What am I missing?

[steveschuerger]

Well you have coralline which is a good sign. 200 PAR is not enough for most stony corals. That’s probably your problem, paired with no nutrients for non-photosynthetic energy.

Actually 200 par is fine except for more demanding Acropora generally. My tank ranges from about 125 par at the bottom to 300 par at the top of the rocks.

 

[Formulator]

Actually 200 par is fine except for more demanding Acropora generally. My tank ranges from about 125 par at the bottom to 300 par at the top of the rocks.

I’d say borderline fine… but ya, it may not be the smoking gun of the problem. Paired with the ultra low nutrients, it could be a contributor. I guess I’m jaded on the topic since I’ve always used halide/T5 hybrid.

 

[steveschuerger]

I’d say borderline fine… but ya, it may not be the smoking gun of the problem. Paired with the ultra low nutrients, it could be a contributor. I guess I’m jaded on the topic since I’ve always used halide/T5 hybrid.

Yah, I definitely think it’s the nutrient issue as much as anything else as well. My corals were struggling last year for a while when I had hardly either Nitrate or Phos

 

[X-37B]

Retest no3 and po4 and get a real number. No3<5 po4<0.1, which I assume you meant not <1.
How many fish, I see 2?
Feed the fish more and no3 and po4 will rise. Running both at close to 0 is ok but you have to feed and test more to get the numbers where you want.
It wont happen on its own.
What forms of nutrient control do you currently do?
No3 and po4 are what your export system is not removing.
Do you run a skimmer, carbon, sump?
What do you mean by letting ca and alk level out? They need to be stable in order for anything to grow.

Knowing all the above will help everyone to understand your system.

 

[Creggers]

Retest no3 and po4 and get a real number. No3<5 po4<0.1, which I assume you meant not <1.
How many fish, I see 2?
Feed the fish more and no3 and po4 will rise. Running both at close to 0 is ok but you have to feed and test more to get the numbers where you want.
It wont happen on its own.
What forms of nutrient control do you currently do?
No3 and po4 are what your export system is not removing.
Do you run a skimmer, carbon, sump?
What do you mean by letting ca and alk level out? They need to be stable in order for anything to grow.

Knowing all the above will help everyone to understand your system.

You’re right I mistyped my P number and it’s less than 1 not .1 - on an iPhone at my office.
I have 12 fish in my system
Nutrient control is done via water changes for now, I ran carbon but when I got my tang I stopped.
CA goes from 450-480
Alk has stayed within 8.8-9.8

When I get home I’ll test my Nitrate and Phosphate again with Hannah checkers, I’ve been using test strips as I was doing weekly water changes for a while

 

[Sisterlimonpot]

My N/P readings are taken before the water changes which is why they’re ballpark.

I utilize a trident with a dos so it’s fairly steady and even when I do a water change it’s never a large swing as my salt is pretty close to the parameters I keep steady.

My post was to get you to think outside the box. It's difficult for anyone to pinpoint your specific issues.

Check the tds coming from the RODI, question the bacteria etc.

 

[Creggers]

My post was to get you to think outside the box. It's difficult for anyone to pinpoint your specific issues.

Check the tds coming from the RODI, question the bacteria etc.

Yeah I think it’s a combination of starving the corals of both light and nutrients. It’s been about a month since I’ve tested my tds so that’s another potential culprit.

I’ll send off the ICP results and get my nutrients back up. I take no offense to any of the comments y’all have posted fyi!

 

[X-37B]

You’re right I mistyped my P number and it’s less than 1 not .1 - on an iPhone at my office.
I have 12 fish in my system
Nutrient control is done via water changes for now, I ran carbon but when I got my tang I stopped.
CA goes from 450-480
Alk has stayed within 8.8-9.8

When I get home I’ll test my Nitrate and Phosphate again with Hannah checkers, I’ve been using test strips as I was doing weekly water changes for a while

Sounds like a solid plan.
I use phosgaurd for po4 control.
When I setup my current system 5 weeks ago po4 creaped up to .5.
Im now down to .06 and I have removed the PG.
Check my build thread.