57 gallon rimless reef: I am murdering my coral

[fort384]

Hi all, new to forum, and very new to reef keeping. I have kept high tech planted tanks for years, but the jump to keeping a reef has been, well, frustrating. I am looking for any advice on what might help fix my woes:

I started my reef tank about 7 months ago.

Here are some quick equipment/tank specs:

57 gallon rimless/lidless tank

20L sump

skimmer: Bubble Magus NAC3+

2 titanium heaters with digital thermostat

auto top off system

BRS 5 stage RODI system, 0 TDS output

2 MP10s, set on ECOsmart mode at around 60-70% each. On sides of tank facing each other, about 6-7" under the water line

Lighting: 2X Aqua Illuminations SOL White Pods, running at 35% white, 45% blue. Ramp up 2 hours to that, ramp down 2 hours from that, total lighting period 12 hours.

Milwaukee SMS 122 pH controller hooked to auto top off (in case of float switch failure, had it laying around from my FW days)

Sump is setup with skimmer/drain in first compartment, fuge growing chaeto (it grows like crazy) in the middle compartment along with some LR rubble, and auto top off/return pump in the last compartment.

Water params:
I test about every 2 weeks, sometimes more, sometimes less. The params have never strayed far from these:

temp: 79F
pH: 8.1-8.3 (between day and night) (pH meter, and API high range kit)
NH4: 0 (API kit)
NO2: 0 (API kit)
NO3: 0 (API kit)
PO4: 0.00 (Hanna checker and API kit)
Ca: 420-480 ppm (API kit)
Alk: currently 10.8 dKH. Has been as low as 7.8d KH. (Red Sea Alk kit)
SG: 1.025 (using BRS refractometer, calibrated with RODI water and cal solution)


STOCK:
2 Percula clowns
2 black bar chromis
1 anthias
1 royal gramma
1 Coral banded shrimp
several snails and hermits

CORAL:
All coral except a hammer I added last week has been in for at least 4 months.

Current coral doing well/growing:
Frogspawn (6 months)
Birdsnest (5 months)

Coral that is still living, but declining/fading away:
Jasmine polyps (6 months)
Several zoa colonies (4-6 months)
acan (4 months)

Coral that I have lost completely:
Xenia
Sympodium
Acro
Trumpet
3 hammers
fauvia
a few zoa colonies

MAINTENANCE SCHEDULE:
I do 10% water changes weekly

SALT: I use Red Sea Coral Pro



My current plan is to add a BRS carbon reactor to the tank and run ROX 0.8 carbon, in case there is some impurity. It arrives tomorrow.

Also, I have tinkered with the light some, especially in the beginning, but I have tried not to monkey with it much as of late.

My dKH was getting on the low end as of last week, but I did several water changes over the course of the week and brought it back up. Not sure if this was a contributor to my coral decline, or related at all.

Also, stupid newbie me was dosing 2 drops of lugols solution each week for the first 6-8 weeks with water changes at the advice of a LFS. I stopped that months ago when I realized I had no idea what I was adding, and really didn't think I should need it, or need to test for I2.

Any insight or advice would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

[Dexters Reef]

Hmm...your equipment, seems all good to me. Your not overstocked on fish. My guess would be this is flow related. You have different types of coral that need very different flow. It can be really hard to balance. I run a high flow tank, and its difficult to place new corals that arent sps. I just got a new frogspawn, placed in the sandbed, and nearly had it blown off the skeleton. I now have it in my back right corner, behind the rock becuase its my only low flow area left.

Likes Low Flow
Xenia (Dead)
Sympodium (Dead)
3 Hammers (Dead)

Likes Medium Flow
Zoos (Few declining, few lost)
Acans (Declining)

Likes High Flow
Acropora (Dead)
Birdsnest (Doing well)

Also you have corals that like both high and low lighting. This could just be a situation where its hard to make one environment thrive for corals that have different needs. Do you have a pic of your tank so we can see what it looks like now?

 

[Chaotic Reefer4u]

[welcome], fort384! My guesstimate is that your lighting is on too long, tone it down to no more than 10, hours total. Can you please post a picture of your tank, hope this helps!

 

[fort384]

So lighting duration is interesting. I have never changed it since I setup the tank. I have only changed intensity.

As far as flow, I am willing to consider it again but here is why I think it isn't flow: I have killed enough Xenia and hammers, that they have been tried everywhere in the dang tank. Low, medium, and higher flow. None of the areas seemed to help or prolong their life. I think it has to be either lighting, or a water quality issue just based on the almost global decline/death of coral in the system.

On mobile now but will get some pics up tonight.

 

[leveldrummer]

is this a tank that was left over from your freshwater days? ever dose any meds that contain copper?

 

[stingythingy45]

Also,have you checked your Magnesium?
I'm thinking Red Sea Pro has good Mg.,but not sure.
Do you have large swings in Alk?
If you do that will most definitely kill corals like acro.

Do you dose anything?

 

[Fishinbob]

Hey fort how's it going? I have a few suggestions... First get your water tested from a few sources( your test, LFS, or fellow reefer) find out where your "BIG 3" are... The one thing I found that kept my tank doing good was consistency! Once I added my dosing system everything seemed to do alot better! I had periods where I forgot to add alk or cal or added to little and it compounded after a week or so! Next like he said tune your photoperiod down slowly maybe 2hr ramp up 4-5hrs peak and 2 hr ramp down! 12 seems way too long I have a DIY led fixture I have 1hr ramp up 6 hr peak and 1 hr down works well for me mostly sps but have alot of Lps! Just remember LEDs are brighter than we think(or can see)! Just do it slowly maybe 30 mins a day or over a period of a week or two drop it down to maybe 8 hrs total! Just remember nothing goes fast in this hobby and anything fast is bad! Took a few months of dialing in the LEDs and dosing system to get my tank stable!! Goodluck! Hope it helps!!

 

[fort384]

The tank is new- was never used for FW. I have a salifert Cu test kit and I have tested copper a few times - it has always read 0.

I have not tested Mg but I ordered a redsea kit last week and it will arrive today so I will report back.

Interesting thoughts on lighting duration. I will start to creep it back a bit.

I am fairly confident in my test results. I have multiple kits for a few of the tests and also use the kits on my high tech planted tank. I always get expected values on it.

I am not currently dosing anything. I wouldn't say I have had wild swings in Alk but it did creep down slowly over several months. It is back up above 10 now after the multiple water changes last week.

I have been reading up on kalk and have considered adding a stirrer reactor to my top off system. But with the relatively few coral I have in my system, I kind of consider it a nice to have for now, as calcium and alk have not been a huge issue for me as of yet (based on my limited knowledge, feel free to refute that . ).

Thanks all for the brainstorming. Keep it coming

 

[Fishinbob]

If your using the red sea salt mag should be fine... I'm pretty sure if your mag is out you'll have problems keeping your alk and cal in check! Hope all goes good keep us updated!

 

[coralsnaked]

Lighting: 2X Aqua Illuminations SOL White Pods, running at 35% white, 45% blue. Ramp up 2 hours to that, ramp down 2 hours from that, total lighting period 12 hours.

Didn't mention which SOL pods you are using , but if you are using the standard 12" inch pods where each 12” section consists of 24 LED lamps grouped into a bank of 8 lenses or pods each containing two 6500K Daylight LED lamps and one Blue LED lamp. Each Pod is equal to a 250 Watt Metal Halide at full intensity. This would mean that you are providing Lumens per gal at 8.9 = 500w / 56g. Eight hours of this full intensity is way too much for most any coral including SPS. But LPS and Softies will simply kill off all symbiotic algea causing a loss in coloration and eventually death.
Everything listed here would be highly supceptable:

Coral that I have lost completely:
Xenia
Sympodium
Acro
Trumpet
3 hammers
fauvia
a few zoa colonies

The timing of your lighting is fine: IE @ 2 hrs ramping up and down with 8 hours of full lighting in between. Just keep the full lighting to about 60% max or 5+ lumens With more sensitive corals lower in the water column and SPS higher.

Happy Reefing

 

[fort384]

I am only running them at 35% of max for white and 45% blue.
So you are saying I need to increase the max setting to 60%?
They are sol whites and are just as you described. I wasn't aware there was another version of a sol white.

 

[FlyFishGuy]

I run LED's (Not Sol, but a total of 72 3w CREE) and was having similar problems keeping coral. I cut the light cycle back to a total of 9 hours (9 hours blue, 7 hours white/blue). The corals began to improve within a week or two and now seem quite happy.

The only other issue which may be a culprit here is nutrition. Do you feed your corals? Your skimmer is removing a lot of nutrients rapidly. Target feeding a suspension food may also help your coral thrive - rather than survive (or die in some cases).

Just some thoughts.

 

[fort384]

I feed Rods reef but I do not generally target feed.

I was under the impression that while target feeding can speed coral growth, none of the corals I am keeping require target feeding for success. Is that not the case?

Yes I agree nutrients in this tank run very very low. So maybe I am over skimming?

 

[fort384]

Ok, I just finished the install on my carbon reactor and it is up and running.

I also cut the lighting back by 1/2 hour today. I will wait a few days and cut it back a bit more overall.

Anyone have any ideas on the intensity setting? I have heard that it is both too high, and too low :/ Not sure where to go.

I also snapped a couple of quick pics with the iPhone. Didn't feel like getting out the DSLR... it is not that impressive right now anyway...

You can see the frogspawn on the sandbed, lower right. The birds nest is at the 2nd highest point on the rocks, right side. I also included a pic of the sump just so everyone can get an idea of what the system looks like.

Will do some water testing here in a bit - got the Mg test kit along with the carbon reactor today as well, so need to crack it open.

 

[fort384]

Ok sorry to triple post here, but here are the results of tonight's test:

pH: 8.3
SG: 1.024
KH: 8.7
Ca: 460
NO3: 0
PO4: 0.03
Mg: 1400

So a couple of things here:

1. As suspected, the Mg seems sufficiently high

2. The Alk has dropped significantly, even inside a week. Does this mean that perhaps I need to start dosing kalk? Is the Alk being uptaken by all of the coralline growth, because the coral certainly isn't uptaking much given the poor growth/death...

 

[MikeyUU]

Do you run your refugium light at the same time as your display lights? or on reverse cycles? If they are on at the same time, you may want to switch them to reverse cycles. I've read that this may help keep pH more constant for your corals over night when oxygen is not being released into the system from photosynthetic algae but CO2 is being produced by your aquatic life. Just an idea, hopefully someone who knows a little more can chime in and help.

 

[fort384]

It is on reverse cycles. My pH never sways more than a point or so from day to night. I gave a range earlier of 8.1-8.4, but I have never seen it swing more than .1 in a 24 hour period.