Help with SPS color

[deepseadan]

Kissman, if you don't mind, can you provide us with a complete list of your equipment and tank size again? How you dose alk, cal etc. when you feed, how often you skim, do you have a fuge, and anything else you do. Maybe we can find a weak link? Oh and no parameter numbers like po4 ect, those are always variable. Thanks

 

[kissman]

I am considering removing my DSB from DT and refugium. Has anybody on this thread done it? I am sure slowly is the way to go? The vaccum I use for my water change is not strong enough. This sandbed has been in the tank for prob 10 years. since I had a FOWLR. I did add a inch or two a few years ago. I thinking of removing it and replacing it with 1-2" I don't want to go bare bottom, don't really like the look. Plus I really like my Diamond Gobie and they need some sand.

 

[fishguy597]

Just some friendly advice but you have done a lot in the last two months. I would just relax and run your tests and keep an eye on everything. If it were me I would quit tinkering and keep it simple. I would also run your gfo. at half capacity. Let everything stabilize for a while and make a decision if you want to remove the dsb . Good luck

 

[kissman]

Kissman, if you don't mind, can you provide us with a complete list of your equipment and tank size again? How you dose alk, cal etc. when you feed, how often you skim, do you have a fuge, and anything else you do. Maybe we can find a weak link? Oh and no parameter numbers like po4 ect, those are always variable. Thanks

Thanks! I think this is everything I kinda rushed through it at work. LOL!

Feeding 1 cube a day plus some flake food
sometimes 1 cube twice a day sometimes I sub Reef Chili, or pellets I try to keep from feeding the same thing.
8ml each Red Sea Energy A&B every night
Skimmer runs 24 hours a day


Equipment
55g Aquarium
20g Aquarium for sump
2 Hydor Koralia Controllable 4's
Hydor Koralia Wavemaker 2 with Day/Night Sensor
Current USA HOT5 Nova Extreme Pro 48" 6x54w
1 ATI Coral Plus
4 ATI Blue Plus
1 ATI Purple Plus
Bulbs replaced 1-2 months ago
1st set of lights on at 12-9pm (2 Blue Plus)
2nd set comes at 1pm till 8pm (all 6 bulbs)
Warner Marine MF181 Skimmer stays in 8" water factory recommendation
1 Phosban Reactor 8tbs of BRS GAC ROX .08 (offlline)
1 Phosban Reactor ¾ cup BRS HC GFO (offline)
Mag Drive 3 Return Pump
Finnex 300w Digital Heater in Sump
Salt SeaChem Reef
1 50mL BRS pump adds Top off water
1 1.1mL BRS pump adding Calcium 12 ml 8 times a day
1 1.1mL BRS pump adding Alk 12ml 8 times a day
Various Macro's in Sump along with 4" sand bed
4" sandbed in DST
65lbs of live rock

 

[Reiser]

Hi Kissman,
my english is not so good, but i hope i translated correctly.

My corals had 4 weeks ago the same pale colour like yours from post 316. Is it right that mostly all corals with green colors have this Problems? The other corals are pale but not so bad like the green?
My Acro tricolor for example lost all the brown color and looks like zeovith corals.
Most of my green Acros were pale and beige. Most SPS have no Polype expansion and my LPS have small polyps.
Growth was very bad all the time.
More fish feeding and coral feeding has brought little.

I think the Problem ist not a limitation from organic materials like po4 or no3.
The Problem is an iron limitation.
No plant or seaweed cant live or growth without iron. And corals are the same.
Iron falls off very quickly in our tanks.
You can feed your corals with phytoplankton or dose iron with trace elements.

Now i dose trace elements with more iron and my corals looks better and gets the green colour back slowly. Some corals gets new growth tips.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2002/10/chemistry

i hope i can help you, regards form Germany

Reiser

 

[deepseadan]

Thanks! I think this is everything I kinda rushed through it at work. LOL!

Feeding 1 cube a day plus some flake food
sometimes 1 cube twice a day sometimes I sub Reef Chili, or pellets I try to keep from feeding the same thing.
8ml each Red Sea Energy A&B every night
Skimmer runs 24 hours a day


Equipment
55g Aquarium
20g Aquarium for sump
2 Hydor Koralia Controllable 4's
Hydor Koralia Wavemaker 2 with Day/Night Sensor
Current USA HOT5 Nova Extreme Pro 48" 6x54w
1 ATI Coral Plus
4 ATI Blue Plus
1 ATI Purple Plus
Bulbs replaced 1-2 months ago
1st set of lights on at 12-9pm (2 Blue Plus)
2nd set comes at 1pm till 8pm (all 6 bulbs)
Warner Marine MF181 Skimmer stays in 8" water factory recommendation
1 Phosban Reactor 8tbs of BRS GAC ROX .08 (offlline)
1 Phosban Reactor ¾ cup BRS HC GFO (offline)
Mag Drive 3 Return Pump
Finnex 300w Digital Heater in Sump
Salt SeaChem Reef
1 50mL BRS pump adds Top off water
1 1.1mL BRS pump adding Calcium 12 ml 8 times a day
1 1.1mL BRS pump adding Alk 12ml 8 times a day
Various Macro's in Sump along with 4" sand bed
4" sandbed in DST
65lbs of live rock

Okay, a couple things that I don't see are (but maybe you forgot to write them down since you are in a hurry)

1. You have brs dosing pumps for alk and calcium, but how about mag? If you're sure your mag is ok and add it separately that's fine. But remember mag is a very important element. Your reef inhabitants don't necessarily use it directly, but mag act as barrier of sorts to get in between cal and alk. If your mag is low, your cal and alk might be precipitating out and possibly causing slight alk swings. I my system I would never think of dosing alk and cal without mag as well. Sps hate any alk swing at all. That very well could be causing your lack of color.

2. How high are your lights off the water? When I used to run t5's, I had to have them literally an inch off the water line for sps. And it was an ati 8 bulb fixture.

3. I don't like the bulb combo. Just my opinion now, but for sps I wouldn't run the purple plus or that many blues. You are lacking the cooler end of the spectrum in my opinion. I would run one 6500k, one 10,000k one aquablue specials and three blue pluses. I think that would much more sps friendly. But that's just my experience with t5's.

Got to get back to work now, but I'm going to read closer and check back later.

 

[kissman]

Okay, a couple things that I don't see are (but maybe you forgot to write them down since you are in a hurry)

1. You have brs dosing pumps for alk and calcium, but how about mag? If you're sure your mag is ok and add it separately that's fine. But remember mag is a very important element. Your reef inhabitants don't necessarily use it directly, but mag act as barrier of sorts to get in between cal and alk. If your mag is low, your cal and alk might be precipitating out and possibly causing slight alk swings. I my system I would never think of dosing alk and cal without mag as well. Sps hate any alk swing at all. That very well could be causing your lack of color.

2. How high are your lights off the water? When I used to run t5's, I had to have them literally an inch off the water line for sps. And it was an ati 8 bulb fixture.

3. I don't like the bulb combo. Just my opinion now, but for sps I wouldn't run the purple plus or that many blues. You are lacking the cooler end of the spectrum in my opinion. I would run one 6500k, one 10,000k one aquablue specials and three blue pluses. I think that would much more sps friendly. But that's just my experience with t5's.

Got to get back to work now, but I'm going to read closer and check back later.

Thanks to answer your questions,

1. I can't remember the last time my Mag read below 1500 I can't remember the last time I added any, But I test it as I do everything every Sunday.

2. The NEP is sitting on legs so I would say 2-3" off tank.

3. The bulb combo was actually suggested on RC and from ATI to get more PAR from the light combo I was running. I was running 1 ATI True Actinic, 2 ATI AquaBlue Special, 1 ATI Coral Plus, 2 ATI Blue Plus. I sent ATI an email asking them what combo gives the best PAR.

I am home from work yay! Bourbon in hand! :beer:

 

[kissman]

I want to thank everybody in this thread for all the advice that has been giving I have become very frustrated. I want my SPS tank to be successful as does everyone.

 

[deepseadan]

On break for a min so a couple more thoughts, are you using brs alk and cal? If so, and I'm reading your info correct, dosing 96ml of cal and alk seems to high. Is your tank really consuming that much a day? Or is it possibly precipitating out? That's just under what I add to my 135 gallon tank which has to have at least as much sps as yours. I don't have a super amount of rock either. Of course just guessing, if I had you setup I would probably 25 - 30ml each daily. If your tank was fully mature with huge colonies of sps, then 96ml wouldn't be far off. The general starting point for dosing brs alk and cal is 1ml per gallon. Minus rock ect.

As for the lights, everyone has a different opinion. Everyone can argue forever, but remember most sps are shallow water corals which receive much more red, orange, yellow, green, than the blue or purple. But then again if lack of light was the only issue, you would probably be seeing brown instead of pail. I would try cutting down on the dosing and see what happens. Remember to stay patient, it will eventually turn around. One last thought, I used to have a 30 gallon tank with t5s. It had a tiny skimmer that ran 12 hours a day. I dosed absolutely nothing ( except fish food), just changed 5 gallons of ocean water every three days because I would buy 15 gallons a week. That was the healthiest sps tank I've ever seen and truthfully I get tired of dosing pumps and everything else.

 

[kissman]

This is a picture of the same tank on 10/16/2009. My PO4 was about 5ppm NO3 was 160+ when I did a test on API the test tube was so red you would think I had just had blood drawn! I worked my butt to get to where I am today! I did water changes every 2 days about 50% each time. Went through a lot of salt, water, etc... Was a huge hurdle. I love this hobby, I love the challenge, I love the forum, I love helping people on this forum. I feel that I am > < close and I feel I have a great knowledge of this hobby. LOL, I also feel something has to give at some point.

My god the Cyano I fought

old Aquamedic Turboflotor

My new baby 4/10/2012

 

[kissman]

On break for a min so a couple more thoughts, are you using brs alk and cal? If so, and I'm reading your info correct, dosing 96ml of cal and alk seems to high. Is your tank really consuming that much a day? Or is it possibly precipitating out? That's just under what I add to my 135 gallon tank which has to have at least as much sps as yours. I don't have a super amount of rock either. Of course just guessing, if I had you setup I would probably 25 - 30ml each daily. If your tank was fully mature with huge colonies of sps, then 96ml wouldn't be far off. The general starting point for dosing brs alk and cal is 1ml per gallon. Minus rock ect.

As for the lights, everyone has a different opinion. Everyone can argue forever, but remember most sps are shallow water corals which receive much more red, orange, yellow, green, than the blue or purple. But then again if lack of light was the only issue, you would probably be seeing brown instead of pail. I would try cutting down on the dosing and see what happens. Remember to stay patient, it will eventually turn around. One last thought, I used to have a 30 gallon tank with t5s. It had a tiny skimmer that ran 12 hours a day. I dosed absolutely nothing ( except fish food), just changed 5 gallons of ocean water every three days because I would buy 15 gallons a week. That was the healthiest sps tank I've ever seen and truthfully I get tired of dosing pumps and everything else.

The alk and calcium I dose a total of 12ml of each over 8 doses a day sorry. I actually just looked at my dosing chart and I thought I was dosing 12ml I am actually at 17ml a day stretched out over 8 doses

 

[kissman]

Hi Kissman,
my english is not so good, but i hope i translated correctly.

My corals had 4 weeks ago the same pale colour like yours from post 316. Is it right that mostly all corals with green colors have this Problems? The other corals are pale but not so bad like the green?
My Acro tricolor for example lost all the brown color and looks like zeovith corals.
Most of my green Acros were pale and beige. Most SPS have no Polype expansion and my LPS have small polyps.
Growth was very bad all the time.
More fish feeding and coral feeding has brought little.

I think the Problem ist not a limitation from organic materials like po4 or no3.
The Problem is an iron limitation.
No plant or seaweed cant live or growth without iron. And corals are the same.
Iron falls off very quickly in our tanks.
You can feed your corals with phytoplankton or dose iron with trace elements.

Now i dose trace elements with more iron and my corals looks better and gets the green colour back slowly. Some corals gets new growth tips.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2002/10/chemistry

i hope i can help you, regards form Germany

Reiser

hey thanks from Germany translation came out great. I actually have tested my Iron and it is always low with the Red Sea Reef Colors. I have never dosed it because I have always read its so easy to overdose

 

[echopiece]

On break for a min so a couple more thoughts, are you using brs alk and cal? If so, and I'm reading your info correct, dosing 96ml of cal and alk seems to high. Is your tank really consuming that much a day? Or is it possibly precipitating out? That's just under what I add to my 135 gallon tank which has to have at least as much sps as yours. I don't have a super amount of rock either. Of course just guessing, if I had you setup I would probably 25 - 30ml each daily. If your tank was fully mature with huge colonies of sps, then 96ml wouldn't be far off. The general starting point for dosing brs alk and cal is 1ml per gallon. Minus rock ect.

As for the lights, everyone has a different opinion. Everyone can argue forever, but remember most sps are shallow water corals which receive much more red, orange, yellow, green, than the blue or purple. But then again if lack of light was the only issue, you would probably be seeing brown instead of pail. I would try cutting down on the dosing and see what happens. Remember to stay patient, it will eventually turn around. One last thought, I used to have a 30 gallon tank with t5s. It had a tiny skimmer that ran 12 hours a day. I dosed absolutely nothing ( except fish food), just changed 5 gallons of ocean water every three days because I would buy 15 gallons a week. That was the healthiest sps tank I've ever seen and truthfully I get tired of dosing pumps and everything else.

I agree with this. Kissman, I took my Gfo offline as well as my carbon and started feeding my fish (5 in a 30 gallon) every day, twice a day. Pellets and flake one day and rods frozen the next. I have also stopped dosing at the moment and my alk and ca are right inline. I do an 8-10% water change once a week sometimes every 2 weeks if I'm busy. My SPS have started coloring back up and I'm starting to see coralline algae growth. I was shooting for 10 dkh and I figured I would try lowering and maintaining 8-8.5. Just regular water changes with reef crystals is keeping that inline. Oh I'm also using the nano reef booster. My tank was so sterile and virtually would never grow any type of algae on the glass. Now I'm scraping every other day and things are starting to look good. I'm still a ways away from awesome colors, but it's an improvement I haven't seen in 6 months! I have a big skimmer and a fuge with chaeto which has doubled in size in the past two weeks. Food in, poop out = happy tank and corals. I'm done chasing my phosphate levels, I'm more focused on how the tank is responding.

 

[kissman]

I agree with this. Kissman, I took my Gfo offline as well as my carbon and started feeding my fish (5 in a 30 gallon) every day, twice a day. Pellets and flake one day and rods frozen the next. I have also stopped dosing at the moment and my alk and ca are right inline. I do an 8-10% water change once a week sometimes every 2 weeks if I'm busy. My SPS have started coloring back up and I'm starting to see coralline algae growth. I was shooting for 10 dkh and I figured I would try lowering and maintaining 8-8.5. Just regular water changes with reef crystals is keeping that inline. Oh I'm also using the nano reef booster. My tank was so sterile and virtually would never grow any type of algae on the glass. Now I'm scraping every other day and things are starting to look good. I'm still a ways away from awesome colors, but it's an improvement I haven't seen in 6 months! I have a big skimmer and a fuge with chaeto which has doubled in size in the past two weeks. Food in, poop out = happy tank and corals. I'm done chasing my phosphate levels, I'm more focused on how the tank is responding.

I am dosing 17min a day with a 1.1ml dosing pump which actually is 18.7ml a day. Below is my schedule. Hey how do you like the Reef Booster I actually have 6 vials but never tried it.

0n 0ff min

1 1200 1204 am 4
2 300 304 am 4
3 600 602 am 2
4 900 901 am 1
5 1200 1201 pm 1
6 300 301 pm 1
7 600 602 pm 2
8 900 902 pm 2

 

[echopiece]

That just seems like a lot. Do you have a lot of growth or coralline? What dkh are you maintaining?

I like the reef booster! Between that and feeding rods foods, I have seen an improvement.

 

[kissman]

18.7ml its not that much over a 24 hour period, yes I have some coralline on my powerheads. My alk stays between 8.1-8.3 I have been testing everyday to make sure I have it dialed in and for a week now thats the range its in

 

[echopiece]

Ok, that sounds good.

 

[deepseadan]

hey thanks from Germany translation came out great. I actually have tested my Iron and it is always low with the Red Sea Reef Colors. I have never dosed it because I have always read its so easy to overdose

Kissman, watch out with iron. My lfs just crashed their tank because the iron test kit they were using wasn't reading correctly. I'm not 100% sure, but I thought it was Red Sea. They said the test kit consistently read low and they eventually overdosed.

 

[deepseadan]

There was a time years back when my sps were struggling. I had a .04 po4. My experience seems to differ from others, because my sps look far better when my po4 reads undetectable on my Hanna tester. Now that I know what bulbs your using I still think you're running the wrong bulbs. To be honest, other than over skimming a bit, everything else you do seems pretty good. What is your par near your acros?

 

[kissman]

There was a time years back when my sps were struggling. I had a .04 po4. My experience seems to differ from others, because my sps look far better when my po4 reads undetectable on my Hanna tester. Now that I know what bulbs your using I still think you're running the wrong bulbs. To be honest, other than over skimming a bit, everything else you do seems pretty good. What is your par near your acros?

Man i wish i knew. I dont have a PAR meter and cant find one in the area. I am considering running GFO again but with only 4tbs. Hanna was reading 30ppb