking any criticism on my lights/flow setup.

 

[reefwiser]

I would order some coralline algae and start getting those rocks covered with coralline algae before hair algae sits in.
InDo-Pacific sells coralline algae grown on plastic that works great I used it in my latest tank to get the algae going.
http://www.ipsf.com/corallinebooster.html
They also sell pods and its good to get them started in a tank as soon as possible.
http://www.ipsf.com/index.html

 

[Tikosyn]

I would order some coralline algae and start getting those rocks covered with coralline algae before hair algae sits in.
InDo-Pacific sells coralline algae grown on plastic that works great I used it in my latest tank to get the algae going.
http://www.ipsf.com/corallinebooster.html
They also sell pods and its good to get them started in a tank as soon as possible.
http://www.ipsf.com/index.html

I actually have live rock in the tank from KP aquatics so I have coralline in there, it’s covering my pumps and starting on the back glass also. The rocks have been covered in some kind of brown algae for what seems like forever

 

[ReefWithCare]

Both Mr Saltwater and FishOfHex will do client calls. They are both very experienced. If you want a paid remote service that could be the way to go.

 

[lapin]

One thing I missed RO/DI water?
I agree with the lighting as maybe a cause. Too bright can burn if not used to the type of light.
I also agree with the need to stop dosing stuff in your tank. Tanks do not need to be dosed unless there is a problem and even then there could be better ways to correct an issue.
The lack of algae growth on your rocks after 6 months if kind of weird.
Maybe the UV is a problem. Are you running them for a reason?
Running any GFO or carbon reactors?
Dosing anything else?
Added anything to kill off algae?
These are just observations and its hard to come up with a solution.

 

[Tikosyn]

One thing I missed RO/DI water?
I agree with the lighting as maybe a cause. Too bright can burn if not used to the type of light.
I also agree with the need to stop dosing stuff in your tank. Tanks do not need to be dosed unless there is a problem and even then there could be better ways to correct an issue.
The lack of algae growth on your rocks after 6 months if kind of weird.
Maybe the UV is a problem. Are you running them for a reason?
Running any GFO or carbon reactors?
Dosing anything else?
Added anything to kill off algae?
These are just observations and its hard to come up with a solution.

I have a BRS RODI system, no tap water here. I just recently added the UV about two weeks ago to try and help with my slight dino issue. I do run rox 0.8 carbon as well. I had a bout of dinos a few months ago and dosed Vibrant for about 3 weeks to deal with it which ended up taking out whatever hair algae I did have, which was not much. I have some growing on one of my rocks now though. I stopped dosing Nopox last night.

 

[Tikosyn]

Anyone chime in on my light settings?

 

[Royce White]

KISS. To much going on here. Once I learned to KISS and let my tank mature everything leveled out and now it's alot like cruise control.

 

[Huskymaniac]

Anyone chime in on my light settings?

Sorry didn’t see the message alert. Unless your keeping some high light spa corals your putting out way to much. The UV can definitely be burning the coral and actually does nothing on overall color. I have mine set down to 30%. I would consider doing the same. I run my blues and violets at 100%, white at 70%, and red/ green at 25. If your doing a straight LPS tank I would look at cutting everything back substantially.

 

[ndrwater]

Read through this whole thread and agree with most saying that your tank is still pretty new, a d that you are kinda going g a bit overboard with the filtration. As mentioned before, flow is a big key and I think you might be slightly lacking in that department as well.
As for the lighting, I think THIS is a big part of the problem. Again as mentioned before, with the settings you have you are basically nuking your corals. As an example, I'll give you a true story how things went when I changed to LED's a few years back.
I was running metal halide/t5 before switching to LED. With my local clubs par meter, I tested par before and after the switch. The LED's were over 10x more powerful than the halide due to the nature of the light and how it penetrates the water more like a spotlight than the diffused light of the old setup. To MY EYE there wasn't much difference, but the meter told the true story. I had to ramp my LED's down to 18% to match the par. Over time, I acclimated the corals to the numbers I run today which is 85%. beyond that I get burning which I think is a major source or your issues.

 

[Fragwil]

As for the lighting, I think THIS is a big part of the problem. Again as mentioned before, with the settings you have you are basically nuking your corals.

+1 On this, I run hydras on my SR80 and for the longest time I had settings kinda like yours, and I could bleach any coral within 2 days.

Check out the low power David Saxby setting, that’s what I’m running now and I’ve had amazing success with it so far.

 

[lzrlvr]

Hi keep it simple here is a photo of my 4 month old

 

[ScottB]

+2 on lighting. I run 3 X Hydras 26 on my 525XL.

I was struggling to keep everybody happy. I borrowed a PAR meter from the LFS. I'd read about hot/cold spots, but the severity of hot/cold spot differences was shocking.

4 inches below water line, directly under the fixture avg 550
4 inches below water line, 6" left/right of fixture avg 150
What I failed to appreciate was the severity of the "cone" shape these lights produce.

At about 12 inches they only begin to overlap and the ranges narrow to around 150-250
Things smooth out at the bottom ~20" to around 150 until you get to the glass which reflects (along with sand) and in the corners you are back to 240.

I strongly encourage anyone running LEDs to borrow one of these and spend a good chunk of time with it.

 

[Tikosyn]

Ok, so at the advice of everyone in this thread I have dropped my lighting down to the Dave saxby low power settings, I will see how that goes going forward, although I believe it is too late for my echinopora :(. I probably shouldn't have gotten that coral this early on anyways, until I really figure out what's going on, seems that my trumpet coral will be dead soon also. I am also planning on picking up a seneye as a par monitor at some point in the future, it seems like a 100% necessary piece of equipment, otherwise it just feels like you are guessing if the coral is happy.

As for flow, are two nanostream 6095's one on each side and one 6095 on the back wall really not enough flow for lps? They are rated for 2510 gph at max flow.

 

[Servillius]

Just looked through the post again. If I'm reading this right, you only have 2 tunze nanostreams for follow? That could possibly be the issue. On a 160g tank, I'd be recommending at least 2 MP40's (or the equivalent)...and maybe more than that.

I’m keeping sps, but by comparison I have a 6255, two 6105, and two 6095 for flow. That’s almost 4 times the flow and a lot more penetrating power.