a dialogue on potassium?

[benchland]

hello,
i have been reading around about potassium, as the blues in my tank look pretty washed out. i have a 40g sps tank with 2 ai super sols (dialed way down). also read that carbon dosing (i dose 1 ml vodka daily) pulls out potassium at a faster rate.

on the other hand i spoke with someone i trust who has 20+ years experience, they said that dosing potassium on such a small tank would not be a good idea.

though i ordered a potassium test kit and some "potassion" a week before i spoke with him. also ordered lugols, which i believe contains potassium iodide (?)
it kind of makes sense to me that potassium can be deadly to animals as it is a derivative of chlorine- another thing to consider is what little portion of seawater potassium takes up, i believe the top two are silica and magnesium (i know calcium is in there somewhere as well). also- i perform 5g water changes weekly, which must be replacing any lost potassium.

just wondering what experience people have had with potassium dosing?

 

[redliner]

Weekly water changes should be sufficient in maintain potassium level in your tank. Test before adding, overdosing has adverse affect on your SPS.

 

[allsps40]

Ok a few things. First the chances of having low potassium are low even if you carbon dose, regular water changes will replenish any potassium. Second potassium iodide is not a proper source of potassium, it has to be potassium chloride or potassium sulfate. I dosed potassium to try to help my blues and it did nothing at all but increase my potassium to twice NSW levels.

 

[Allmost]

that's why we have test kits

test, and if low, dose. and as allsps mentioned, potasium iodone cant be used to increase K+, without killing everything from iodine poisoning.



Elevated K+ [potassium] has no good effects, it can caue hair algae and burned tips. it should be maintained at NSW levels, like CA++./

 

[allsps40]

Yep I was testing and that is how I know I doubled my K+ level in my tank.