What am I missing/doing wrong?

[Brandon Rush]

For some reason I can not seem to keep SPS. I have a 30 gallon frag tank and can not figure out what I'm missing. SPS will do perfectly fine for about 3 weeks, then it will close up and never open back up. My parameters are spot on, my par is spot on. I can't figure out what is stressing the coral out and causing this. Does anyone have any idea. The tank is fishless, but I dose nitrates, alk, and phosphates. I don't notice any large swings. Any ideas/help please!

Parameters:

PH/ 8
Alk/8.2
CA/450
Mag/1400
Nitrate/4
Phosphate/ 0.03

 

[NeonRabbit221B]

How old is the tank? Lighting?

 

[Brandon Rush]

How old is the tank? Lighting?

1 year old, recently cleaned it out and set it back up. Using a radion gen 4 xr 30. Used a par meter and am getting around 250 where the corals at.

 

[Konydiver]

Are you feeding your tank? As in nutrition. They could be starving if you don't have fish.

Something like Red Sea AB+ can help or Reef Roids

Also check your Trace Elements - Might need an ICP Test to have a look at them all. If they are defecient, they could cause loss of health.

 

[Boxofpurplerocks]

Dosing the tank with nitrates and phosphates isn’t the same as feeding your tank/fish and having it break down into these products. Along the way you have things like ammonium which are produced which are what actually feed the coral, not the end product of phosphate or nitrate. So I’d say there’s a good chance you’re starving your corals. In that case, either ghost feeding your tank to get these numbers up rather than dosing, or getting some fish, would be the solution.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Get 5 or 6 fish or start dosing ammonia/ammonium.