My Alk dropped???

[steallife904]

So over the last few days I noticed my acans looking a bit deflated. I started to assume my copperband butterfly was nipping them. Well today I thought about it and realized I haven't tested water in a few weeks.... Well my alk which has always been 7dkh or slightly higher measured 5.9 on my salifert kit, I then used an ATI kit and it measured 6dkh... So I am thinking this alk drop is the issue? I'm going to slowly bring it back up and I bought a doser months ago waiting for the right time to hook up, seems like it's that time. Wonder why all of a sudden it dropped so much. My tank is loaded with corals and added 4 frags Friday.... You think the growth and all finally started sucking the alk out???

 

[organism]

Even 7 is pretty low alk for an LPS tank imo, I'm at 9-10. Low alk will definitely do that, you should be dosing it in some way fairly regularly... I do it using kalk as the topoff water in the ATO, 1 tablespoon pickling lime per 5 gallons although with tons of acros it's now 2 T per 5 gallons.

 

[steallife904]

It's actually a mixed reef. So I am going to start bringing alk up and prepare the doser. For mixed reef should I shoot for a dlk of 8?

 

[chilli_reef]

Doesn't really matter honestly.
9-11 mixed reef or all Zoanthids, that's about where you want to be. Results are miniscule with most with in those variations.
Some sps do like a little higher Alk and show it in coloration changes.

 

[Reef Bass]

Doesn't really matter honestly.
9-11 mixed reef or all Zoanthids, that's about where you want to be. Results are miniscule with most with in those variations.
Some sps do like a little higher Alk and show it in coloration changes.

For hard corals, I find alk to be arguably the single most important water quality parameter after temp and salinity. For soft corals, those without a calcium carbonate skeleton, it seems less critical.

My experience with sps is the exact opposite of what you are saying. IME, they prefer an alk below 9. I run alk around 8 for sps and lps.

 

[Tweaked]

For hard corals, I find alk to be arguably the single most important water quality parameter after temp and salinity. For soft corals, those without a calcium carbonate skeleton, it seems less critical.

My experience with sps is the exact opposite of what you are saying. IME, they prefer an alk below 9. I run alk around 8 for sps and lps.

This, and the lower the nutrients, the lower the alk. I am currently running the AquaForest program which recommends numbers in line with the NSW. I am currently dropping to 7.5 but always maintained 8.1 on my tanks.

 

[steallife904]

I would think my nutrients are good. I feed pretty heavy everyday but I only have a few fish in the 150 now so that could be an issue. I have over the last few weeks add a bunch of frags to my tank which already had frags and some colonies. Just wondering if it finally hit a point where water changes cant keep up? I knew the day would come so I already have a doser I just need to set it up. I figured I should add alk slowly though every day until I get it to around 8dkh. Then start the doser up dosing everyday. Crazy how much it dropped in a short time though.

 

[organism]

You don't need a doser, those are more for tanks that have higher alk demand than yours, and adding pickling lime to the ATO serves the same purpose for next to no money. Also if your alkalinity is that low you can raise it 1.4dkh per day, the longer you take the more corals you might lose.