Growth explosion please??

[justy]

Hi

Just wondering if anybody has had slow growth of their sps and then found the reason for that slow growth.
I ask because I can not get my acropora to explode into growth.
I have 120watts of LED's plus I have added 4 T5's about 5 months ago over a surface area of 4 square feet.
This has definitely helped but still not the growth I remember getting on my old tank.
Current tank is 300ltr I dose ca 26 ml a day and kh 96ml a day. So clearly there is uptake.
I have also started using AF bugs and food plus A,V, E, B
No3 0 - 0.25 Po4 0.08 - 0.06

Can anybody offer any ideas.
Ps colours and health of corals look good.

Many thanks justin

 

[offdahooklikeoj]

whats your mag, cal, and alk levels? your cal and alk dosing should be equal.. something is out of whack.

 

[justy]

Hi I use calcium chloride 400 grams /Ltr
And sodium bicarbonate 80 grams /Ltr so they are not dosed in equal amounts.
Ca is stable @ 420 and kh is stable @ 7.0 and mg is around 1360.
Thanks.

 

[A1t2o]

Could be about anything. How long are the lights on? How much flow? Param like listed above. Placement, coral warfare, ext.

 

[justy]

The lights are on for 9 hours, I have two jebao wp 25's plus Ehiem1060 return pump all polyps move vigorously.
Corals are not near enough to be fighting with each other,but saying that I do have a couple of colonies of large green button polyps and purple mushrooms all over the lower parts of the rock, so could be chemical warfare?
Thanks for the ideas, keep them coming please as I have been racking my brains for months.
justin.

 

[leicobra]

Could be about anything. How long are the lights on? How much flow? Param like listed above. Placement, coral warfare, ext.

Justin, how often do you feed your tank? How much do you feed? Numbers of fishes in the tank? Do you use supplements? Light intensity?

From my experience in the past. I notice even when all my parameters were stable, yet nutrient level plays an important part. Not enough= slow to no growth. Too much= cyanobacteria

All and all, still there are many other factor like the ones above. I am sure there are many more experienced others who can tell you more.

 

[justy]

Hi

I have 6 fish I feed 1 and a half cubes a day of either mysis or brine shrimp a day.
Light intensity 120watts of LED's and 96 watts of T5's.
I also add fauna marin trace elements to my balling salts.
And as mentioned AF products.
I also add a pinch of flake food.
Front glass needs cleaning every two days or so.

 

[scrapz]

I went from 6x39w t5w for a month to 250w mh for 2 days then onto a 400w. As soon as I swapped to the 400w, literally every single one of my corals just splooged out in growth. They all dropped this big encrusting ring that I had to check all the coral to make sure they weren't STNing. Can't say if it was the 400w but I'm sure having as much useable light is helping.

 

[justy]

I have always suspected the light that is why I have slowly been adding the T5's I am currently at 47 watts / square foot.
How does that compare to your lights?
Thanks

 

[scrapz]

Probably operating at 50+ watts per sq ft but at a high concentration level. I'm using a lumenbright mini concentrated in a 2x2 area..

 

[justy]

On my old tank I had 86 watts/ foot. 4 T5's and 2 x 150 halides.
This grew corals very well.
There is no more room above the tank to fit any more light unless I switched the LED's for a better quality one with more output.

 

[Member No. 1]

Hi I use calcium chloride 400 grams /Ltr
And sodium bicarbonate 80 grams /Ltr so they are not dosed in equal amounts.
Ca is stable @ 420 and kh is stable @ 7.0 and mg is around 1360.
Thanks.

dKh is a little low. I would slowly raise it to closer to 8.0-8.5. I personally run mine higher, but at the higher level it's stable.

 

[justy]

I've always kept kh around natural sea water levels.
I am now running fairly low nutrients as well.
I'm a bit wary of increasing it!!
Thanks

 

[33yrplus]

dKh is a little low. I would slowly raise it to closer to 8.0-8.5. I personally run mine higher, but at the higher level it's stable.

+1

I used to run NSW levels for Alk at 1.0265 too. I didn't like being on the edge as there was no safety margin before you get into low alk issues. I now run my alk around 9. I would suggest increasing Alk and make sure your salinity is 1.0265 with a calibrated refractometer. Calibrate Refractometer with a calibration solution and not RO/DI water.

Your NO3 is a little low and your PO4 is a little high. If you want to increase growth the coral needs some nitrate.

Your CA mix sounds very high. I use Balling lite and mix mine to 72g/litre Anhydrous CaCl

Most likely something is limiting your coral growth. First choice would be low Alk, then Low Nitrate, then low light levels. That being said, I have had SPS corals that had hardly any growth for 6+ years then they suddenly started growing like crazy. I have no idea why as all parameters were within tolerances during the time and they were under a 400 watt Radium.

 

[justy]

Thanks for the in depth reply I realy apreciate it. have you noticed less growth when alk is low and more when it's high.
Nitrates have only recently dropped to current levels since using AF products. Growth was slow before this.

 

[33yrplus]

I don't know whether the growth rate is higher at 8+ then at 7. IME if alk drops much below 7 the growth stops and corals begin to have issues. My 18" Chalice was always the first one to have issues with recession. Sadly it is now a few large colonies.

My suggestions would be to:
bring alk up to 8 over a weeks time period.
try to keep everything as stable as possible.
check for parasites etc.
try to increase nitrate a bit

What type of acros are having slow growth? There is varying growth rates between acro species and even size. It also takes time once you have corrected the problem for the growth rate to pick up.

 

[justy]

Thanks, Yes I have increased the doser to raise alk slowly, it's definitely worth a go. As I will just change this one parameter I should be able to monitor any changes to coral growth easily.
Yes you are right some corals are growing ok stylo milka, plating monties are growing like weeds. I have a hystrix that is hardly growing which is odd.
Tri colour, horida, spathulata, millipora, have some growth tips but growth is very slow.
Thanks for your help and suggestions.

 

[justy]

Well an update, kh 7.3 ca 430 mg mg 1360 No3 0.25 and po4 0.06
Not much can get in parameters other than bringing kh up slowly.
Just wondering how much effect large green button polyps and purple mushrooms can have on sps growth? Is it possible they can inhibit growth through chemical warfare? I have quite a few in my tank they are a bit of a pest really.

 

[justy]

Hi Anybody have experience with large green button polyps and purple mushrooms being toxic to sps?

Many thanks

 

[biggles]

I would remove the mushrooms and be running carbon atm with them in there mate.