Yellow sps completely faded.

[markalot]

@markalot also, he did the test inside water. ill send you the link of the hydra26 HD PAR test.

The second set of numbers looks fine, but you will have shading issues since the light source is direct rather than reflected. A second fixture would do wonders, as would some T5's (cheaper!).

 

[angela223]

@markalot yeah.. i actually stopped feeding because whenever i do my nitrates/phos always go so high. All my acros do have polyps extended so i guess thats good. So do you think i should continue adding nopox along with feeding? I'm a bit lazy with water changes so i think nopox would be best right?

 

[markalot]

@markalot yeah.. i actually stopped feeding because whenever i do my nitrates/phos always go so high. All my acros do have polyps extended so i guess thats good. So do you think i should continue adding nopox along with feeding? I'm a bit lazy with water changes so i think nopox would be best right?

I'm lazy with changes as well, as in I don't do them :) Maybe just a pinch of coral food daily, just to get something in the water, and maybe a little nopox just to keep things under control. The trick is doing something the same every day. NOPOX can work wonders, a little too well, so just a bit IMO. I don't think chasing PO4 is good so it may be better to pick a small dose and then just stick with it rather than measuring PO4 and adjusting the dose based on the reading. Acros don't die in higher PO4 (within reason of course). If anything higher PO4 can improve acro health in new tanks. @metrokat dosed Phosphate when she experienced RTN in a newer tank and had success with it.

 

[phixman]

I agree with the phosphates, usually low phosphates can cause sps to be pale and browned out at the same time ( like a tan color) and higher phosphates causes coral to brown out. I’ve had phosphates at .2 before with no issues when a family member fed my tank while I was gone, in fact growth and color looked good. I have an issue with low nutrients going to 0 in my 20 gallon tank due to my deep sand bed , I can overfeed reef roids and they won’t go over 0 :(. The only negative thing you may experience with higher nutrients is algae

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I lost all my acros last year because I was “trying” to get low nitrates and phosphates by using nopox. Stop using nopox all together. Pour it down the drain. Your acros are full sized colonies, so they’ll be the best nutrient export when they are recovered and happy. I’d like to know your hydra program.

 

[phixman]

What does your flow look like ?
I have an mp10 at full blast in my nuvo 20
Calc -400
Alk-7.3
Mag-1320
Phosphates 0
Nitrates 0

I’d prefer .2 phosphates , but they don’t go up, going sandless in my new tank. Hope this might help

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

What does your flow look like ?
I have an mp10 at full blast in my nuvo 20
Calc -400
Alk-7.3
Mag-1320
Phosphates 0
Nitrates 0

I’d prefer .2 phosphates , but they don’t go up, going sandless in my new tank. Hope this might help

That’s a serious looking schedule. Is that a single 26? I have 2-52 HD’s and 2 vortech mp 40’s set to 15% in my 50 gallon cube

 

[angela223]

I have a wavemaker pointing directly into the acroporas so i hope thats enough flow.. i cant have it too high flow or else everything else(elegances and duncans) in my tank will be unhappy cos i do have quite a small tank. I only have 1 hydra26 HD. I recently just changed my scheduele to the ab+spectrum one. I used to have the "pirates of the caribbean" preset that everyone talks so highly of which was why i used it and it looked really pretty. But i guess this ab+ spectrum one is apparently the best for sps.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I have a wavemaker pointing directly into the acroporas so i hope thats enough flow.. i cant have it too high flow or else everything else(elegances and duncans) in my tank will be unhappy cos i do have quite a small tank. I only have 1 hydra26 HD. I recently just changed my scheduele to the ab+spectrum one. I used to have the "pirates of the caribbean" preset that everyone talks so highly of which was why i used it and it looked really pretty. But i guess this ab+ spectrum one is apparently the best for sps.

I believe the single 26 good enough, not great, to keep the acros you have alive as long as they’re near the top. That’s probably, what, 60-65 total watts? It’s probably 200-250 par at the top which isn’t ideal but it’s not terrible. I recommend you stop worrying about your nitrates and phosphates unless the nitrates go over 20 and phosphates go over 0.2. Right now your corals look like they’re starving. The nopox is stripping the water before the corals get a chance to consume the nutrients. In a tank that small 25-35% biweekly water changes is all you should have to do.

 

[angela223]

@Chaswood79 ah i see okay. I might think of adding t5 lights like you said. I just looked at them on ebay and they look suuper long.. how would i fit them on my tank? :/ my tank is only about 60cm wide and i dont know it can fit on my tank without blocking the light from my hydra.. also why is there so many t5's? theres white and blue etc.. do i have to get all of them?? im so confused. this is what my tank looks like at the top. Are you able to suggest/link the t5 lights that i should get?

i was looking around and i saw some cheap t5's. would ONE of these suffice? https://www.aquaticsupplies.com.au/products/juwel-t5-hilite-marine?variant=18418994247

or do i need multiple?

 

[Shooter6]

I dont see your alkalinity in your parameters. Are you testing it? Possible that you trace elements are depleted? How often are you doing water changes and what salt are you using?

 

[angela223]

@Shooter6 my kh is around 9. I always dose redsea alkalinity/kh buffer. im using redsea coral pro salt. Topping up calcium with redsea calcium as well.Im also dosing coral essentials power trace A,B,C and using redsea coral colours a,b,c,d. Pretty sure thats why my greens have come back. But Ive stopped dosing them because i thought that was the reason why my nutrients shoots up high and wanted to get more info from this forum first before i continue anything else. Also i dont really do water changes regularly. Probably once every 2-3 weeks. Also would like to mention that im currently doing fallow method so i have no fish at all in my dt atm.

 

[Shooter6]

Only d is a "nutrient " personally my nitrates run above 8ppm and my phosphate is steady as 0.12 per redsea pro test.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Its going to be hard to keep the acropora in perfect health with the lps in the tank but you doing pretty good keeping them alive so far. I don't have any recommendations for you since I don't use leds, but I would say another light t5 or led would certainly help along with more flow. But with more flow your going to have issues with all the other corals then. Its a tough balance when you keep that variety of coral in a small tank like that. I would just focus on keeping the nutrients stable along with everything else and just make sure the acros are keeping their health. Eventually color will come if everything else is on point. I don't think there has been any bad advice here so far. Just decide on what you want to try and change and give it time to see if it makes a difference.
The original pictures of those corals are beautiful, and those corals are pretty tough to keep in the first place so your doing good. The picture of the coral might not even be a shortcake now that I see the original picture but maybe someone else can verify that. It is a beautiful piece! If it were me, I would simplify things by focusing on just the acros and taking out the corals that don't do well with more flow in the tank and also add some t5 or another led fixture. I would also keep the led as high as I could on max percentage, the best acropora tanks I have seen had their leds hung high and on 100%. But that is just how I would do it, I am not saying that what you should do. You are lucky to get such beautiful acros out there. When we get them here on the east coast in the us, they are pale and take a lot of care to get back to looking like that. Good luck! :)

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

@Chaswood79 ah i see okay. I might think of adding t5 lights like you said. I just looked at them on ebay and they look suuper long.. how would i fit them on my tank? :/ my tank is only about 60cm wide and i dont know it can fit on my tank without blocking the light from my hydra.. also why is there so many t5's? theres white and blue etc.. do i have to get all of them?? im so confused. this is what my tank looks like at the top. Are you able to suggest/link the t5 lights that i should get?

i was looking around and i saw some cheap t5's. would ONE of these suffice? https://www.aquaticsupplies.com.au/products/juwel-t5-hilite-marine?variant=18418994247

or do i need multiple?

That link is for just the lamps. You would have to buy a T5 fixture or T5/LED hybrid fixture. Something like this
https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/24-h...re-with-led-mounting-system-aquatic-life.html
I think your lighting is fine as long as you keep those acros in the top middle of your display. 2 hydra 26’s 16”(40 cm) above the water would be ideal if you wanted more acros all over the tank. My main concern, and I’m not trying to sound rude, is that you really don’t know what you’re doing. On top of that you said you’re lazy. Acros are very sensitive animals. The other corals in your tank are easy, but you have wild colonies that probably just came from the reef with stable water chemistry and now they’re in a confined space with unstable water chemistry. We’ve all been there. My acro learning death curve cost me $10,000 in the last year, but I learned a lot in that process.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I’ll never buy a bag of gfo or a bottle of nopox etc again.

 

[angela223]

@Pedoconfuego thank you so much for your replies! It really helped :) i will definetely just try keep parameters stable instead of trying to keep them a certain number and maybe try adding some t5’s. I hope i dont end up giving them too much light though lol.

@Chaswood79 and yes i clearly dont know what im doing which is why im asking you guys here on the forums LOL! But thabks for the link, i will research and try get my hands on some t5’s and hold off on using nopox. Ill feed more and do fornightly water changes. Hopefully this will start making a difference.

Im glad none of my acros died yet. Thanks everyone so much for helping me out. Youve all been so helpful :D