Tips and advice for SPS

[Isiah1820]

So I’ve kept LPS successfully, torches,hammers,octos, frogspawn. Tank has been running for over a year now, I’ve tried cheap sps frags and they all seem to bleach out within a few days. I keep my tank pretty stable, and I’m lost lol. I can barely keep Monti caps alive, they lose colors but won’t completely bleach out. I also lost a digi after maybe a month. I can keep birds nest and stylos tho. Just looking for advice. Will post numbers below and tank shots.

 

[Davileet]

Calcium is higher and temperature is lower than I would personally keep it. What kind of lights do you have?

 

[thatmanMIKEson]

So I’ve kept LPS successfully, torches,hammers,octos, frogspawn. Tank has been running for over a year now, I’ve tried cheap sps frags and they all seem to bleach out within a few days. I keep my tank pretty stable, and I’m lost lol. I can barely keep Monti caps alive, they lose colors but won’t completely bleach out. I also lost a digi after maybe a month. I can keep birds nest and stylos tho. Just looking for advice. Will post numbers below and tank shots.

I see alkalinity went up in 5 days? how often do you check it and how do you dose elements alk/cal/mag? are you sure there are no swings In 5 days or 24hrs, including temperature and salinity? there's lots of things it could be if you can support birdsnest your very close so it can't be to far from achieving.

it's hard to say what's going on in someone else's system, but your close so I'd just try little things one at a time, I'd honestly lower alkalinity to 7-8dkh 9max. it's always been easier on acropora for me when I have other things going on. (with high alkalinity you need high light high flow and high nutrients)
also I've never liked having calcium above 420 it's a good number I try to stick at and I don't worry when it's 380 or so I just adjust, but that's not a big deal. if you do one I'd lower alkalinity..

good luck!

 

[Lavey29]

You have high alk compared to low nitrates nutrients. With low nutrients number your alk should be 8 DKH.

 

[Lavey29]

That Yellow fungia plate is really cool

 

[Isiah1820]

Calcium is higher and temperature is lower than I would personally keep it. What kind of lights do you have?

2 ai primes.

 

[Isiah1820]

I see alkalinity went up in 5 days? how often do you check it and how do you dose elements alk/cal/mag? are you sure there are no swings In 5 days or 24hrs, including temperature and salinity? there's lots of things it could be if you can support birdsnest your very close so it can't be to far from achieving.

it's hard to say what's going on in someone else's system, but your close so I'd just try little things one at a time, I'd honestly lower alkalinity to 7-8dkh 9max. it's always been easier on acropora for me when I have other things going on. (with high alkalinity you need high light high flow and high nutrients)
also I've never liked having calcium above 420 it's a good number I try to stick at and I don't worry when it's 380 or so I just adjust, but that's not a big deal. if you do one I'd lower alkalinity..

good luck!

I try and test once a week or when I can. That can mean more than once a week or once. And I’m new to the dosing thing I have the Red Sea element package, and I don’t use it often. I also use the Red Sea pro salt. How would I go about lowering cal, and Alk? And my nutrients do swing. I feed heavy and dose no pox based on the Red Sea calculation 1.1 mil daily.

 

[Isiah1820]

I’m going to test again tomorrow and see where I’m at.

 

[Isiah1820]

Is this a good guide? I don’t dose the elements cause I’ve tested days apart or even a week and my elements will be almost the same. I have a ton of coral so those elements should be getting consumed right? Idk

 

[TopShelfAquatics]

We just released this video today and Kevin shares a bunch of secrets from the farm and gives TSA's top ten SPS in our minds!

 

[Isiah1820]

We just released this video today and Kevin shares a bunch of secrets from the farm and gives TSA's top ten SPS in our minds!

Will definitely check this out.

 

[SFREEF3R]

Do I understand correctly that you measure and then manually dose to correct once or twice a week?

As for lowering Alk and Ca - these will naturally come down as your corals consume them and also potentially with water changes. However the Red Sea Coral pro salt has a dKH of 12. If you want to target a lower dKH I would suggest using the normal Red Sea salt (blue bucket) with a typical dKH of 8.

I share the opinion that 8 dKh is a safer baseline to target. Having your salt close to the target will help minimize fluctuations. Keep in mind you will have to more actively add Ca/Alk to maintain this value. I presume your water change water at 12 dKH (vs. your tank at 9/10dkH) is a meaningful part of your Ca/Alk addition.

Do you have an idea of how many dKH your corals consumer per day or week now?

 

[SFREEF3R]

<Duplicate post>

 

[matt_work27]

From my experience I have only ever killed sps from too low nutrients not too high, so error on the high side in my opinion. Dripping kalkwasser has also been very effective in increasing ph and growth

 

[Isiah1820]

Do I understand correctly that you measure and then manually dose to correct once or twice a week?

As for lowering Alk and Ca - these will naturally come down as your corals consume them and also potentially with water changes. However the Red Sea Coral pro salt has a dKH of 12. If you want to target a lower dKH I would suggest using the normal Red Sea salt (blue bucket) with a typical dKH of 8.

I share the opinion that 8 dKh is a safer baseline to target. Having your salt close to the target will help minimize fluctuations. Keep in mind you will have to more actively add Ca/Alk to maintain this value. I presume your water change water at 12 dKH (vs. your tank at 9/10dkH) is a meaningful part of your Ca/Alk addition.

Do you have an idea of how many dKH your corals consumer per day or week now?

Usually when I test the levels are similar so I don’t dose. It may be cause I’m using the pro salt, it’s a 32 gallon also and I do a 5 gallon WC every 2 weeks. And I don’t know what is being consumed per day. That is why I mentioned how are my levels almost the same days apart? Again I have a lot of coral. Shouldn’t they be lower with consumption?

 

[Isiah1820]

From my experience I have only ever killed sps from too low nutrients not too high, so error on the high side in my opinion. Dripping kalkwasser has also been very effective in increasing ph and growth

I have kalkwasser. But I do need to get a PH tester.

 

[matt_work27]

Might as well pick up a cheap one just so you know where you are at but it isn't something I test remotely often

 

[Pod_01]

I also use the Red Sea pro salt.

That is impressive tank with that salt. I personally could not grow anything when I started with that particular salt. Congratulations.

Like others mentioned my suggestion is to use salt that has Alk in the 8 dKh. From my experience I find 7.5 dKh works well with SPS and low NO3 and PO4 values.
SPS are sensitive to Alk swings so I dose small amounts multiple times a day.
Something to consider is the use of Tropic Marin All For Reef. This product releases Alk gradually so it doesn’t create a spike and it can be dosed once a day by hand. It also includes trace elements so it makes the reef keeping of SPS easier at the start.

Good luck,

 

[SFREEF3R]

Usually when I test the levels are similar so I don’t dose. It may be cause I’m using the pro salt, it’s a 32 gallon also and I do a 5 gallon WC every 2 weeks. And I don’t know what is being consumed per day. That is why I mentioned how are my levels almost the same days apart? Again I have a lot of coral. Shouldn’t they be lower with consumption?

If the salt is your only addition for alk/ca then each water change will raise you Alk by about 0.5dkh if you’re in the 9-10 range when you do the WC (which if your levels are stable is probably roughly your consumption rate).

It makes me question the accuracy of your alk test though. I wouldn’t expect a 1dKH swing in a week even immediately before/after a WC.

What test do you use?

 

[thereefhotspot]

We just released this video today and Kevin shares a bunch of secrets from the farm and gives TSA's top ten SPS in our minds!

Nice video! I definitely recommend everyone take the time to watch this through whether you are a beginner or an expert! I even learned something new and my family has owned an aquarium store for 37 years!!