Help with SPS placement...Pics inside

[Dr. Fish]

I recently bought my first few SPS pieces. Everything is living, but I wouldn't say thriving. I really don't see any growth and I feel the colors could be better.

Tank Details:
34G 20x20x20 cube
ATI 6x24w fixture..4 blue+, 1 purple+, and 1 coral plus. All new bulbs
S.G. 1.205 Refractometer
Cal 440 salifert
Alk 9.8 Salifert
NO3 2 Salifert
PO4 0.00 Hannah

Here is an overall shot of the tank to get an idea of my aquascape.

Here are pics of some SPS corals, if you can give some placement advice based on my aquascape that would be awesome.

My ORA purple grape cap....Looks just like the day I bought it, no color change, no growth at all.

My ORA green birdsnest...All polyps are out. Decent color, but I feel it could be brighter and more "fuller", hasn't shown any growth. Ideas?

Lastly, some Ricordia frags. Ideas on placement?

 

[sahin]

Your tank appears fairly young. Give the SPS stability and time. Over many months you will see them colour up.

As for SPS placement. Mostly place high up. Stuff like Monti Caps should be placed lower down. Birdnests do fine mid level. Some SPS like Red Planet for example like being placed lower to get the green colour out.

Note also that a lot depends on where those frags were placed before they came to your tank. So try and match light levels in that way if at all possible.

Most experienced reef keepers will place the SPS frags lower to begin with and slowly raise them up...but stuff like most caps etc you know to place lower.

Your rics should be placed at the bottom and may even require some shading.

Hope that helps.

PS, the best advice I can give to you is that you seem to be doing really well. Keep doing what you are doing. Stick to the basics: keep Alk, Ca and Mg stable. Keep up the water changes. Dont start carbon dosing etc etc. Stick to the traditional way as much as possible and you will see your tank flourish. Have LOTS of patience for the SPS too.

 

[FusionVi]

Nice tank. Good job on rockwork.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Reefer1225]

Nice aquascape. +1 Sahin comments

 

[REEF SMAC]

Sahin summed it all up pretty well. Couldn't agree more.

You're really off to great start.

 

[dan-in-gr]

Hi, Looks good. The only thing I would change to get more color out of corals is to drop 2 of the blue plus and put in 2 pure actinic. In my setup, I ran pure actinic and replaced the bulbs with 4 blue plus and am tossing those out this week for pure actinic for better florescence. I have used the Giesemann brand from Germany and love them. It takes time for corals to spread on plug or rock before they do any real growth, so be patient.