Start dosing Kalk?

Randy Holmes-Farley

Reef Chemist
View Badges
Joined
Sep 5, 2014
Messages
66,543
Reaction score
62,838
Location
Arlington, Massachusetts, United States
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
This is untrue. Hexacorals like Euphyllia will generally utilize calcium and alkalinity in a balanced fashion. The coral animal builds it's skeleton out of calcium carbonate and calcium is a major component of that.

I'm not sure where the above misconception started, but if people are ending up with unbalanced alkalinity consumption it's probably because they have a lot of coralline growth happening. Sometimes coralline algae, especially in seawater with depressed pH, takes the form of high-magnesium calcite which incorporates a substantial portion of its mass from magnesium rather than calcium. This will lead to excess alk consumption over calcium, but coral skeletal growth really won't.

Unless someone has a specific issue maintaining balanced calcium and alk, they should always dose it in balanced form. People have been using kalkwasser to maintain the two for decades.

Maybe the idea came from data. That is certainly why I espouse it.

All corals have a slight imbalance of calcium relative to alkalinity due to incorporation of magnesium and strontium in place of calcium. I do agree that coralline is among the highest users of magnesium relative to calcium, but ALL calcifying organisms take up some magnesium and strontium into the skeleton, leading to slowly rising calcium if kalkwasser is used to replace all alkalinity consumed.

In general, reef tanks are a mix of organisms that will have show less calcium demand than alkalinity, and that was shown by my tank using just limewater for 20 years, with substantially higher calcium and the starting salt mix.

FWIW, I show the magnesium incorporation rate into a large number of coral species here:

 

biophilia

Well-Known Member
View Badges
Joined
May 6, 2018
Messages
575
Reaction score
1,270
Location
CA
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Maybe the idea came from data. That is certainly why I espouse it.

All corals have a slight imbalance of calcium relative to alkalinity due to incorporation of magnesium and strontium in place of calcium. I do agree that coralline is among the highest users of magnesium relative to calcium, but ALL calcifying organisms take up some magnesium and strontium into the skeleton, leading to slowly rising calcium if kalkwasser is used to replace all alkalinity consumed.

In general, reef tanks are a mix of organisms that will have show less calcium demand than alkalinity, and that was shown by my tank using just limewater for 20 years, with substantially higher calcium and the starting salt mix.

FWIW, I show the magnesium incorporation rate into a large number of coral species here:


Thanks for the insight. Very interesting!
 

MightyMO

"The Algae made me do it!!!"
View Badges
Joined
May 9, 2020
Messages
920
Reaction score
1,289
Location
Mid Missouri
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
To be honest with ya, I ran red sea coral pro plus salt, it is buffered really high in the alk and calcium ranges. And if you don't have a mature sps dominated tank, you levels will always remain on the high side so you won't have to dose 2 part or kalkwasser for what you are going for... I would highly recommend the red sea blue bucket salt as it will keep the alk and calcium numbers at a better stability point than what the pro plus will do for your set up... as far as your phosphate numbers are concerned, I would recommend not overfeeding as you don't have a lot of livestock yet. That will help with the phos numbers... It is still pretty new so just keep your eyes on things... some phosphate is good, 0 phosphate imo is bad... I'd like to see a pic of your tank cuz it sounds like you have a good idea in your mind of what your going for and I'm totally intrested in seeing it! Hope i helped!
 

MightyMO

"The Algae made me do it!!!"
View Badges
Joined
May 9, 2020
Messages
920
Reaction score
1,289
Location
Mid Missouri
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
To be honest with ya, I ran red sea coral pro plus salt, it is buffered really high in the alk and calcium ranges. And if you don't have a mature sps dominated tank, you levels will always remain on the high side so you won't have to dose 2 part or kalkwasser for what you are going for... I would highly recommend the red sea blue bucket salt as it will keep the alk and calcium numbers at a better stability point than what the pro plus will do for your set up... as far as your phosphate numbers are concerned, I would recommend not overfeeding as you don't have a lot of livestock yet. That will help with the phos numbers... It is still pretty new so just keep your eyes on things... some phosphate is good, 0 phosphate imo is bad... I'd like to see a pic of your tank cuz it sounds like you have a good idea in your mind of what your going for and I'm totally intrested in seeing it! Hope i helped!
And for all who will take this the wrong way, I am not bashing coral pro plus salt, I have a 5 gall bucket of it on hand atm... Just right tool for the right job is all I'm suggesting...
 
OP
OP
Saluki2003

Saluki2003

Active Member
View Badges
Joined
Nov 21, 2020
Messages
234
Reaction score
155
Location
San Diego
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
To be honest with ya, I ran red sea coral pro plus salt, it is buffered really high in the alk and calcium ranges. And if you don't have a mature sps dominated tank, you levels will always remain on the high side so you won't have to dose 2 part or kalkwasser for what you are going for... I would highly recommend the red sea blue bucket salt as it will keep the alk and calcium numbers at a better stability point than what the pro plus will do for your set up... as far as your phosphate numbers are concerned, I would recommend not overfeeding as you don't have a lot of livestock yet. That will help with the phos numbers... It is still pretty new so just keep your eyes on things... some phosphate is good, 0 phosphate imo is bad... I'd like to see a pic of your tank cuz it sounds like you have a good idea in your mind of what your going for and I'm totally intrested in seeing it! Hope i helped!
I’ll test again tomorrow to get post WC numbers again. My Alk went from 137ppm (post WC) to 124ppm (pre WC) in a week. Is this a normal fluctuation?

I feel like my Phosphates and Nitrates are holding pretty well...we’ll see how steady they stay with the fuge. Last week was 0.03ppm and this week it’s 0.04ppm both tests preWC. I think last weeks 0.06ppm post WC was an outlier from user error on the test.

I’ll need to get a Nitrate test that will give me lower end values.
 

Mastering the art of locking and unlocking water pathways: What type of valves do you have on your aquarium plumbing?

  • Ball valves.

    Votes: 38 47.5%
  • Gate valves.

    Votes: 42 52.5%
  • Check valves.

    Votes: 16 20.0%
  • None.

    Votes: 21 26.3%
  • Other.

    Votes: 8 10.0%
Back
Top