Water Chemistry and Dosing Help

[charliereef]

I got a 23.7 gal mixed reef with SPS, LPS and macroalgae. For the past month I've been fighting some goni tissue recession and wanted to get into dosing as I've heard great things about promoting coral growth. I just bought some hanna + salifert testers and these are the results I got:

Hanna:
Mag: 1000
Cal: 600
Alk: 5.8
Nitrate: 0.1
Phosphate: 0.07

Cal Salifert: 500+ (Outside of range)

Just seeking general advice moving forward, I genuinely dont know how my corals are happy with these params hahaha. I have Alkalinity, Magnesium and Calcium supplements from Aquaforest, as well as All for Reef from Tropic Marin. How would you guys go about raising those numbers?

 

[ShakeyGizzard]

I got a 23.7 gal mixed reef with SPS, LPS and macroalgae. For the past month I've been fighting some goni tissue recession and wanted to get into dosing as I've heard great things about promoting coral growth. I just bought some hanna + salifert testers and these are the results I got:

Hanna:
Mag: 1000
Cal: 600
Alk: 5.8
Nitrate: 0.1
Phosphate: 0.07

Cal Salifert: 500+ (Outside of range)

Just seeking general advice moving forward, I genuinely dont know how my corals are happy with these params hahaha. I have Alkalinity, Magnesium and Calcium supplements from Aquaforest, as well as All for Reef from Tropic Marin. How would you guys go about raising those numbers?

Mag is low, it needs to be 1200 to 1400, your calcium is way high it needs to be 380 to 450, alk is low, it needs to be 8-12. First off what salt do you use, AFR is great for smaller tanks, but you need to get your parameters stable first. Your salt mix is basically a baseline your parameters work off of. Some mixes have elevated alk, cal, and mag. I personally use Instant Ocean Reef crystals. You need to establish a regular water change interval to help get your numbers up. I don't think the goni's will like your tank based on the low nitrates and phosphates.

 

[ShakeyGizzard]

I got a 23.7 gal mixed reef with SPS, LPS and macroalgae. For the past month I've been fighting some goni tissue recession and wanted to get into dosing as I've heard great things about promoting coral growth. I just bought some hanna + salifert testers and these are the results I got:

Hanna:
Mag: 1000
Cal: 600
Alk: 5.8
Nitrate: 0.1
Phosphate: 0.07

Cal Salifert: 500+ (Outside of range)

Just seeking general advice moving forward, I genuinely dont know how my corals are happy with these params hahaha. I have Alkalinity, Magnesium and Calcium supplements from Aquaforest, as well as All for Reef from Tropic Marin. How would you guys go about raising those numbers?

you also need to test your PH, have you been dosing anything ? you have some off the wall numbers to me

 

[Euphylliaphyle]

+1 for starting out with water changes. Feed your corals to help with too-low phosphate and nitrate. Search here for feeding advice. You may need to thin out the macro until phosphate and nitrate recover a little - they are competing with your gonis. How old is your tank?

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Alk is very low, mag is low calcium is high. However the corals look happy so I wouldn't change things too fast. With macro algae in the tank I would not worry about nitrate and phosphate it will always show low levels unless you pour nutrients into the tank, but the picture tells me your corals don't need it.

I don't see the goni in the picture, can you show a pic? IMO unhappy goni's does not mean there is a problem with the tank, goni's are just like that.

Just my 2 cents

 

[Gumbies R Us]

@VintageReefer can give you more information on gonis

 

[charliereef]

Mag is low, it needs to be 1200 to 1400, your calcium is way high it needs to be 380 to 450, alk is low, it needs to be 8-12. First off what salt do you use, AFR is great for smaller tanks, but you need to get your parameters stable first. Your salt mix is basically a baseline your parameters work off of. Some mixes have elevated alk, cal, and mag. I personally use Instant Ocean Reef crystals. You need to establish a regular water change interval to help get your numbers up. I don't think the goni's will like your tank based on the low nitrates and phosphates.

I also use Instant Ocean reef crystals. I'm only asking for help because its always been a kind of low nutrient tank and the goni had been fine, I've had this colony for close to 2 years with no issues until some months ago when it caught BJD while I was away. I did feed it regularly though.

 

[charliereef]

you also need to test your PH, have you been dosing anything ? you have some off the wall numbers to me

Right, I haven't dosed anything apart from phyto and reef roids now and then. Yeah, when I first tested I thought I was doing something wrong but I triple checked everything.

 

[charliereef]

+1 for starting out with water changes. Feed your corals to help with too-low phosphate and nitrate. Search here for feeding advice. You may need to thin out the macro until phosphate and nitrate recover a little - they are competing with your gonis. How old is your tank?

Yeah I think I'll start that way, trim the algae, feed more and 10% water change weekly maybe. My tank is 2.5 years old.

 

[charliereef]

Alk is very low, mag is low calcium is high. However the corals look happy so I wouldn't change things too fast. With macro algae in the tank I would not worry about nitrate and phosphate it will always show low levels unless you pour nutrients into the tank, but the picture tells me your corals don't need it.

I don't see the goni in the picture, can you show a pic? IMO unhappy goni's does not mean there is a problem with the tank, goni's are just like that.

Just my 2 cents

Here I've created a little comparison for the goni. Obviously most of the death came from the time it caught BJD while I was away, but its been coming and going since then.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I assume the magnesium test is not accurate, and do not recommend magnesium testing at home for that reason. if you do not take that advice, at least use that same kit on some new salt water.

I would not use AFR right now with calcium possibly already high.

I would dose alk up to 7-8 dKH with baking soda, and use a trace element supplement such as Tropic Marin A and K.

I'd also feed more to get nitrate up, or dose N in some fashion.

 

[Privateye]

I'd be willing to bet that the alkalinity is the source of the unhappy corals. I've lost corals when it gets that low, and the BJD could have followed this stressor.

It might be worth bringing up the magnesium as well to prevent a see-saw effect between alkalinity and calcium though. Or perhaps just if you're seeing such an effect while trying to raise the alkalinity.

 

[charliereef]

I assume the magnesium test is not accurate, and do not recommend magnesium testing at home for that reason. if you do not take that advice, at least use that same kit on some new salt water.

I would not use AFR right now with calcium possibly already high.

I would dose alk up to 7-8 dKH with baking soda, and use a trace element supplement such as Tropic Marin A and K.

I'd also feed more to get nitrate up, or dose N in some fashion.

Why would you assume the test is not accurate? It appears to be measuring correctly as per your advice to try it on fresh saltwater

How would you go about dosing baking soda and why is it better than say, KH plus from AquaForest?

Thank you in advance

 

[charliereef]

I'd be willing to bet that the alkalinity is the source of the unhappy corals. I've lost corals when it gets that low, and the BJD could have followed this stressor.

It might be worth bringing up the magnesium as well to prevent a see-saw effect between alkalinity and calcium though. Or perhaps just if you're seeing such an effect while trying to raise the alkalinity.

Yeah I'll try to dose alk first and see how the other elements react, just noticed 1000 mag and 600 cal are the lower and upper limits respectively for the hanna checkers im using so they could be even lower than the reading.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Why would you assume the test is not accurate? It appears to be measuring correctly as per your advice to try it on fresh saltwater

How would you go about dosing baking soda and why is it better than say, KH plus from AquaForest?

Thank you in advance

Two reasons to think the mag result is not accurate.

1. Magnesium tests are so often inaccurate that I do not recommend their use for home testing to guide dosing. It causes more problems than it solves. It is easy to know how much magnesium to dose based on calcium testing.

2. A value of 1100 ppm at 35 ppm would imply that you tank consumed thousands of ppm of calcium with no magnesium dosed, assuming you started with levels found in most any salt mix. Unless you did that, 1100 ppm could only result from the very rare instance of a bad salt batch.

Baking soda may be better (or worse) than the AF alk part depending on exactly why the alk is low, and what AF puts into the mix. I doubt you will notice any effect either way, but baking soda is cheap and always available and it why I recommended it.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Yeah I'll try to dose alk first and see how the other elements react, just noticed 1000 mag and 600 cal are the lower and upper limits respectively for the hanna checkers im using so they could be even lower than the reading.

The calcium checker is among the most error prone of the Hanna checkers for users, and the actual magnesium is extremely unlikely to be under 1000ppm.