Wiz
2500 Club Member
Current tank is 75d/30r/29s i started it 4years ago. Moved it and upgraded 2 years ago. Everything was great. Couldnt stop the growth. Fraging sps/lps/softies like a mad man. Shortly before i moved my montis had a strange problem. Random patches of white would appear. No pests, all other corals were fine. I researched as much as i could. Couldnt find a reason. Then i moved.
Had a half full display and sump in place and cycling for 2 weeks. Moved the tank in one trip. Kept all rocks, inhabitants and water. Kept a few cups of sand added to the new live sand. Moved the 30l fuge in tact with 6" dsb. Just about doubled my water volume. For a while everything did great. I started to think the new salt water had something that was missing. Montis started to recover. And grew
.
I had tested for a month straight when i set up and found my doses. Then once a week for a month. Then monthly.
I decided for various reasons to ditch my dsb. Mainly because my macro fauna had not been as good since i introduced it. So i closed of the refugium and completely emptied it. I did not scrub glass. But i did remove all sand and water. Put in new live sand with a few cups of my old sand. Put a quarter of tbe macros back. And let that run closed off for a week. Then i opened it up. Tested for a few months and all was well. Changed my dose a bit but fine otherwise. And within a few months and a pod order my fauna is back to its original state. One square inch of my rouble is packed with critters!
About a year in i had started slacking on testing. It had been a few months. I noticed the montis having a different issue. They were retracting so far all you saw was specs of color. They didnt die. Just look awful. Then a few other sps started to get rough. And zoas were shrinking and letting go. I tested and all parameters were off. Nitrate 40ppm! Mag was lil low calc and alk were high! I did a 25% water change and stopped dosing. I ajusted the mag. Started back carbon dosing. And kept testing. Here is where it gets wierd. For atleast 3 weeks now i have been testing daily. My calc and alk have been bouncing around. They drop really slowly but some days remain the same or even lighly rise. I have not dosed alk or calc for a week and my calcium tests between 430 and 440 consistantly. My alk has consistantly dropped slowly. Like .1dkh a day. Which is baffling. I used to keep it at 12. But when this happened i thought i should go a bit lower in case this ever happens again. So i let it drop to 9.6 then dosed enough to raise it to 10. Brs calc. It raised it to 10. 5 the next night. So i let it fall to 9.6 again and dosed less than half the recomended dose. It was exacly 10 the next night. I have no idea whats going on. I was dosing 3oz+ a day! Now i dose pretty much 0 and it stays the same. Some zoas and some sps are fine. All lps are fine. Red planet and purple acros fine. Nems fish all fine. Montis are retracted and some sps have brown algae growing on some tips. I am starting to believe my lights might be to high percentage. So i lowered that recently and raised the fixture. But not sure if that matters.
Probably missed things there but its a start. Opinions?
Had a half full display and sump in place and cycling for 2 weeks. Moved the tank in one trip. Kept all rocks, inhabitants and water. Kept a few cups of sand added to the new live sand. Moved the 30l fuge in tact with 6" dsb. Just about doubled my water volume. For a while everything did great. I started to think the new salt water had something that was missing. Montis started to recover. And grew
. I had tested for a month straight when i set up and found my doses. Then once a week for a month. Then monthly.
I decided for various reasons to ditch my dsb. Mainly because my macro fauna had not been as good since i introduced it. So i closed of the refugium and completely emptied it. I did not scrub glass. But i did remove all sand and water. Put in new live sand with a few cups of my old sand. Put a quarter of tbe macros back. And let that run closed off for a week. Then i opened it up. Tested for a few months and all was well. Changed my dose a bit but fine otherwise. And within a few months and a pod order my fauna is back to its original state. One square inch of my rouble is packed with critters!
About a year in i had started slacking on testing. It had been a few months. I noticed the montis having a different issue. They were retracting so far all you saw was specs of color. They didnt die. Just look awful. Then a few other sps started to get rough. And zoas were shrinking and letting go. I tested and all parameters were off. Nitrate 40ppm! Mag was lil low calc and alk were high! I did a 25% water change and stopped dosing. I ajusted the mag. Started back carbon dosing. And kept testing. Here is where it gets wierd. For atleast 3 weeks now i have been testing daily. My calc and alk have been bouncing around. They drop really slowly but some days remain the same or even lighly rise. I have not dosed alk or calc for a week and my calcium tests between 430 and 440 consistantly. My alk has consistantly dropped slowly. Like .1dkh a day. Which is baffling. I used to keep it at 12. But when this happened i thought i should go a bit lower in case this ever happens again. So i let it drop to 9.6 then dosed enough to raise it to 10. Brs calc. It raised it to 10. 5 the next night. So i let it fall to 9.6 again and dosed less than half the recomended dose. It was exacly 10 the next night. I have no idea whats going on. I was dosing 3oz+ a day! Now i dose pretty much 0 and it stays the same. Some zoas and some sps are fine. All lps are fine. Red planet and purple acros fine. Nems fish all fine. Montis are retracted and some sps have brown algae growing on some tips. I am starting to believe my lights might be to high percentage. So i lowered that recently and raised the fixture. But not sure if that matters.
Probably missed things there but its a start. Opinions?
