yet another why can't I keep sps??
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The artist formerly known as SawCJack00
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The solution to this is to get what would normally be on real live rock, i.e. biodiversity. I strongly recommend looking into wondermud and live sand activator from IPSF.com They are in Hawaii so you are getting organisms from a Pacific reef area. I started my entire coral farm using dry rock. You can view my build threads or website to see the results...
oh ive got pods... the entire tank is crawling with them originally this tank was full triton. huge fuge. Eventually i did not like all the particulates in water column which is a side effect of triton they dont talk about. its crazy how much is going on in there after lights out.
there was a point where i could throw a pound a ground beef in thetr and never register a nutrient spike.
rock is covered with calcareous algae.
there was a point where i could throw a pound a ground beef in thetr and never register a nutrient spike.
rock is covered with calcareous algae.
Did you mention your par yet? I was having bad results until I measured it with a seneye... for some reason I’d assumed 4 T5s and DIY LEDs wouldn’t be torching the top half of the tank with 500-700 par. I was about to add more LEDs because I thought it wasn’t enough lol.
Also agree with the dry rock comments. One of those things where you just have to hang in there. BRS said they thought the bare bottom/ dry rock hardships in year one were a myth until they experienced it. Of course I thought the same until I went through it. Everything would do fine, random die back, come back strong, repeat. For a year.
Also agree with the dry rock comments. One of those things where you just have to hang in there. BRS said they thought the bare bottom/ dry rock hardships in year one were a myth until they experienced it. Of course I thought the same until I went through it. Everything would do fine, random die back, come back strong, repeat. For a year.
I tell you a little secret lol, was checking out a lfs he was growing masive colonys of sps dry rock , when i looked under the hood they had a huge refugium with all kinds of biodiversity like dan the reefer said might take a little time
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You can do that or you can put it in the tank. I have a shallow sand bed so just added to that.
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Vibrant tends to cause NO3 and PO4 to bottom out very quickly. If you keep a close eye on them and dose if needed you can probably avoid issues, but it's a fine line to walk, and is unnecessary IMHO.
I also say stop the GFO/GAC and quadruple check your salinity to make sure it is correct. That is what ended up being my sps issue with my current tank. Bad refractometer calibration solution so my salinity was way lower than I thought. Which means my trace elements were also low, etc.
I've also ordered the wondermud and live sand activaor from IPSF, twice. If you don't want to put it in your sump, then I'd dump it behind the rocks, its is probably a darker color and some coarser pieces of sand than you have. It's only a small amount they ship, so should be easy to hide it.
eventually i am gonna bring the fuge back online. i only took it off bc of conflicting reports of vibrant killing the chaeto ball. So probably will get fuge goingagain soon
I normally do not run GFO only GAC. Chose to put a little in to try to get this algae to loosen its grip on the rock so i can manually remove it. I will get my hands in the tank today and see if i can make a bit more headway. my last effort was a good one and had made a big impact on GHA.
i am going to look into this site their mud and sand activator. I also could reach out to a member of club for a handful of sand from a fantastic tank.
**I should also put this here. In my basement i have a 55 gallon FULL of Fiji live rock that i have been using since 2001it has never been out of the water for more than ten minutes. it has been jist sitting there in a empty heated tank with minimal lighting since i started this new build 2.5 yrs. i let my last tank go for a number if reasons. that rock qas covered with disco mushrooms in plague proportions, vermetids and hydroids. Even though ive had zero cross contamination new tank has vermetids i think they are simply unavoidable. its been 2.5 years with no food in the "rock tank" shrooms are obviously gone bc minimal light. some rocks had hydroids some didn't. what do you guys think??
I normally do not run GFO only GAC. Chose to put a little in to try to get this algae to loosen its grip on the rock so i can manually remove it. I will get my hands in the tank today and see if i can make a bit more headway. my last effort was a good one and had made a big impact on GHA.
i am going to look into this site their mud and sand activator. I also could reach out to a member of club for a handful of sand from a fantastic tank.
**I should also put this here. In my basement i have a 55 gallon FULL of Fiji live rock that i have been using since 2001it has never been out of the water for more than ten minutes. it has been jist sitting there in a empty heated tank with minimal lighting since i started this new build 2.5 yrs. i let my last tank go for a number if reasons. that rock qas covered with disco mushrooms in plague proportions, vermetids and hydroids. Even though ive had zero cross contamination new tank has vermetids i think they are simply unavoidable. its been 2.5 years with no food in the "rock tank" shrooms are obviously gone bc minimal light. some rocks had hydroids some didn't. what do you guys think??
I think alot of people gave you some good information, and thats your call, but if it was me i would not over react and use the method saw jack was suggesting but thats your call!!!!
And by the way i dont pay more then 40$ a frag thats why I call myself Loosechange reef lol
And by the way i dont pay more then 40$ a frag thats why I call myself Loosechange reef lol
@Loosechangereef We have a ridiculously active reefing community here. all Frags but two were homegrown local. I usually do a pack 4/$100.
ok going to run salinity, po4, no3, and alk (double check) right now. I will come back and post the results when done
ok going to run salinity, po4, no3, and alk (double check) right now. I will come back and post the results when done
Keep on feeding. If you need to up the export, then cool, but don't limit the corals of what they actually need which is ammonia/ammonium and all kinds of phosphate/phosphorous/organic/inorganic - nitrate and whatever singular kind of phosphate that you are wanton to dose are not the same thing. Keep feeding a lot.
If you want diversity, order a small pack of live rock from Florida.
I also agree that supplements to kill algae are a bad idea. Just don't do it. If you get algae, then you are just going to have to fight it with manual removal, urchins, snails, etc. until your tank matures past it - the best way is for lots of coralline to cover those rocks. It can take months and months to fight it, but that was the cost of starting a sterile tank... sorry. Stiff bristle brush on the end of a siphon hose can work well. Just grabbing tufts can work Ok too. There is no universal answer here, other than it sucks and there is no shortcut. FWIW - I have very low N and P and my tank would be covered in algae is I did not have urchins, ceriths, astreas, etc. and mostly real live rock with actual things growing on it where the algae cannot take hold .. fish are a joke.
If you want diversity, order a small pack of live rock from Florida.
I also agree that supplements to kill algae are a bad idea. Just don't do it. If you get algae, then you are just going to have to fight it with manual removal, urchins, snails, etc. until your tank matures past it - the best way is for lots of coralline to cover those rocks. It can take months and months to fight it, but that was the cost of starting a sterile tank... sorry. Stiff bristle brush on the end of a siphon hose can work well. Just grabbing tufts can work Ok too. There is no universal answer here, other than it sucks and there is no shortcut. FWIW - I have very low N and P and my tank would be covered in algae is I did not have urchins, ceriths, astreas, etc. and mostly real live rock with actual things growing on it where the algae cannot take hold .. fish are a joke.
92Miata
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Raising his alkalinity with no Phosphate will kill everything he's managed to keep alive at this point.
Alkalinity, light, and Phosphate are all tied together. Raising light or alkalinity without addressing Phosphate will increase photosynthesis and skeleton building without giving the corals the things they need to do that - and lead to tip burn followed by melting.
Also, where the heck did people get the idea that 8 dkH is LOW?
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