Fauna Marine Trace Elements & Color Elements

[randoma]

I've been using Randy's 'two-part' method for many years. Used to use ice melt, but now I'm getting materials from BRS. Anyway, I'm intrigued by the Fauna Marine Trace elements which are added to the two-part recipe but I can't figure out how much to add. I found some references to 20ml per gallon for all 3, but also 6ml per gallon for Trace 1 & 2 and 20ml for Trace 3.. 6ml != 20ml by a longshot... So, anyone have direct experience with this?

Also, Fauna Marine has 'color elements' - are those in addition to the Trace elements or instead of?

 

[bertoni]

Do you mean the Organic product? The standalone dosage recommendation is 1 ml per 26 gallons per day, and that's probably as close as you're going to get. They don't give a breakdown of what's in it, as far as I can tell.

The color elements are intended to bump coral colors. I don't know how well they work, but they would be used in addition to other supplements if you wanted to try to produce more intense coloration.

 

[randoma]

I don't think it is organic.. They're from the 'balling light' system, whatever that means. 'Ultra Balling Light Trace 1[2,3] Color & Grow Elements'.

The organic nutrients and trace elements is something else.

 

[randoma]

Fauna Marin instructions, when used with their 'two-part' system is the addition of 25ml/5L of their mix. But it is unclear to me what the actual Ca/Alk/Mg concentration is since the BRS 'two-part and Fauna Marin use a different source of Ca/Alk/Mg.

BRS uses 2.5 cups of Calcium Chloride/gallon, FM uses 2kg(!) of Calcium Chloride Dihydrate/5L... I'm pretty sure that 2.5 cups of BRS' Calcium is not even close to 2kg. But I'm also pretty sure that it would be impossible to dissolve 2kg of BRS' Calcium in 5L of water. Then again, I've never actually tried....

 

[bertoni]

2 kg is a lot of calcium chloride. 2.5 cups is more like 0.5 kg. I don't know what the upper limit of solubility might be, but it is very high. If it's a two-part, the alkalinity solution probably isn't more than 2x the DIY unless they are using sodium hydroxide. That would make a very basic solution (ph > 14). You might just try ½ their recommendation, and keep up a good water change schedule. Some elements might be accumulating.

 

[Sam2832]

I use the fauna marin balling light. You have to add 25 ml/5liters of the trace 3 for the kh. For the ca you add 25 ml/5liters of trace 1 and 2. The mg does'nt have additive.

Kh 500g/5 liters
Ca 2 kg/5 liters
Mg 2 kg/5 liters

You will have a residue in the jug for the kh, be sure that your dosing pump does'nt take it, it could mess up the amount dosed.
If you keep the tube 1 inch above the bottom you should be ok.

Good luck


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[randoma]

2 kg is a lot of calcium chloride. 2.5 cups is more like 0.5 kg. I don't know what the upper limit of solubility might be, but it is very high. If it's a two-part, the alkalinity solution probably isn't more than 2x the DIY unless they are using sodium hydroxide. That would make a very basic solution (ph > 14). You might just try ½ their recommendation, and keep up a good water change schedule. Some elements might be accumulating.

For Alk they're using 500g of sodium bicarbonate in 5L of water. That sounds like roughly 2x what Randy's comes out to. (I believe that Randy's two-part/BRS two-part is roughly 9oz of soda ash per gallon, which is close to 1/2 of 500g/5L if my math is correct).

The Magnesium is 2.0kg/5l of magnesium chloride hexahydrate, which by my calculation is roughly twice the weight/volume of Randy's/BRS.

In which case, assuming it is supposed to be a balanced mix, I don't think that their Ca mix can be 4x - is it possible that the Ca mix they're using is twice as dense as Randy's/BRS? So, 2kg/5l comes out to roughly twice the concentration?

At any rate, if 'Balling Light' is 2x the concentration and uses 25ml/5L, my calculation comes out to 9.5ml of their trace elements per gallon of BRS/Randy's. Would you agree?

 

[bertoni]

I am not sure why their calcium solution would be 4x, so I suspect that you are correct overall. They might be using anhydrous calcium chloride, which will be a bit denser. I am not sure what the purity of their product is, either, so the two effects might cover most of the difference. Anhydrous calcium chloride should be about 25% more concentrated, as a starting point.

Your numbers seem reasonable to me.