Keeping SPS

[gjgordon]

For months now I have been reading all these forums with my fish tank bubbling away with only a few zoas and a hammer coral (all doing awesome). I want to try my hand at a few SPS but reading these post has scared to poop out of me and had shied me away from trying. My tank is a very simple setup with a HOB skimmer, HOB power filter and a few power heads in a 40 Gal tall. So the other day I was at the LFS and say a nice SPS frag so I said what the he'll and bought it. I glued it to my live rock and low and behold after 2 weeks, I still have good colour and PE. I do a 12.5 percent WC every other week with Reef Crystals. My tank specs are SG 1.025, NO2 - 0, NO3 - 0, ammonia - 0 and PH 8.2. I have no idea about calcium, magnesium or any other elements for that matter. I do have a 165W LED hung about 10 inches above the tank and it is set at 50 percent blue and 30 percent white which seems sufficient. Anyhow, I hope I am doing something right but in the long run I can only say to the newbies like me that you will never know until you try but don't go all out start small because if uncessful, you won't lose all your hard earned $$$.

 

[scooter31707]

I agree. When you can purchase a Ca and Mg test kit, preferably Salifert or Red Sea. SPS will demand stable conditions and parameters.

 

[Art13]

On the other side of it, depending on the type of sps you bought as well, if that is your only one in the tank with weekly water changes, honestly there should be no real dosing at least for a while. As the demand pics up and it grows, same with lps, is when you'll have to make a choice on dosing or not. I would still pick up the tests so you can test your system for peace of mind. I would test before and after each water change, if there is no decline then no need for dosing. If you have say 9dkh and 440 calc after a water change, it goes down to say 8.7 dkh and 430 calc in a week and you do a water change and it brings it back up to the original numbers, nothing to worry about for a while. Just remember each test has a margin of error, unless you are seeing a noticable decline in the params, as in testing for a few weeks and it keeps going down, then i would pick up some stuff to dose with.

 

[Mock]

I agree. When you can purchase a Ca and Mg test kit, preferably Salifert or Red Sea. SPS will demand stable conditions and parameters.

Calcium and Mag are the last two.... The first and for most is Alk. Without knowing what it is and keeping it stable you might as well throw the others out the window.

 

[scooter31707]

I agree with Mock (good catch). I apologize, I thought I saw that parameter in their OP somewhere, maybe not, but yes that is the other key parameter.

 

[Dkuhlmann]

You got lucky on this one, but NEVER just glue any coral in anyplace until you have acclimated it from the bottom of your tank and slowly raised it to where it's requirements are for flow and lighting. I also agree with the others on testing and not having to dose anything until you get a larger amount of SPS and LPS that will use the nutrients out of the water. I'm also guessing that your ammonia reading is a false one.