Sir Kon Salty Sox
Kind of a Valuable Member
Tank has been up and running close to 7 months. 75 g and a 29g sump (I have a 30g standard that is going to replace it soon. Adding in the bevels and different spots for stuff, water volume should be same) Started tank with 100 lb dry rock, 9 lb live rock, 60 pound live sand, and a yellowtail damsel. Yes, I am a horrible person and fish-in cycled my tank. To make it worse, I even took the fish back to LFS when I noticed her bothering my clowns. Lesson learned; bottled bacteria is a thing. Moving on!
I test nitrate, phosphate, high range pH, and calcium. I have never since cycling the tank had any nitrate levels. Yes, I use API test kits but I have read the directions and actually follow them and I am pretty sure my results are valid. If anyone is local to Lafayette, IN and wants to come test me water with salifert/hanna, I would pay you for your gas + cost of the test strip/liquid.
High range pH was around the 8.4 mark, and now (last couple weeks) it’s coming in at 7.4, 7.8. I believe this level to be a little low.
Calcium I am using anywhere from 25-35 drops to get blue color, that’s calcium in 400-500 level. I have one encrusting cypahstrea but it is getting gray in spots and I believe it is dying ☹ the calcium level is also slowly dropping…
Newest member of the tank is a full grown kole tang. Picks at the rocks, and eats anything I throw in the tank. She is I believe the reason I have been getting detectable phosphate levels, cause I am throwing in a LOT of food every day for her. She's fat.
Now are you ready for the weird one? Phosphate is all over the place. They will go from 0 to 1 to 0.25 to 1, kind of sporadic. Never extremely high, but they have been at 0.0. This might be from the increase in feeding, but I wanted to get some type of detectable nitrate/phosphate. I started feeding 3 frozen cubes of mysis, about 100 new life spectrum pellets, and about 15 hikari wafers a day. I have also picked up phyto-plankton, and have added 1 lid worth a few days back, hoping some of the color comes back into these corals. Nothing really too crazy happened yet. Will continue to do one lid per week, two days after the water change on Friday nights.
I am a huge fan of “nothing happens fast in this hobby” so I just kind of have been watching and observing. I do however believe there is some type of intervention that would benefit my tank at it’s current stage. I run a little (maybe 1 pound soaking wet) bag of carbon down in the sump area, have 4 air stones going, change 10-15% water weekly on Fridays, and use filter floss and that’s about it.
1) Am I ready to start dosing? I want to get nitrate at a detectable level. There are about 7 coral frags in there, mushrooms seem to be losing a little color, zoas not as happy as they have been. 2 clowns, 1 kole make a lot of poop, where is it all going?????
2) Should I dose anything other than nitrate? Possibly some pH up to get pH closer to that 8 area.
I have tried to include all the information but of course if you need more just ask. Really just want to make sure I am not currently doing anything wrong that will slowly but surely cause a huge headache down the road.
I test nitrate, phosphate, high range pH, and calcium. I have never since cycling the tank had any nitrate levels. Yes, I use API test kits but I have read the directions and actually follow them and I am pretty sure my results are valid. If anyone is local to Lafayette, IN and wants to come test me water with salifert/hanna, I would pay you for your gas + cost of the test strip/liquid.
High range pH was around the 8.4 mark, and now (last couple weeks) it’s coming in at 7.4, 7.8. I believe this level to be a little low.
Calcium I am using anywhere from 25-35 drops to get blue color, that’s calcium in 400-500 level. I have one encrusting cypahstrea but it is getting gray in spots and I believe it is dying ☹ the calcium level is also slowly dropping…
Newest member of the tank is a full grown kole tang. Picks at the rocks, and eats anything I throw in the tank. She is I believe the reason I have been getting detectable phosphate levels, cause I am throwing in a LOT of food every day for her. She's fat.
Now are you ready for the weird one? Phosphate is all over the place. They will go from 0 to 1 to 0.25 to 1, kind of sporadic. Never extremely high, but they have been at 0.0. This might be from the increase in feeding, but I wanted to get some type of detectable nitrate/phosphate. I started feeding 3 frozen cubes of mysis, about 100 new life spectrum pellets, and about 15 hikari wafers a day. I have also picked up phyto-plankton, and have added 1 lid worth a few days back, hoping some of the color comes back into these corals. Nothing really too crazy happened yet. Will continue to do one lid per week, two days after the water change on Friday nights.
I am a huge fan of “nothing happens fast in this hobby” so I just kind of have been watching and observing. I do however believe there is some type of intervention that would benefit my tank at it’s current stage. I run a little (maybe 1 pound soaking wet) bag of carbon down in the sump area, have 4 air stones going, change 10-15% water weekly on Fridays, and use filter floss and that’s about it.
1) Am I ready to start dosing? I want to get nitrate at a detectable level. There are about 7 coral frags in there, mushrooms seem to be losing a little color, zoas not as happy as they have been. 2 clowns, 1 kole make a lot of poop, where is it all going?????
2) Should I dose anything other than nitrate? Possibly some pH up to get pH closer to that 8 area.
I have tried to include all the information but of course if you need more just ask. Really just want to make sure I am not currently doing anything wrong that will slowly but surely cause a huge headache down the road.
