CDavmd
AstroReefer
Hi all, just looking for another set of eyes and some opinions.
The tank is 11 years old. Its a 36 gallon Corner Bow with about another 10 gallons in an acrylic sump. It has housed mainly LPS and some select SPS and a small amount of fish and inverts over the years. Currently only 2 clowns, 2 Anthias and a Basslet. Serpent Star and Coral banded shrimp and my corals. Some of the colonies are from the original setup 11 years ago others are a few months old. The tank is getting ready to be taken down (in a few months) and the livestock moved to my new reefer 425XL build (you can see it in my signature).
I've done all sorts of things with this tank over the years but have settled over the past 4 years with the following regimen with until recently good success.
Red Sea Pro Salt mixed to a spec grav of 1.026
Temperature 79-80
ATO with a half teaspoon of BRS Kalk per gallon.
Chemipure Elite in the sump changed out every 3-6 months depending on Phosphate level
Puragen in my overflow-box changed out every 6 months
I use BRS filter socks and change them out every 3 days. I periodically will put a piece of polysponge in the filter sock.
AI Vega LED system
Until recently, I had an SWX 120 Skimmer. When it died in August I replaced it with a simplicity 120.
I do a 5 gallon water change every week occasionally 2 weeks but mainly every week.
I feed lightly, 1 cube of either reef plankton, mysis, etc every day. I used reef chili and reef roids maybe 2x per week. I used reef energy for a bit but did not see any difference in the corals so stopped it.
I use Red Sea test kits except for phosphate and Alk where I use the Hannah checkers. My chemistry has been relatively stable with Ca in the 420-440 range, Alk in the 7-8 range, Mg always tests very high in the 1400-1600 range. My nutrients tend to run low so I have been feeding more regularly. I have gone from 1-2 nitrate down to zero at times. My phosphates were running <0.01 for a few weeks until I started feeding more and now generally run in the 0.03-0.05 range.
I also Dose Red Sea NOPOX at 0.8cc per day to keep my Nutrients in the appropriate range. I switched over to this from Vodka about 5 years ago and have been quite happy with it.
The only other major changes in the last few months was a complete change out of the sand bed in August. I removed the very old sand which was about 2-3 inches and replaced it with a 1/2 inch of new sand. I removed some rock and changed my scape to a more open flow structure. I also added a marine pure block to my sump.
Flow is with three MP10's set to reef crest, and lagoon during periods of the day and a transition of 10-80% for 1 hour at sunrise and sunset...kind of a big wash out effect to get things stirred up and filtered.
Everything was growing and looking great until about 3 weeks ago. I am not sure but I may have put a little too much Kalk in my ATO because my pH increased from its normal 8.3-8.4 to 8.56 for a few days. During this time I was away for about 4 days and left my wife to dose the NOPOX. She unfortunately doubled the dose and I came home and found that my sunset Monti bleached, the green slimer was no longer green but a very dark purple (obviously a brown out). Several days later I noted some STN starting at its base and growing upward daily. My hydnorpha started becoming very light green almost bleached while its underside in the shadow remained normal in color. My Nitrates and Phosphates were at Zero. I cleaned out my ATO and ran it without Kalk for the next week in order to help get the phosphate back up and pH down a little. I also started feeding more. Interestingly, my Alk was only in the 7.45 when the pH was higher than normal.
About 2 weeks later my red dragon had RTN and died and more recently another acropora has started having STN.
I am stumped. I can't believe all this was from a couple days of zero nutrients. So what I've done so far:
I lowered my light intensity by 50% and have done a few water changes. The other tank inhabitants look fine. My LPS, Goni's, Zoa's, etc. all look good. The bleached Monti is showing signs of recovery.
I'm tracking nitrate and Phos almost daily and giving the NOPOX around 0.7cc-0.8cc to keep them in the desired range Nitrate 1-3 and Phos 0.03-0.05. I've looked in my sump and see no major issues, no rusted magnets, etc.
Inspecting the corals, I do not see any obvious bugs or pests.
So I checked my levels about 1 week after running the ATO without Alk and before a water change. I had been feeding heavier that week as well. I took samples for a TRITON eval at this time also. These were my numbers with my Red Sea Kits and Hannah checkers on that day:
Alkalinity 7.0 dKH
Calcium 415
Magnesium 1420
Nitrate 3
Phosphate 0.08
Sp gr 1.026
pH 8.3
Here are the Triton results for the water sample from that same day:
Everything looks fairly reasonable with the exception of Zinc!! For the life of me, I can't figure out where that is coming from. I use RO/DI water and recently changed out my carbon and DI resins. I don't put my hand in very often and I don't use hand lotions or sunscreen.
Interestingly my Hannah phos level is way off from the Triton phos level....not sure what to make of that.
Anyway sorry for the long post, hoping someone might see something I am missing. Appreciate any thoughts or comments.
Thanks!
Carlos
Sudbury, MA
The tank is 11 years old. Its a 36 gallon Corner Bow with about another 10 gallons in an acrylic sump. It has housed mainly LPS and some select SPS and a small amount of fish and inverts over the years. Currently only 2 clowns, 2 Anthias and a Basslet. Serpent Star and Coral banded shrimp and my corals. Some of the colonies are from the original setup 11 years ago others are a few months old. The tank is getting ready to be taken down (in a few months) and the livestock moved to my new reefer 425XL build (you can see it in my signature).
I've done all sorts of things with this tank over the years but have settled over the past 4 years with the following regimen with until recently good success.
Red Sea Pro Salt mixed to a spec grav of 1.026
Temperature 79-80
ATO with a half teaspoon of BRS Kalk per gallon.
Chemipure Elite in the sump changed out every 3-6 months depending on Phosphate level
Puragen in my overflow-box changed out every 6 months
I use BRS filter socks and change them out every 3 days. I periodically will put a piece of polysponge in the filter sock.
AI Vega LED system
Until recently, I had an SWX 120 Skimmer. When it died in August I replaced it with a simplicity 120.
I do a 5 gallon water change every week occasionally 2 weeks but mainly every week.
I feed lightly, 1 cube of either reef plankton, mysis, etc every day. I used reef chili and reef roids maybe 2x per week. I used reef energy for a bit but did not see any difference in the corals so stopped it.
I use Red Sea test kits except for phosphate and Alk where I use the Hannah checkers. My chemistry has been relatively stable with Ca in the 420-440 range, Alk in the 7-8 range, Mg always tests very high in the 1400-1600 range. My nutrients tend to run low so I have been feeding more regularly. I have gone from 1-2 nitrate down to zero at times. My phosphates were running <0.01 for a few weeks until I started feeding more and now generally run in the 0.03-0.05 range.
I also Dose Red Sea NOPOX at 0.8cc per day to keep my Nutrients in the appropriate range. I switched over to this from Vodka about 5 years ago and have been quite happy with it.
The only other major changes in the last few months was a complete change out of the sand bed in August. I removed the very old sand which was about 2-3 inches and replaced it with a 1/2 inch of new sand. I removed some rock and changed my scape to a more open flow structure. I also added a marine pure block to my sump.
Flow is with three MP10's set to reef crest, and lagoon during periods of the day and a transition of 10-80% for 1 hour at sunrise and sunset...kind of a big wash out effect to get things stirred up and filtered.
Everything was growing and looking great until about 3 weeks ago. I am not sure but I may have put a little too much Kalk in my ATO because my pH increased from its normal 8.3-8.4 to 8.56 for a few days. During this time I was away for about 4 days and left my wife to dose the NOPOX. She unfortunately doubled the dose and I came home and found that my sunset Monti bleached, the green slimer was no longer green but a very dark purple (obviously a brown out). Several days later I noted some STN starting at its base and growing upward daily. My hydnorpha started becoming very light green almost bleached while its underside in the shadow remained normal in color. My Nitrates and Phosphates were at Zero. I cleaned out my ATO and ran it without Kalk for the next week in order to help get the phosphate back up and pH down a little. I also started feeding more. Interestingly, my Alk was only in the 7.45 when the pH was higher than normal.
About 2 weeks later my red dragon had RTN and died and more recently another acropora has started having STN.
I am stumped. I can't believe all this was from a couple days of zero nutrients. So what I've done so far:
I lowered my light intensity by 50% and have done a few water changes. The other tank inhabitants look fine. My LPS, Goni's, Zoa's, etc. all look good. The bleached Monti is showing signs of recovery.
I'm tracking nitrate and Phos almost daily and giving the NOPOX around 0.7cc-0.8cc to keep them in the desired range Nitrate 1-3 and Phos 0.03-0.05. I've looked in my sump and see no major issues, no rusted magnets, etc.
Inspecting the corals, I do not see any obvious bugs or pests.
So I checked my levels about 1 week after running the ATO without Alk and before a water change. I had been feeding heavier that week as well. I took samples for a TRITON eval at this time also. These were my numbers with my Red Sea Kits and Hannah checkers on that day:
Alkalinity 7.0 dKH
Calcium 415
Magnesium 1420
Nitrate 3
Phosphate 0.08
Sp gr 1.026
pH 8.3
Here are the Triton results for the water sample from that same day:
Everything looks fairly reasonable with the exception of Zinc!! For the life of me, I can't figure out where that is coming from. I use RO/DI water and recently changed out my carbon and DI resins. I don't put my hand in very often and I don't use hand lotions or sunscreen.
Interestingly my Hannah phos level is way off from the Triton phos level....not sure what to make of that.
Anyway sorry for the long post, hoping someone might see something I am missing. Appreciate any thoughts or comments.
Thanks!
Carlos
Sudbury, MA
