Safely raising DKH

[Rhodesholar]

Hello everyone.

Ok I'm confused...which isn't hard to do. LOL

I have read on this subject but have not thus far seen the definitive answer I am looking for so I am asking.

The consensus I have read is not to raise DKH more the 1 per day.

First question. What constitutes per day? Are we talking to raise it over a 24 hour period a full 1 DKH, several hours, or one light cycle.

My next question is I have read some have immediately bumped up the Alk a full one DKH all at once.

So anyone out there who cares to respond and set me straight on this.

1. Is it safe to bump up a full 1DKH all at once in an SPS tank and have you done this with no consequences.

2. When saying take a day to bump it up 1DKH are we talking a full 24 hours, a day like 8 hours etc.

So I want to run my tank 9DKH. I am currently sitting at 8.2.

So is it ok to make one dose to get it to 9 (I wouldn't do it but I am asking) or take full 24 hours to get it to 9.

Or can you raise .1 DKH say every hour, or every two hours. What is the consensus?

I am concerned about this because I killed several Acropora due to a bad test kit and I KNOW going to fast can cause serious problems.

Thank you to anyone who responds.

 

[Member No. 1]

Hello everyone.

Ok I'm confused...which isn't hard to do. LOL

I have read on this subject but have not thus far seen the definitive answer I am looking for so I am asking.

The consensus I have read is not to raise DKH more the 1 per day.

First question. What constitutes per day? Are we talking to raise it over a 24 hour period a full 1 DKH, several hours, or one light cycle.

My next question is I have read some have immediately bumped up the Alk a full one DKH all at once.

So anyone out there who cares to respond and set me straight on this.

1. Is it safe to bump up a full 1DKH all at once in an SPS tank and have you done this with no consequences. Over 24hrs.

2. When saying take a day to bump it up 1DKH are we talking a full 24 hours, a day like 8 hours etc. 24 hrs

So I want to run my tank 9DKH. I am currently sitting at 8.2. 8.2 is just fine

So is it ok to make one dose to get it to 9 (I wouldn't do it but I am asking) or take full 24 hours to get it to 9. 24hrs

Or can you raise .1 DKH say every hour, or every two hours. What is the consensus? 0.1 every 2-3 hours. But most test kits have an error factor larger than that.

I am concerned about this because I killed several Acropora due to a bad test kit and I KNOW going to fast can cause serious problems. You just answered your own question!

Thank you to anyone who responds.

If I recall from one of your other posts, you only have one coral in your tank. Just go slow. No need to raise it from 8.2 to 9 at all, let alone in less than 24 hrs.

 

[Vinny Kreyling]

If I remember correctly WWC runs @ 8.6, so nothing wrong with 8.2.

 

[Rhodesholar]

I have confirmed my tank drops 1DKH in 24 hours roughly. I don't know why but it does.

The coral came from a dealer who runs his tanks at 9.

So I wanted to keep it in that ball park.

He has beautiful specimens and he will now be my go to guy for SPS.

So I figure the closer I can keep my tank to his parameters the less stress on the specimen and a greater margin of success.

 

[Vinny Kreyling]

OK, understood.

 

[bertoni]

1 dKH should be fine. If you are very worried, dosing baking soda will reduce the pH effect.

 

[Imaexpat2]

Rarely is it, that something good happens fast in a reef tank. If you look at a wide range of great looking, thriving reef tanks, youll find that most of them have one thing in common...Slow and Steady. Reefing is more like a journey as opposed to a race.

 

[Rhodesholar]

Rarely is it, that something good happens fast in a reef tank. If you look at a wide range of great looking, thriving reef tanks, youll find that most of them have one thing in common...Slow and Steady. Reefing is more like a journey as opposed to a race.

I totally agree. But my point is why take longer to do something then you need to?

I am going backwards with my DKH levels. My tank uses (1) DKH per day. So my situation is I am afraid to make up the (1) DKH let alone increase it (I want to keep my DKH at 9) to rapidly.

So that is why I am asking just how fast I can safely make up what my tank is using.

 

[Imaexpat2]

If your struggling that bad with your DKH levels, then something with your water chemistry or system is very wrong. I never struggled anywheres near that bad with DKH in my tank until I got a crap load of SPS corals and clams in my tank...which caused several things in my water chemistry to be too low. I started dripping Kalkwasser for make up water and it easily solved that issue for me and everything came back into acceptable standards and kept it there with minimal effort on my part. No more struggling with stable Ph, Calcium, DKH or Mag levels for me. Of course like people, every tank is a completely different personality. In the short term I would do what ever it took to get it back up and then I would take a long hard look at my system and try to figure out whats causing the drop so I can address and fix it.

 

[Rhodesholar]

I don't know what the issue is but it drops at least .05 - 1 in 24 hours.

I find it drops rapidly when the lights are on.

Mag = 1380 so I don't think its a low mag level.

There is no precipitation on the heaters, pumps or anything but it's going somewhere.

I'm testing with a Hanna checker and it measures properly because as I dose it measures .01 increase per each dose which is what I was shooting for.

 

[bertoni]

That just sounds like coralline growth to me, or stony corals. That's not a particularly high consumption rate.

 

[Rhodesholar]

I do have quite a bit of coralline growth on the rock, overflow, glass etc.

So maybe that is where it's going.

I have everything nailed down and as stated there is nothing on my heater, pumps etc.

It's confirmed the tank is consuming 1DKH per day.

 

[bertoni]

I'd guess it's the coralline. My soft coral tanks would consume 2-3 dKH per day due to coralline growth.