OMG help me

reeferlover

reeferlover

New member
lol, seriously

Ok so i find myself learning more and more its kinda crazy. Anyway. My new will be all sps. i have already started with about 15 frags. I am running GFO about a lb of it in a huge skimz reactor. my po4 is 0 is that ok? Im not running carbon i heard that can be bad? i am running a small amount of biopelletes in a BRS reactor. And im dripping kalk. am i doing anything wrong? i am running a swc 160 skimmer. I also have a fuge on the end of my sump with a trickle running into. i run the light on it 24hrs a day. i also have a sock to start my sump.

Drains into filter sock then into skimmer then biopellet reactor then into skimz phosphate reactor then into return and is t off into sump also i drip the kalk into fuge and it over flows in return section

I have 5 chromies 3 clowns and a fire fish i feed prime reef flakes about 2 to 3 times a day. i have a lot of flow in my main tank

I dont want any STN RTN i have delt with it in other tanks
 
eventually you will starve your corals. i dont know what your tank volume is but my system is a little over 400g and 2 cups of brs gfo is all I need and I have a lot more fish than you do. IMO zero phosphates is not a good thing. your tank needs nutrients to grow and mature. Definitely do more reading.

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is this a joke?

a pound of GFO?

first off good luck with a pound of GFO. You should use a calculator to figure out how much GFO you will need. There is one on here as well as www.bulkreefsupply.com. put your info in and it will spit out an amount to use...which is still high in my opinion.

Do you have a test kit? I would test before you just go and decide to add biopellets, a pound of GFO and other bright idea it sounds like you may have.

ALK IMO is the most important thing to keep stable in an sps tank. I dont think dripping kalk is the best way to do that but who knows. In my opinion dude and I say this with the best intentions, you should really talk to your LFS and some people that have some knowledge and experience in the hobby. Everything you listed in your post is wrong, not even close.
 
Is that a literal pound of GFO or a figurative pound? You don't need a trickle filter for marine.

Are you testing any of your other parameters? And how are you testing your PO4? DO you dose Mg?

Corals need some PO4, you have to remember that the symbiotic algae they house are essentially plants.

vmacisback said:
is this a joke?

a pound of GFO?

first off good luck with a pound of GFO. You should use a calculator to figure out how much GFO you will need. There is one on here as well as www.bulkreefsupply.com. put your info in and it will spit out an amount to use...which is still high in my opinion.

Do you have a test kit? I would test before you just go and decide to add biopellets, a pound of GFO and other bright idea it sounds like you may have.

ALK IMO is the most important thing to keep stable in an sps tank. I dont think dripping kalk is the best way to do that but who knows. In my opinion dude and I say this with the best intentions, you should really talk to your LFS and some people that have some knowledge and experience in the hobby. Everything you listed in your post is wrong, not even close.
Click to expand...

I often feel the LFS is the problem. Read articles from people who aren't trying to sell your products.
 
+1 on the GFO comments. I run about 1 cup for a total water volume of 65 gallons in a TLF reactor. Does a great job of keeping my P in the range 0.3-0.5.
 
Ok ok. I have never used phosban and was told u can't use too much. I bought a large reactor and a large container of 454 grams of the phosban and was told I can't use to much. I will fix it i guess I don't need my huge reactor of course I test all parameters. They are all in good parameters. I dripped kalk in last tank never had problems and parameters were good. I don't understand how everything I posted was wrong. I get that the phosban is too much. I got a pm kalk reactor and will dose kalk that way and will be adding a dosing pump for mag alk and Cal and calculator what I need for the difference that my kalk doesn't take care of. I ditched the bio pellets for now. I'll research more. So ill go to the right amount of phosban and I'm running carbon now just a little while I figure this out.
 
Ok phosban is off line reactor is sitting empty. I'm running rowaphos through a brs reactor. That's it. So my for now I'll just run that. I had no idea u could run too much of it. I though there was a min but no max. I'll research more information now.
 
Ok i got that ill not run anything and get tested in a few days what about carbon i have always ran it my sps are getting more colorful then when i bought them
 
I have had a lot of very successful tanks fustrating how people act like they know everything and im an idiot for asking a question i have been reading thats why i asked i was told today by a owner at a very nice reef store in chicago that it was fine im learning like everyone else
 
Dude ur not an idiot just misinformed. Read up on stuff and know that it takes time and patience. It's a marathon not a sprint.
 
What vmacisback said. Don't be discouraged. It sounds like you are getting back on track. Take some time to peruse the deep readings on particulars, whether scientific studies or personal accounts found online. You will find all types here. :)

What is the size is your system?
 
lol i know im not an idiot i just dont like people who act like that when someone asks a question. I work in healthcare and no question is a stupid one and obviously i felt something wasnt right.

OK so i ditched the biopellets and gfo in the amount. I have read that phosphates will hurt sps due to the phosphate being used to produce the calcium skeleton instead of calcium. also that higher numbers in phosphate will cause browning in sps. so i was told its ok to have a lot of gfo. also the biopellets i had like a .5 cup of them. I read that it takes 8 weeks to get them going i figured by the time they start working ill have some nitrates for them to consume.

I have a 75gal rr with a 55 gal sump. the drains goes to a sock then my swc 160 skimmer then to 1 cup of gfo which is .5 less then BRS recommends for my 100 gal of water. I also have a kalk reactor and i only have the kalk being stirred up for 15 mins a day for now. i want to start slow and test to see how its doing and ill increase the stirring or pumping up to 4 15 min cycles a day and at that point i will start dosing alk and cal 2 part. i will start dosing mag soon after i test for it. i also have a fuge at the end of my sump i have my return t off and a gate valve before the fuge i let the water trickle into the fuge i have live rock and chaeto there. i run the light 24hr a day. its growing a lot.

As of now i have no detectible phosphate. i will be buying a better test kit. cal is at 420 ph 8.4 alk 10 0 nitrates amonia and nitrites thinking that looks pretty good. all of the sps frags i have added r growing and looking awesome. i have a mp10 and tunze 6045 with a mag 9.5 for return lots of flow in there. also using 8 bulb t5 fixture with geissmann bulbs reefgeek had a sale or would be using ATI.

I have 5 chromis 3 clowns and a firefish i feed flake prime reef 2 to 3 times a day

So when should i use biopelletes and when if ever should i use carbon? should i let my tank have some phospates? i have seen on my last tank that the biopellets helped my skimmer work better is that normal? i know i have read that it will pull the bacteria that attachs to the nitrates out of the water from the biopellets
 
IF i were you i would cut back on a few things so that you can see cause in effect. The fact that you had a pound of GFO running, biopellets and a fuge with chaeto with a light on 24hr a day mean u have most likely 0phos in the tank. How about you just choose one. I have had bad experiences with run carbon and GFO along with Biopellets. It just strips the water too much for SPS to survive. I think it has more to do with the combo of all 3 at the same time.

Do you have algae in the tank? whats the purpose of all these phos reduction tools in the tank? The only real need for carbon is yellowing of the water column, so if it isnt yellow dont run it at this point.

I would stick with bio pellets and a good skimmer and thats it...WHats with all the overkill? Biopellets arent proven but we do know that they help with nitrate reduction and some phos reduction. If the phospahte creeps up while running the bio pellets then you can add a small amount of GFO but you can also cut back on feeding 2-3 times a day which in my opinion is a bit much for the amount and type of fish you have.

Try one method and stick with it long enough to see some results. You said your in the medical field...So am I, would you give a patient 10 different meds in order to cure a single diagnosis? Dont think so. Give it some time and your tank will show you whats wrong and go from there.
 
ok

i was treating a very high phosphate because i started with well water through a RO unit that apprently wasnt working properly, and now i have a nice new ro di unit. still forced to use well water but its only 250 ppm entering the unit. of course o leaving

I had just added the biopellets because it takes up to 8 weeks to get them going. also i was just using a very small amount. just to kinda see how things would go. I literally added them 2 days before my post. I had planned to ditch the fuge for frags and wanting something to handle nitrates.

I am not running carbon.

I like having a fuge running because i like to have a place for natural nitrate remidies. i did not want algea in my display. But if i can use reactors to replace the chaeto then great thats the route i want to go.


Funny thing is the chaeto is growing out of control assuming phospates and light, the phosphates are of course at 0. Ill just be running 1 cup of gfo in my BRS reactor until phospates start to rise up and then ill replace and depending on how fast i go through the 1 cup i may add more as recommended by BRS.

I will only run carbon if needed, can i just throw a bad of it by my return or place it in my drain sock for the time i want to run it?

You seem to be misunderstanding what my intentions were. i wanted the chaeto for nitrate reduction, the gfo (which i was told by multiple people that you cant have too much) for the extremely high phosphates i was dealing with, and the biopellets were added early and in a small amount for future use in dealing with nitrates and being able to remove the fuge completely. Again was not running carbon.

Can i ask what you do in ur hospital?
 
seems like you had the bad exsperiences i was trying to avoid. also we are dealing with multiple diagonises.

High phos, dirty well water, high nitrates post cycle, and i was preparing for the future of my tank with the biopellets.

Also i only feed a small amount. if my fish are consuming what i am feeding then it isnt too much. If i were overing feeding then yes maybe a problem. But i want my fish happy and i do want some food to break down in my tank. i think im ok there.

so you mean that people dont use gfo and a fuge or biopellets and a fuge and a skimmer. i think its ok. why not have a little bit ok everything. it gives you more room for error. especially when you are using natural things.

Skimmer will only skimmer what is avalible. my skimmer isnt big enough to over skimmer. Chaeto and live rock fuge certainly cant harm anything.
 
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