When is it safe to add SPS?

[djcalvin408]

Hi All


Base on your experience... When do you know when its the right time to add SPS to your tank? Mine is still fairly new (2 1/2 months), so im not sure if its fully established yet. Water perameters has been pretty stable, with one occurance where my ALK jumped up from 8dkh to 10dkh in one day, after water change using Red Sea premium salt.


Current perameters
ammonia = 0
nitrite = 0
nitrate = 5
ph = 8.2
alk = 10
calcium = 470
magnesium = 1400



thanks in advance!

 

[ColaAddict]

Established just means how comfortable you are with keeping your parameters stable, which is what u need to keep SPS. I can start a tank and in 1 month start adding acros in it.
How will u be supplementing your alkalinity, calcium, and magnesium?
You can always buy some cheap montis/SPS to try

 

[ritter6788]

Base on your experience... When do you know when its the right time to add SPS to your tank? Mine is still fairly new (2 1/2 months), so im not sure if its fully established yet. Water perameters has been pretty stable, with one occurance where my ALK jumped up from 8dkh to 10dkh in one day, after water change using Red Sea premium salt.

I agree with adding a cheap coral to experiment with before going adding too many. Maybe someone local to you or if you're a member of a reef club could sell you a frag cheap to try. I like to see good coraline algae growth before adding sps.

The Red Sea salt is known to have a higher alkalinity, 11 or 12 dkh I think. I try to match the tank parameters to the salt mix that I use so there are no parameter swings when I do water changes. If you don't want it that high then you'll have to change salt brands.

 

[djcalvin408]

I rarely have to dose Ca, Alk or Mag. When I do, its the two part B-ionic 37ml of each. I do 40G water change every two weeks with tank volume around 120G. I'm thinking because there are only have a few LPS, and no SPS therefor dosing is not needed at the moment. Talking to LFS they say a years wait so thats why i'm here looking for a second opinion =)

Coraline algae starting to form on live rocks and around the tank, but not totally covered yet.


Thanks for your input guys! Time to pick up some SPS, as i cant wait any longer =)

Cheers