Keeping it simple..and it works (part 2)

ComforablyNumb said:
Did your dad keep up with his water changes? I had a birdsnest I gave away when it got too large and I kept bumping it off when doing other maintenance in the tank. Didnt really care for the appearance of that particular coral either..but, as always, your mileage may vary and personal preferences certainly do.
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I'm pretty sure they died around the same time of year every time.. hunting season, he'd get other people to take care of the tank and I'm sure they'd overfeed and no water changes for a month.. I don't live near him or I would have helped. He took his tank down because of that.. extended vacations meant returning to dead stuff.
 
That is always a challenge for me when we are away for more than a week as well. I have a nephew with a degree who does not know what the meaning of "dont feed them too much" is, but he is all I have when we are gone on vacation.
 
Beautiful tank. I'll never understand the comments like "yea but you can't do that for X, but no offense". Why the need to criticize?
 
Wow, that's a lot less than I expected for water changes. I expected you say 50% a week. You only do a water change every other month?

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People are in this hobby for different reasons. There's plenty of opportunities for vastly different styles, all of which can be successful. One person's "best" might be someone else's "can't do it."

I appreciate the Berlin method, that's what I learned early on, too. Yes, you can't keep a tank stuffed with SPS without some sort of supplementation, but using kalk for topoff fits nicely with a "keep it simple" approach and can be totally sufficient for maintaining parameters.
 
Zorin said:
You only do a water change every other month?

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On average. I can just look at my octo lps and can tell when its time... it is the first to hold back full extension (not my sps) if alk starts to get out of whack, which is usually the first thing that depletes. Its all I test for now.

Said octo when I first got it 20 months ago:
H0dungX.jpg


What it looks like now:
pfvr1Xz.jpg




To me and the non-hobbyist folks who look at my tank, these are the more interesting corals. I also have a nice big neon green leather coral that garners some attention but the star of the show as far as most folks are concerned is this one:
lSF3RFA.jpg


A basic nem hosting a gold stripe maroon clown. People look and comment about those two more than anything else. Its not even close. Poor gal had her mouth nipped by another when young. She carries the scar two yrs later if you look closely. Aggressive thing tho. Fearless. She takes personal exception to my hand whenever its near her nem. Hasnt drawn blood yet, but I think that is only a matter of time. She even knows to target my under-wrist area as that is where I am most vulnerable. ;)
 
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der_wille_zur_macht said:
using kalk for topoff fits nicely with a "keep it simple" approach and can be totally sufficient for maintaining parameters.
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Great comment. I may go back to using kalk on a more reg basis to see if it extends my water change interval. I dont have a lot of stonies, which is why I no longer test for calcium.. or pH <--which I never tested for. My lps would also probably benefit from a slightly higher level of calcium, so you make an excellent point. My calcium used to start at 410- 420, would gradually declined to the 390 - 400 area...until a water change brought it back up. The testing results went the same for about a yr, so I stopped testing for it on a reg basis.
 
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You mentioned a 40% water change. 35 gallons??

Do you maintain an RODI unit or do you just buy the water by the gallon at the LFS?

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Hi, yes, I use a couple of the Brute 33gal for mixing my rodi water with my salt. I also mix for a minimum of 2 days to get everything really dissolved and oxygenated. I put in a power head and a heater. I drain my tank down to whatever level is appropriate for the amount I want to change. Having the corals out of the water for 10 minutes doesnt seem to bother them.

I always change at night after the lights have gone off and most of my corals have withdrawn polyps anyway.

Sidenote: I used actual seawater for many months when I lived in Newfoundland. Worked well, but got to be a pain, especially in winter. Gave that up that in January.
 
ComforablyNumb said:
Hi, yes, I use a couple of the Brute 33gal for mixing my rodi water with my salt. I also mix for a minimum of 2 days to get everything really dissolved and oxygenated. I put in a power head and a heater. I drain my tank down to whatever level is appropriate for the amount I want to change. Having the corals out of the water for 10 minutes doesnt seem to bother them.

I always change at night after the lights have gone off and most of my corals have withdrawn polyps anyway.

Sidenote: I used actual seawater for many months when I lived in Newfoundland. Worked well, but got to be a pain, especially in winter. Gave that up that in January.
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Tried using NSW when I lived there. ...wasnt a time lol
 
Nice tank, and you're not even stressed out and broke ;). SPS people, tell us something we don't know already, or even better, just go away.
 
nereefpat said:
Nice, healthy colonies in there for sure.

Any idea what your parameters are for alk, Ca, and Mg?
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alk - 10 range
ca - 410 - 420 after water change, gradually declines to 390 - 400
(got the same readings for a yr, so I dont really test for that anymore)
mg - don't test anymore, was always within range
 
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