Mike's 200g
- Thread starter MichaelW
- Start date
MichaelW
New member
Yeah it came from barrier about 2 year's ago. It was pretty dark color when I got It and I hoped I could get it to color up better... But it actually got worse :headwalls: I can't bring myself to take it out, it's grown well and every now and then I think I see color developing.... Only to still be waiting. Yours sounds like a nice piece as we are close I would always be up for trading frags of stuff.
Looks great Mike..
Does your big foxface ever taste any corals in the tank? Lps?
Considering adding a Fiji foxface to my dt but they make me a bit nervous.
Of course that spectacular angel you have indicates that you are not that nervous, in general.
Mine is a one spot foxface they stay slightly smaller. Probably if I was to replace him I would get a magnificent Fox face, they have pretty cool color. I have had him well over 2 years now. A long time ago, 2 years, i did blame him for the death of a new shortcake frag I got. But looking back it was probably just dieing and he was nipping at shedding tissue. Mine has never been a problem any other instance even with low. My father in law did have one what we think was going after a wellsophyllia brain.
The angel is a different story he does have an impact on PE but is not damaging sps. Acans...... Forget about it, that's dinner to him.
qn5reef
New member
Let's trade some frags. Let see if my wild piece can color up in your tank and yours can color up in mine. I don't want to hijack your thread so i will PM you FTS later to see if there is any other pieces you want to trade.
MichaelW
New member
For sure. You should come over sometime and check out what I got and have a beer
qn5reef
New member
I like that idea and I like beer! Let me send you some detail of my tank in PM soon.
mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
If you have T5 then the light is not your problem. Hang it 8-10 inches off the water and run all 8 bulbs for 6-8 hours max(6.5 hours seems to be my sweet spot) and focus on other things in your tank, because the lighting is not your issue.
MichaelW
New member
Thanks, I really like that coral 2. PE has become much less since the angel addition as you can tell From the pictures. However at night it is still really fuzzy.
MichaelW
New member
Looking for thoughts/advice,
My tank has pretty good colors I think and pretty good growth. Obviously there are some pieces that are not doing as well as others but I'm general I would say the tank is doing pretty well.
However, of course us SPS keepers are always trying to get better color etc.
My parameters have been very stable lately with alk right around 7.3 dkh, ca 410, mg 1400
And no3 1ppm and po4 0.04.
I do however get a light haze on my glass daily, and recently started to get very brown sand but no hair algae etc on my rocks (maybe due to the range and foxface?)
I know these are good numbers but I am thinking about lowering them to see if I can get colors like I see in Debora's, Krzysztof, and Damian's tanks who run more like 0.2ppm no3 and slightly lower po4.
Currently I do not do anything special for nutrient control (skimmer, fliter socks, passive use of activated carbon,and the live rock)
I have a reef dynamics recirculating bio pellet reactor and All in one biopellets sitting on my shelf as this was my original plan for this tank but never fired them up. I am wondering if I start using them might I see increase in color. I also thought the bacteria shed from them could be an extra food source for corals as I had heard this about bio pellets before.
Do you think I may see positive results in running the all in one bio pellets or not?
I also do not currently dose any "coral foods" or aminos. I was using acropower and sponge power but stopped a while ago when I was getting some stn (which appears to have stopped now)
Trace elements are added in the fauna marin balling lite (i tried the color elements But think it may have been a factor in the stn) along with 10-15% weekly water changes so I think things like that are kept in check.
I do enjoy adding things to the tank though (i guess it makes me feel like I'm doing something) and had thought about combining the all in one bio pellets with some aquaforest products (biopellets replacing np pro and gfo) such as their coral a, b e, v and bacteria. What are thoughts on this?
P.s I probably would not use the aquaforest probiotic salt as it is more expensive and not locally available compared to the red sea blue bucket I currently use.
Long post I know but just looking for opinions from you awesome reefers.. And I if you think I should just leave it all alone and be happy with what I got tell me to stop thinking so much
My tank has pretty good colors I think and pretty good growth. Obviously there are some pieces that are not doing as well as others but I'm general I would say the tank is doing pretty well.
However, of course us SPS keepers are always trying to get better color etc.
My parameters have been very stable lately with alk right around 7.3 dkh, ca 410, mg 1400
And no3 1ppm and po4 0.04.
I do however get a light haze on my glass daily, and recently started to get very brown sand but no hair algae etc on my rocks (maybe due to the range and foxface?)
I know these are good numbers but I am thinking about lowering them to see if I can get colors like I see in Debora's, Krzysztof, and Damian's tanks who run more like 0.2ppm no3 and slightly lower po4.
Currently I do not do anything special for nutrient control (skimmer, fliter socks, passive use of activated carbon,and the live rock)
I have a reef dynamics recirculating bio pellet reactor and All in one biopellets sitting on my shelf as this was my original plan for this tank but never fired them up. I am wondering if I start using them might I see increase in color. I also thought the bacteria shed from them could be an extra food source for corals as I had heard this about bio pellets before.
Do you think I may see positive results in running the all in one bio pellets or not?
I also do not currently dose any "coral foods" or aminos. I was using acropower and sponge power but stopped a while ago when I was getting some stn (which appears to have stopped now)
Trace elements are added in the fauna marin balling lite (i tried the color elements But think it may have been a factor in the stn) along with 10-15% weekly water changes so I think things like that are kept in check.
I do enjoy adding things to the tank though (i guess it makes me feel like I'm doing something) and had thought about combining the all in one bio pellets with some aquaforest products (biopellets replacing np pro and gfo) such as their coral a, b e, v and bacteria. What are thoughts on this?
P.s I probably would not use the aquaforest probiotic salt as it is more expensive and not locally available compared to the red sea blue bucket I currently use.
Long post I know but just looking for opinions from you awesome reefers.. And I if you think I should just leave it all alone and be happy with what I got tell me to stop thinking so much
mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
I don't think your numbers are the source of your lack of color, so adding pellets would probably not improve things there. The AIO pellets don't provide a food source for the corals, in fact you should strain the reactor output through a sock then run it into a skimmer. Your colors look pretty good to me but if you want to tweak them a bit you could try the various aminos and coral foods like acropower, Salifert AAs, or Aquaforest's line.
Perhaps try coral A and coral V from aquaforest to start, see if the corals are lacking nutrition before trying the more specific additives.
Perhaps try coral A and coral V from aquaforest to start, see if the corals are lacking nutrition before trying the more specific additives.
reefmutt
Active member
As usual, this is the toughest question to answer: what should I do for better colour..
I'm kind of with Matt..
Personally, I don't think how often your glass gets a haze should play into your equation.. It just doesn't really seem to be related.
You have mentioned it before and it seems to me that you relate it to a nutrient problem...
I don't think you have a nutrient problem..or maybe too few nutrients.. But not too many..
Yes this is coming from the guy with 5ppm n and .18 po4.. I DO have a nutrient problem and an algea problem but my corals are stupid happy right now..
By the way, I have to clean my glass daily as well..
I think you should play with adding nutrients, not removing them..
I like the coral foods idea..why not try that for a while..
Obviously this advice is based on my own experience which I guess is a bit atypical, or at least a situation that you hear about less often than those amazing aquaforest tanks or plenty of other low nutrient tanks..
I would say that adding a carbon source can be quite disruptive to a tank.. But maybe that's only for high nutrient tanks.. Maybe low nutrient tanks like yours wouldn't react negatively and putting the aio pellets on would let you feed more etc.. But really, with your numbers, I think you have some wiggle room too to try upping foods without adding the carbon source right away.. Or ever..
I'm kind of with Matt..
Personally, I don't think how often your glass gets a haze should play into your equation.. It just doesn't really seem to be related.
You have mentioned it before and it seems to me that you relate it to a nutrient problem...
I don't think you have a nutrient problem..or maybe too few nutrients.. But not too many..
Yes this is coming from the guy with 5ppm n and .18 po4.. I DO have a nutrient problem and an algea problem but my corals are stupid happy right now..
By the way, I have to clean my glass daily as well..
I think you should play with adding nutrients, not removing them..
I like the coral foods idea..why not try that for a while..
Obviously this advice is based on my own experience which I guess is a bit atypical, or at least a situation that you hear about less often than those amazing aquaforest tanks or plenty of other low nutrient tanks..
I would say that adding a carbon source can be quite disruptive to a tank.. But maybe that's only for high nutrient tanks.. Maybe low nutrient tanks like yours wouldn't react negatively and putting the aio pellets on would let you feed more etc.. But really, with your numbers, I think you have some wiggle room too to try upping foods without adding the carbon source right away.. Or ever..
MichaelW
New member
Hmm sounds like 2 against running the pellets. I want to add more coral type foods and aminos but hadn't really wanted my numbers to go much higher.
I will try the aquaforest coral a and v. How come not the b and e? Do you think the pro bio s would be good in my situation (maybe for the brown sand).
Is the aquaforest coral food pretty much the same as reef foods?
I stirred my sand up (about half the tank) today to get some junk out of it and so it's nice and white again (at least for now). Not sure if this was a good move or not. My sand bed is only for aesthetics. Some places it's less than a half inch. The water of course got really murky and clouded but soon cleared up.
I will try the aquaforest coral a and v. How come not the b and e? Do you think the pro bio s would be good in my situation (maybe for the brown sand).
Is the aquaforest coral food pretty much the same as reef foods?
I stirred my sand up (about half the tank) today to get some junk out of it and so it's nice and white again (at least for now). Not sure if this was a good move or not. My sand bed is only for aesthetics. Some places it's less than a half inch. The water of course got really murky and clouded but soon cleared up.
mhucasey
Acros & wieners, oh my!
Its not that we are against using pellets, its just that to address your color issue, reducing nutrients from their already low level won't do anything other than maybe make your corals very pale.
Coral A is Amino Acids, Coral V is vitamins(including C, which is also a carbon source). Both of these seem to be everything they advertise. I have no problem recommending them.
Coral B is like Zeovit coral snow with some other stuff in it. It supposedly helps skeletal growth but its main benefit seems to be clearing up the water and perhaps helping with cyano. Good but it won't affect your colors.
Coral E is the food for SPS. It contains Copper Suphate to lighten corals by reducing zooxanthellae. I will not recommend this to anyone at this time(I am using it though) because it has the potential to harm your corals.
I don't know about the coral foods that Aquaforest offers the than Coral E. I can't tell if the powdered foods are useful for SPS. I'll look into them more in the future.
ProBio S is just a bacterial blend, probably selected to work with their carbon source. With an established tank I don't think it will do much to clean your sand. If you add a carbon source like Pellets you will probably have to deal with cyano on the sand for at least a while.
You may want to dose Iodium and Flourine, they will help with blue corals, and you should find out what your potassium level is at. Low potassium can impact reds.
MichaelW
New member
Thanks for the info Matt. I believe the trace elements in the fauna marin balling lite include iodium, flourine and probably potassium. I think adding extra trace elements on top of these may have caused or contributed to my stn a little while ago.
I think I will order up some of the coral a and v to try out. Is there not much point in pro bio s if you are not using the carbon source with it?
I think I will order up some of the coral a and v to try out. Is there not much point in pro bio s if you are not using the carbon source with it?
