Why cant u keep sps?

ycnibrc · Dec 10, 2019

mfollen said:
For those who don’t have anything broken, but are looking to improve bacterial diversity, is there any concern that any bacteria dosing products could have problematic bacteria such as something like vibrio?

Are there certain products above the rest in regards to quality and/or diversity of beneficial strains?

great thread!

U can over dose bacteria and the side effect is algae. I always advice people to do 50% for 3 months then increase 10% every month until full dose. Normally the process will take 6 months which u can see the benefits or not from dosing

ycnibrc · Dec 10, 2019

RCS82 said:
How does one wade thru all of the different products out there these days. We have stuff for tank cycling like Dr Tim's, Seachem and others. Then theres the Zeo products and KZ and then MB7 and other brands, maybe Aqua forest. Then the probiotic stuff as well as the Vibrant and Chroma products which is more Carbon related I think? So much out there with so many different opinions out there as well. Not really a question but I like the topic here and hoping for more insight.
Thanks

Every company have their own stuffs. I chose zeovit because for me their reefing philosophy make sense. Zeovit base their program on replicate sea water. Coral dna have been engineered to thrive in sea water for millions of year. If u can provide your reef tank to replicate the natural environment which coral have been living then i believe the success rates will be good

RCS82 · Dec 10, 2019

ycnibrc said:
Every company have their own stuffs. I chose zeovit because for me their reefing philosophy make sense. Zeovit base their program on replicate sea water. Coral dna have been engineered to thrive in sea water for millions of year. If u can provide your reef tank to replicate the natural environment which coral have been living then i believe the success rates will be good

Yes I get what you're saying and understand where you're coming from with starting this thread. I think it's well known that real live rock is the greatest thing in the world for a reef tank. But this is 2019 and options are nil as far as that goes. I remember working at the lfs in the 90s and we'd receive boxes of fiji or Jakarta or live rock from where ever that was just covered in life, and some dead from the journey lol. But today it's all dry rock with 100 different bottles on the store shelves. Again no real question, just discussing.
Thanks
Side note, being in Canada we are even more limited rock wise I believe. Even Tampa Bay rock would be a great option.

NeutronMan · Dec 10, 2019

Maybe we can get some of the pros, here, to sell some crushed up rock from their systems?

shrimped · Dec 10, 2019

LARedstickreefer said:
Maybe we can get some of the pros, here, to sell some crushed up rock from their systems?

TAKE ALL MY MONEY

homer1475 · Dec 10, 2019

Real live ocean rock is still available. Yes the days of old reefing with rock from far away places is gone, but real ocean rock is still available.

Daddy-o · Dec 10, 2019

Now that Anthony has made my brain dwell on bacteria ;Joyful I found this article in Science Daily that I thought was interesting:

Study reveals corals' influence on reef microbes

As they grow, corals are bathed in a sea of marine microbes, such as bacteria, algae, and viruses. While these extremely abundant and tiny microorganisms influence coral communities in a variety of ways, a new study reveals that corals also have an impact on the microbes in waters surrounding them.

www.sciencedaily.com

Cheers! Mark

Thaxxx · Dec 10, 2019

homer1475 said:
Real live ocean rock is still available. Yes the days of old reefing with rock from far away places is gone, but real ocean rock is still available.

Yes it is.
Tampabay saltwater https://www.tbsaltwater.com
I'm lucky being in Florida, I go there and have hand picked the pieces I want.
This is differant than most of live rock available from other vendors. Other vendors ship rock wrapped in wet newspaper. Tampabay saltwater ships submerged in water, so there will be little die off. Read their story to see how they've been doing it for 20 years +

EddieJ · Dec 10, 2019

Thaxxx said:
Yes it is.
Tampabay saltwater https://www.tbsaltwater.com
I'm lucky being in Florida, I go there and have hand picked the pieces I want.
This is differant than most of live rock available from other vendors. Other vendors ship rock wrapped in wet newspaper. Tampabay saltwater ships submerged in water, so there will be little die off. Read their story to see how they've been doing it for 20 years +

Tampa Bay Saltwater is excellent rock. That’s what my tank was started with. All sorts of life on it when you get it. Shipped via airlines so it’s fresh out of the ocean. Smells fresh with zero death.

ycnibrc · Dec 10, 2019

Daddy-o said:
Now that Anthony has made my brain dwell on bacteria ;Joyful I found this article in Science Daily that I thought was interesting:

Study reveals corals' influence on reef microbes

As they grow, corals are bathed in a sea of marine microbes, such as bacteria, algae, and viruses. While these extremely abundant and tiny microorganisms influence coral communities in a variety of ways, a new study reveals that corals also have an impact on the microbes in waters surrounding them.

www.sciencedaily.com

Cheers! Mark

There is a term for it BMC beneficial micronism for corals. The scientists found out coral do consume them as food

Doctorgori · Dec 10, 2019

.. IMO our "Pest free" dry rocks makes for micro-organism wise: plain boring and uninteresting...I haven't seen those tiny feather dusters in years, .....the tanks were waaaaay more bio-diverse "back in the day" ...no additives, "Color enhancers", bacterial additives, ICP test, et et ..just Kalkwasser and frequent religious water changes...

here is a picture of my reef tank circa early 90's ... while not a exact correlation as colorful branching SPS were not available in the same way they are now, but montipora, and encrusting sps were very common on wild live rock ....note the big brain in the center

ycnibrc · Dec 10, 2019

Doctorgori said:
.. IMO our "Pest free" dry rocks makes for micro-organism wise: plain boring and uninteresting...I haven't seen those tiny feather dusters in years, .....the tanks were waaaaay more bio-diverse "back in the day" ...no additives, "Color enhancers", bacterial additives, ICP test, et et ..just Kalkwasser and frequent religious water changes...

.here is a picture of my reef tank circa early 90's (note the big brain in the center)

Haha the good old day....but we dont have radion to show off tenius back then :-)

Doctorgori · Dec 10, 2019

ycnibrc said:
Haha the good old day....but we dont have radion to show off tenius back then :)

Ha ha ...yeah I re-edited that post ....that tank was lit with an Icecap ballast 4x yellow 6000K VHO (sacrilege nowadays)

Charlie’s Frags · Dec 10, 2019

ycnibrc said:
Haha the good old day....but we dont have radion to show off tenius back then :)

Or hydras

nbd13 · Dec 10, 2019

Thought I would chime in here...this thread caught my attention as this was EXACTLY my experience. I was out of the hobby for about 12 years, I came from the true live rock era from the ocean, I had thriving SPS tanks with no issue....fast forward to my current tank. Set it up exactly like I knew how except with man made rock, I added Fritz turbo start and let the rock sit for a month in a container with circulation, then transferred to tank, added more Fritz. Added fish a few weeks later, then SPS at around the 4-6 week mark.

Everything was going great, excellent growth, super low nutrients no matter how much I feed, I mean 0.01-0.04 on Hanna for PO4 and 0 Nitrate on Salifert. Never had a tank with such low nutrients. Ran triton method (which doesn't have a bacteria source, I don't believe), ran a fuge with chaeto which grew like a weed (now I realize I shouldn't have used chaeto from the get go)

Then came the adage, dino's....tank was nasty. SPS started to die off in a massive way...lost probably 90% of my frags and mini colonies.

Could not figure out what was going on, so removed the chaeto, nutrients skyrocketed. PO4 was at 0.5 and Nitrate at 100...dino's gone. Couldn't keep any SPS alive. I had a torch and hammer coral that thrived and that was it.

Then is was actually in a thread I posted for advice that ycnibrc suggested using some bacteria products.

I got 4 Xport Dimpled bricks from BRS, seeded those with Microbacter7, removed the fuge and went with an algae reactor to allow me to have the space for the bricks in the fuge section of my sump and minimize detritus build up.

Then, the key I think was using Zeostart and Zeobak. I started dosing those per ycnibrc starting at 50% and I add Zeovit Coral snow every few days as well. I do not run any other Zeovit products, I still run Triton method with their 4 additives. I do change about 10-15% of the water every 1-2 weeks as well. This was about 4 weeks ago, I have since upped the dose of Zeostar and Zeobak and I', about at 75% now of the recommended dose.

My tank is finally thriving, SPS frags are growing again, the 3 SPS I had left over are actually growing again, new frags are actually surviving and growing at a decent rate. One in particular is growing so fast it's covered the plug since I bought it 2 weeks ago!

I can only think the bricks and bacteria products from Zeovit are what are making the difference!

My PO4 is at 0.3-0.35 and Nitrate at about 30-50....the numbers don't even matter to me though, the corals are healthy and growing, that's all I care about. Chaeto grows a little but not crazy and again I'm ok with that.

I am SOLD on this methodology. Trust me years ago when I did this hobby with fresh live rock from the ocean there was no concern about this stuff, setting up a new tank this day and age I think the bacteria diversity is lacking and the key here.

How many posts do we see in this forum asking for help and the common theme is just like my story, new tank, ultra low nutrients, spa thriving, the algae and crash.....

THIS SHOULD BE A STICKY IMO! Helpful information in here....title it "Can't keep SPS alive, read this first"!

Thanks @ycnibrc I think you may have saved me from going mad not being able to keep SPS!

ycnibrc · Dec 10, 2019

nbd13 said:
Thought I would chime in here...this thread caught my attention as this was EXACTLY my experience. I was out of the hobby for about 12 years, I came from the true live rock era from the ocean, I had thriving SPS tanks with no issue....fast forward to my current tank. Set it up exactly like I knew how except with man made rock, I added Fritz turbo start and let the rock sit for a month in a container with circulation, then transferred to tank, added more Fritz. Added fish a few weeks later, then SPS at around the 4-6 week mark.

Everything was going great, excellent growth, super low nutrients no matter how much I feed, I mean 0.01-0.04 on Hanna for PO4 and 0 Nitrate on Salifert. Never had a tank with such low nutrients. Ran triton method (which doesn't have a bacteria source, I don't believe), ran a fuge with chaeto which grew like a weed (now I realize I shouldn't have used chaeto from the get go)

Then came the adage, dino's....tank was nasty. SPS started to die off in a massive way...lost probably 90% of my frags and mini colonies.

Could not figure out what was going on, so removed the chaeto, nutrients skyrocketed. PO4 was at 0.5 and Nitrate at 100...dino's gone. Couldn't keep any SPS alive. I had a torch and hammer coral that thrived and that was it.

Then is was actually in a thread I posted for advice that ycnibrc suggested using some bacteria products.

I got 4 Xport Dimpled bricks from BRS, seeded those with Microbacter7, removed the fuge and went with an algae reactor to allow me to have the space for the bricks in the fuge section of my sump and minimize detritus build up.

Then, the key I think was using Zeostart and Zeobak. I started dosing those per ycnibrc starting at 50% and I add Zeovit Coral snow every few days as well. I do not run any other Zeovit products, I still run Triton method with their 4 additives. I do change about 10-15% of the water every 1-2 weeks as well. This was about 4 weeks ago, I have since upped the dose of Zeostar and Zeobak and I', about at 75% now of the recommended dose.

My tank is finally thriving, SPS frags are growing again, the 3 SPS I had left over are actually growing again, new frags are actually surviving and growing at a decent rate. One in particular is growing so fast it's covered the plug since I bought it 2 weeks ago!

I can only think the bricks and bacteria products from Zeovit are what are making the difference!

My PO4 is at 0.3-0.35 and Nitrate at about 30-50....the numbers don't even matter to me though, the corals are healthy and growing, that's all I care about. Chaeto grows a little but not crazy and again I'm ok with that.

I am SOLD on this methodology. Trust me years ago when I did this hobby with fresh live rock from the ocean there was no concern about this stuff, setting up a new tank this day and age I think the bacteria diversity is lacking and the key here.

How many posts do we see in this forum asking for help and the common theme is just like my story, new tank, ultra low nutrients, spa thriving, the algae and crash.....

THIS SHOULD BE A STICKY IMO! Helpful information in here....title it "Can't keep SPS alive, read this first"!

Thanks @ycnibrc I think you may have saved me from going mad not being able to keep SPS!

Wow great im so glad that i can help u. Everyday i keep reading thread that reefer have problems with keeping sps and every thread are almost the same scenario. Start out good for a few months then crash with no reason all parameters are good so what give??? Im not advocate for zeovit so i only suggest adding bacteria source to see if it can improve. For me as a hobbyist i want to see reefer successful at reef keeping thats the only way the hobby can grow and sustain in the long run.