I run RO. I have thought about low nutrients in the tank going to start feeding more. I feed Formula 1 in the afternoon and mysis at night now. Only gave mysis at night before. I have 8 fish. 6 anthias, dusky wrasse and xmas wrasse.
Am I the only one that can't keep SPS?
- Thread starter jfingers8
- Start date
2 x 6105 may sound like alot but i've found that lack of water flow around acros is one of the major causes for death from the bottom, barring any pests of course. You might want to try some cycopeeze as a food source as they are a great visual indicator to how the water is moving in your tank. How often do you do water changes? There are a number of acro reefers getting excellent results just with water changes and fish feeding. Good luck
i know i get great flow because when i feed mysis i can see exactly how the current is flowing some of my corals get hit pretty good. I do water changes 10% every sunday.
I do run carbon and that is what im going to try, feeding the tank a lot more and see what happens.
If I had to guess with this limited information:
1) The sand. What is that stuff? If you can't find out EXACTLY what it's made out of, remove it.
2) As someone else said, your corals might be starving. This was always my problem until I learned to detect it. I super-skimmed, polished with a sock, and sucked out all phosphate with gfo. I still skim, but I now dose carbon (bacteria are food too!) cut back on the sock, and stoped the gfo.
I now also feed oyster eggs regularly after lights out, along with adding coral specific foods to my fish feedings. It scared the snot out of me first, the volume of food, but it's been a year now and I'm stable and no more bleaching.
1) The sand. What is that stuff? If you can't find out EXACTLY what it's made out of, remove it.
2) As someone else said, your corals might be starving. This was always my problem until I learned to detect it. I super-skimmed, polished with a sock, and sucked out all phosphate with gfo. I still skim, but I now dose carbon (bacteria are food too!) cut back on the sock, and stoped the gfo.
I now also feed oyster eggs regularly after lights out, along with adding coral specific foods to my fish feedings. It scared the snot out of me first, the volume of food, but it's been a year now and I'm stable and no more bleaching.
DustinB
New member
I had that black sand in my first tank I got from another guy that was running it fish only. One thing I noticed was the tank was scratched up from his magfloat. I found out when he got the magfloat too close to the sand the sand would pull to it. There was actually magnetic particles on the sand, apparently iron. I got rid of it and only kept the rock when I upgraded, I never had corals in it other than a few mushrooms it came with. I did notice they never really grew well. They exploded in my current tank.
I don't know how bad iron can affect SPS though. Just a thought.
I don't know how bad iron can affect SPS though. Just a thought.
Well hopefully that is the problem we'll see i now sand was completely sucked out with a wet vac so whether it was the sand or something in it its gone. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Might be to early to tell what is going on but first thing i noticed was all the polyps on my Yellow Porites opened up again. They were closed for almost 2 weeks.We'll see if any other results pop up.
ingtar_shinowa
New member
still i think its gonna help. I hope you didnt disrupt too much junk and release and nutrients
Yea i think it's going to help also. i disrupted things a little tiny bit not much at all. i took out all the rock. removed most of the water then when i got near the sand bed there was like a inch of water and i sucked out the rest of the water and sand with a wet vac. very little clouding when i put everything back.
ingtar_shinowa
New member
nice
Curious - How is your tank doing now? Reading this seems like you were starving the tank. I can tell you that I thought my param's were spot on and then I noticed a my Redox going over 500mv which is quite odd for a reef tank (350-400 is more typical)... belief is the probe is defective. After some research and consideration I'm pretty certain I have been starving my system. It's amazing how efficient skimmers are now. Couple a really efficient skimmer with a fuge, DSB, carbon, regular water changes, filter socks and hardly any feeding since there are only 3 fish in the tank, a couple dozen SPS frags and some zoos & acans and you have my situation. I was only doing a little Formula 2 flake once a day and a dime to nickel size chunk of Rod's reef food and I have 450 gallons of water. I added DT's phytoplankton every few days or so but that's about it. Now, I'm tossing Zooplanktos-L and Coral Aminos per normal doses and although it really looks like a mess like wmilas said, the corals are extending their polyps again. I'm adding more fish too. Hoping it turns around quickly. I have some nice SPS in here that I'd hate to lose. Let us know how it's going.
mudskipper1
Trust Me I'm an Engineer
Is iron really an issue for sps? I know quite a few people dose iron to help with macroalgae growth, not sure what the specific compound was, and also, GFO obviously has iron in it, so it must just be specific forms of iron?
Photo_John
New member
Do you run a fuge on your tank?
I enjoy a simplistic system of reef keeping, good light, good flow, a good 2 part additive, and a kicking dsb with fuge. I find a fuge makes all the difference... 2 cents
I enjoy a simplistic system of reef keeping, good light, good flow, a good 2 part additive, and a kicking dsb with fuge. I find a fuge makes all the difference... 2 cents
jgonz_1979
New member
feed those corals!!!
feed those corals!!!
i use to have problems like yours, but the problem was my corals were starving, but you need to feed the corals specially when youre driving a low nutrient tank. just bought some coral frenzy , reef roids or some quality reef foods.
the other solution it´s place some fishes , because ther poo will feed youre corals.
feed those corals!!!
i use to have problems like yours, but the problem was my corals were starving, but you need to feed the corals specially when youre driving a low nutrient tank. just bought some coral frenzy , reef roids or some quality reef foods.
the other solution it´s place some fishes , because ther poo will feed youre corals.
