New Tank with ULNS and Carbon

[JayVIP]

Hey all. I've been reefing for about 8 years now and I would consider myself experienced, but not an expert per say. I've stumbled, cruised, fallen, and risen like many others in this hobby. I've had red flat worms, red bugs, zeovit, zeovit crash, high nutrient systems, and low nutrient systems. I have no shortage of knowledge and experience but to call yourself an expert, I feel like you have to have hands on experience with just about everything.

My recent tank has really caused me to question everything in this hobby. I've been doing a ton of research about ULNS and phosphates and why some people have been successful with the presence of phosphate and why some people aren't. Organic phosphates vs inorganic, blah blah. And finally, a light bulb went off in my head and I feel like I may be onto something in regards to my personal tank.

So I restarted my 116g tall tank after neglect. I got lazy and just let it go. So I decided to restart the tank and do everything to a "œT". And so I did. I ran GFO, Carbon, and Biopellets right from the start. I do water changes every 2 weeks, GFO changed when algae shows on the glass which = phosphates at .03, and Carbon every 2 weeks. I followed this routine religiously and was sent reminders on my digital calendar on my phone.
I opted not to run a refugium due to the biopellets and instead used the refugium compartment as a frag compartment.

My Parameters currently on this 4 month old tank:
Temp: 78 +- .5 degrees
Salinity: 1.025sg +- 0sg: very stable
Alk: 7.5dKH +- .25dKH: depending on the time of day
CA: 450ppm +- 25ppm: depending on the time of the day
Mg: 1380ppm +- 20ppm: depending on the time of the day
PH 8.25 +- .5: depending on day time or night time.
Phosphate 0: when running GFO
Nitrate 0

I run a Warner Marine MF 181 skimmer rated for 150g medium bioload, and run a 8 bulb dimmable ATI Sunpower. So no shortage of skimming, and lighting plenty intense for sps.

So. At first glance, you wouldn't notice anything immediately wrong with the tank. All parameters are within "œideal" specs but my SPS was not showing that. Water was clear as day, algae was very well kept in check by clean up crew, coralline was taking off all over the walls and rocks just after only 4 months.

The SPS however, was a different story. Polyps would be extended, color would be fine for a while, but they would not encrust the base and any new tips that would grow would appear white and then die. (looked like alk burn so I assumed it was) The only difference from alk burn was that it wouldn't just be the tips. It would be on parts of the coral that were more exposed to light, towards the top, basically places on the coral where you would expect new growth to be. Then after a certain time period of the coral slowly turning white, it would then begin to show at the base where it was unable to encrust. Once you start to see STN, there really isn't turning back.

So I cycled the tank and then put in the SPS after 45 days, 20 days of which was stable.

Here are some comparison photos of what I'm referring to.

Red planet After 7 days being in the system


Today, 40 days later


Green slimer after 7 days


Today, 40 days later and after trimming the dead tips due to algae.


Random Frag after 7 days


Today, 40 days later

 

[JayVIP]

So, what i've come to realize as far as the health of the corals, due to the slow death, there isn't anything in the tank causing harm to the corals itself, but rather preventing the growth. On parts of the coral where you would expect to see growth, there is death. So I believe that when the coral is attempting to grow, or calcify, something is preventing the skeleton from growing properly which doesn't allow the skin of the sps to grow over the skeleton properly, which in turn, causes the edge to die, and algae to grow, which prevents the coral from regenerating. So I've come to the conclusion that I need to figure out what is preventing the growth, or calcification of the coral skeleton.

Then I came across this video thanks to this SPS forum which has been a great deal of help.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvP0686gLWc

I strongly believe that because of my new tank, the BRS Rox Carbon was stripping what little trace elements was left that was necessary for calcification. Even though I was below the recommended amount, I was still using too much for my specific tank.

I have now removed my carbon and GFO as of today and will document the changes. I will also add a couple frags to see if they will incur new growth just in case my current frags are beyond the health level of being saved.

Thoughts and opinions are welcome of course.

 

[JayVIP]

Also what i've learned is that there is a balance of numbers dependent upon each other. For instance, If you are running higher levels of nitrate like 20-40ppm, I believe you need a higher number of measurable phosphate like .05 to .1, higher intense lighting, and you can get away with running alk in the 9dKH range.

If you are running a low nutrient or ULNS, you need to run pretty close to natural seawater levels, which is pretty much undetectable levels of nitrate, phosphate, and dKH needs to be below 8. I've learned that anything higher than 8 or so will cause burnt tips in SPS when running lower nutrient systems. Also, I've determined that you either need to feed heavily, or dose some type of aminos on a regular basis, to spike the phosphate levels or "feed" your corals the necessary phosphates.

 

[Tweaked]

Also what i've learned is that there is a balance of numbers dependent upon each other. For instance, If you are running higher levels of nitrate like 20-40ppm, I believe you need a higher number of measurable phosphate like .05 to .1, higher intense lighting, and you can get away with running alk in the 9dKH range.

If you are running a low nutrient or ULNS, you need to run pretty close to natural seawater levels, which is pretty much undetectable levels of nitrate, phosphate, and dKH needs to be below 8. I've learned that anything higher than 8 or so will cause burnt tips in SPS when running lower nutrient systems. Also, I've determined that you either need to feed heavily, or dose some type of aminos on a regular basis, to spike the phosphate levels or "feed" your corals the necessary phosphates.

This... has been stated many times and holds water. I like to strip my water, and after dropping my Alk to 7.9 everything has been great. I also like to run less light now turning the halides off three days a week via the Apex (S--W--S) and pushing for those insane colors teetering on the edge of low No3 and Po4 resulting in less zoox algae within the coral. And as we all know, zoox is brown. So far so great!

 

[dg3147]

Been there!

My two cents in these new systems is usually need to actually add No3 to it directly using a No3 salt compound. Also, they seem to need more frequent water changes (I have no idea why; though, I always though it might be due to other trace elements).

But looks like classic new tank symptoms that last for the first year or so.

 

[mavjoy]

IME, i just keep it simple:

-make sure the big 3 is consistent (ca, alk and mg)
- skimmer is pulling out gunk and not light tea stuff
- feed more ( i just feed the fish)
- tried bio pellets and didn't work for me
- i just use carbon passively.
- Water change 10% biweekly
Just need the tank to mature and establish more beneficial bacteria.

 

[JayVIP]

IME, i just keep it simple:

-make sure the big 3 is consistent (ca, alk and mg)
- skimmer is pulling out gunk and not light tea stuff
- feed more ( i just feed the fish)
- tried bio pellets and didn't work for me
- i just use carbon passively.
- Water change 10% biweekly
Just need the tank to mature and establish more beneficial bacteria.

This is very much my plan. I re read what I wrote but I just want to note that I did not remove the GFO offline as i previously stated. I did however remove the Carbon. In the future, I will run the 1/4 cup of GFO and 1/2 cup of carbon in the same reactor and replace every two weeks to a month as part of my regimen.

 

[Moser]

I think you are probably starving your corals.

Either too much pellets/ carbon changes/ GFO

Or not feeding enough/ both.

Multiple small feedings are best for a reef tank

Mo

 

[Peter Eichler]

Carbon dosing is really hurting this hobby in my opinion. Threads like this didn't exist prior to it getting popular. You're driving your nutrients too low, nitrogen and phosphorous are essential for life. If you're encouraging bacteria to consume it by adding a carbon source and you're coral isn't getting the essential building blocks of life, this is what can happen.

 

[Moser]

- tried bio pellets and didn't work for me

What happened?

Always interesting to know what issues there were in biopellet tanks..

Mo

 

[mavjoy]

^ I think it stripped all the nutrients too fast and just didn't have the time to balance it out. I rather just stick to what worked before KISS method.

 

[JayVIP]

Carbon dosing is really hurting this hobby in my opinion. Threads like this didn't exist prior to it getting popular. You're driving your nutrients too low, nitrogen and phosphorous are essential for life. If you're encouraging bacteria to consume it by adding a carbon source and you're coral isn't getting the essential building blocks of life, this is what can happen.

I agree and disagree with this statement. I think its another evolution in the hobby. Things get tried and things fail but you would never know what is truly successful without the failures of others. While some people may not be able to run biopellets successfully, there are a bunch of people who do. That is what I am trying to say with this thread. So many people are so quick to say "starving corals" and nobody is really willing to put it on paper. The negative threads to positive threads about new techniques are about 10:1 negativeositive. In my opinion, so many negative threads kill the positive ones.

 

[Peter Eichler]

I agree and disagree with this statement. I think its another evolution in the hobby. Things get tried and things fail but you would never know what is truly successful without the failures of others. While some people may not be able to run biopellets successfully, there are a bunch of people who do. That is what I am trying to say with this thread. So many people are so quick to say "starving corals" and nobody is really willing to put it on paper. The negative threads to positive threads about new techniques are about 10:1 negativeositive. In my opinion, so many negative threads kill the positive ones.

Carbon dosing hasn't allowed the hobby to evolve, it has set it back. The percentage of people that are carbon dosing that understand the dynamics of what they're doing and the risks involved is probably very low. There are lots of positive threads and short term success stories with carbon dosing and bio-pellets. However, I don't know of many tanks and people that can balance it out properly in the long term, and eventually once those nitrates and phosphates dip too low people have problems. Then they start dumping large amounts of amino acids and food in the tanks to try and offset the problems... It just doesn't make sense to me. A carbon source is a quick perceived fix, if you have nitrates building up in your tank fix it with a larger skimmer, it's pretty clear to me that dumping sugar or adding bio-pellets isn't the answer. I was an early "experimenter" and tried carbon dosing years ago, I had similar problems to what you're having, so have many many others. It's just one guys opinion, but I feel the people with biol-pellet reactors should have just spent that money on a better protein skimmer.

Rant over!

On another note, I think bio-pellets are a solid option for fish only and non SPS tanks with higher nutrients.

 

[Moser]

I agree and disagree with this statement. I think its another evolution in the hobby. Things get tried and things fail but you would never know what is truly successful without the failures of others. While some people may not be able to run biopellets successfully, there are a bunch of people who do. That is what I am trying to say with this thread. So many people are so quick to say "starving corals" and nobody is really willing to put it on paper. The negative threads to positive threads about new techniques are about 10:1 negativeositive. In my opinion, so many negative threads kill the positive ones.

Not sure what you mean about afraid to put it on paper, but Daryll Vanackers and Krzysztof Tryc's tanks are advert enough that bp's can work.

The question is how confident is a reefer to feed heavily enough whilst running biopellets, when all we worry about these days is keeping Phos and nitrate as low as you can. The trouble is people use biopellets to keep nitrates at zero, not so you can feed very heavily. Unfortunately, this results in starved tanks.

So often you hear " I feed the crap out of my tank" and when you get to the bottom of it, it's a cube a day on 100 gallons or whatever.

I agree a lot with what Peter said. If anything, most reefers should be aiming for nitrate 2-5 and phos 0.03. Just like alk of 8 or Ca 420. If you reach for those numbers, you won't be far wrong! Currently those numbers sit at 0 and 0 for most, and IMO novice reefers can't maintain a tank on those numbers.

Mo

 

[Wings6010]

New Tank with ULNS and Carbon

I've been carbon dosing for two years on my 75 mixed reef and absolutely love it! Yes, I agree with most post here unless you know what you're doing you could very quickly starve your corals to death. I've been using the Red Sea coral program (NOPOX, coral colors and reef energy) with amazing results, while also being able to keep my dKH at a constant 10 with no ill effects. I also run 1 cup of Rox and 1 cup of HC GFO in separate reactors changed out once a month.. I barely test my parameters anymore my sps tell me how my tank is doing..View attachment 314078

 

[tmantaylor18]

IME, i just keep it simple:

-make sure the big 3 is consistent (ca, alk and mg)
- skimmer is pulling out gunk and not light tea stuff
- feed more ( i just feed the fish)
- tried bio pellets and didn't work for me
- i just use carbon passively.
- Water change 10% biweekly
Just need the tank to mature and establish more beneficial bacteria.

.

only thing I would add is using a product like reef roids, oyster feast ect.

 

[Moser]

^ I think it stripped all the nutrients too fast and just didn't have the time to balance it out. I rather just stick to what worked before KISS method.

Did the corals become pale?
Did they slowly stn from base up?
Did the tips burn?

Those are the important observations IMO.

If those features were documented more often, we might pick up a common theme and cure to the problem.

Mo

 

[Moser]

I've been carbon dosing for two years on my 75 mixed reef and absolutely love it! Yes, I agree with most post here unless you know what you're doing you could very quickly starve your corals to death. I've been using the Red Sea coral program (NOPOX, coral colors and reef energy) with amazing results, while also being able to keep my dKH at a constant 10 with no ill effects. I also run 1 cup of Rox and 1 cup of HC GFO in separate reactors changed out once a month.. I barely test my parameters anymore my sps tell me how my tank is doing..View attachment 314078 View attachment 314079 View attachment 314080 View attachment 314081View attachment 314082

Nice work!

What you didn't tell us is how much you feed. That is the key here...
Exactly, in grams, cubes etc.

A pinch of this and "lots" of that and "feed heavily" doesn't mean anything....

Mo

 

[Wings6010]

New Tank with ULNS and Carbon

Nice work!



What you didn't tell us is how much you feed. That is the key here...

Exactly, in grams, cubes etc.



A pinch of this and "lots" of that and "feed heavily" doesn't mean anything....



Mo

Of course my daily feeding regiment is 2 cubes of PE mysis a sheet of Nori and a few pinches of NLS Pellets. The corals are fed twice a week using a mix of oyster feast, Reef Roids and Reef Chilly, I also dose 3mls of reef energy aminos and perform 10g water changes weekly using RSC! oh and did I also mention I run a bare bottom .

Parameters
Salinity: 1.025
pH 8.32-8.45
Temp 77 Winter- 81 Summer
Po4: 0-.03ppm Hannah checker
No2: 1-3ppm Hannah checker
dKH: constant 10 Hannah Checker
Ca: 440 Hannah checker
Mg: 1550

My livestock include:
2x bartletts Anthias
1x sunburst Anthias
1x copperband butterfly
1x sailfin
1x purple tang
1x mystery wrasse
1x lineatus wrasse
1x clown wrasse
1x cleaner wrasse
1x tanakas Pygmy Wrasse
1x Midas Blenny

75g-40g sump
Dual reactors (ROX, HC GFO)
Skimz sm163 skimmer
4 part Doser (alk,Ca,NOPOX, Mag)
6 bulb t5 (4x blue plus, 2x coral plus)
ATO
RKE Controller

 

[mavjoy]

Did the corals become pale?
Did they slowly stn from base up?
Did the tips burn?

Those are the important observations IMO.

If those features were documented more often, we might pick up a common theme and cure to the problem.

Mo

All of the above it started with the larger piece first.