pH on Fiji Reefs - Aqautic "Myth" information

cayars

Premium Member
In the C Journal by Anthony Calfo Vol1 Num1 there is an article by Anthony on pH called:

Aqautic "Myth" information

Anthony recommends to maintain a strong and stable pH on the higher end of the natural range: 8.3-8.6

He goes on to say "Aside from my personal observations in the Pacific - Tonga/Fiji, S. E. Asia and the Indian Ocean, that more of the creatures commonly kept in aquaria hail from areas of the reef with such "high" ph..."

I haven't ever seen any data on pH from any of these reefs to back this up but doubt he would make up something like that so I'm trying to research this. I'm not finding much in the way of pH at all on these reefs.

Does anyone have any data to support or oppose this? I'd very much appreciate any data/links that anyone has on pH in these areas.

Thanks,
Carlo
 
I don't know of any specific research articles, but PH is an easy thing to measure and based on what we know about the effects of low vs. high PH on our aquariums and Mr. Calfo's expertise in the matter, I would imagine that it's true. In the Reef Aquarium book series there are many citings of scientific studies about the effects of PH on calcium deposition in stony corals being optimized at values on the high end such as those you mention.
 
I would agree it's easy to measure. What struck me is the typical 8.2-8.4 we always hear about as being ideal and then Calfo suggests 8.3-8.6 and bases it on the region of Fiji.

One might think if this were true (not saying it's not) that the typical pH we run at should be higher then we always hear about since this is the region most of our corals come from.

Carlo
 
yeah, most "new" advice I've read recommends keeping it as high as 8.6 to optimize calcification and fight the acidifying tendencies of closed systems.
 
an ideal ph is one that is suitable to the creatures in the tank as well as easy to maintain. 8.6 PH is unattainable to most aquarists, and more likely to fluctuate these tanks dont remain stable at 8.6. If you can boost it that high it will probably fall back down rather quickly and that swing is hard on fish. Just keep it as high as you can but keep it stable most of all.
 
That's the thing. I CAN keep my nailed down at any value from 8.3 to 8.6. On a PinPoint pH meter and Neptune ACIII both calibrated I naturally run at 8.33/8.35.

So it would be a peace of cake to get it higher but adjusting the buffer I use. The question is really, what is the IDEAL pH for tanks with most of it's corals from the Fiji/Tonga area.

See what I'm getting at?

Carlo
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10840752#post10840752 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by seapug
yeah, most "new" advice I've read recommends keeping it as high as 8.6 to optimize calcification and fight the acidifying tendencies of closed systems.

Curious, where are you hearing 8.6? I still normally hear 8.2-8.4 (besides the Calfo article mentioned earlier).

Carlo
 
That's the idea. pH plays an important role in calcification (growth) of stony corals, especially the fancy Acros and SPS that hail from reef crests in the Fiji area. The details are in the last volume of The Reef Aqarium book series, I think. There have been many studies showing skeletal calcification is optimized at higher pH values in the 8.5-8.6 range. Above or below a wider range of values (7.6 to 8.8, or something like that) it slows. But it's also an issue of what reef zone the corals come from. Reef crests will naturally be much more high energy zones with crystal clear water and high pH, whereas lagoons will generally be higher nutrient/lower pH zones. If you look in the Reefkeeping.com archive articles I'm sure you can find some references to it.

That being said, as rcypert mentioned, most hobbyist tanks run in the 8.0 - 8.4 pH range and have great growth. If you have the means to accurately control it, it would be interesting to crank it up to 8.6 for a few weeks and see what happened.
 
I'll give it a shot and bump up the pH 0.1 per day and see what happens over the long haul. I'll use 8.55 as a target zone on my ACIII.

Thanks for the info and I'll have to check that out in the book you mentioned which I've got around here some place.

Thanks,
Carlo
 
keep us posted. Maybe take some before shots of you SPS, and then in a week take some more. Keep a sort of journal. See if there is any noticeable growth.
 
Absolutely.

I actually have measurements of about 10-15 different types of corals in my tank which I've been keeping for about 6 months at 1 week intervals.

So I should have a decent baseline to work from too.

Carlo
 
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