Tank and Coral issues

I'm in antelope also but noticed a few things I think we have pretty good water from the tap im getting 150 TDS but I did notice a few issues so I changed out all filters now see if It gets better.
 
The few issues I've had I can trace back to my ineptitude. Nothing like you guys are describing. I don't have my TDS meter set up to read the incoming so I'm not sure. In the past I've seen readings between 200-70.

I have no doubts about my water source....at the moment.
 
I've always read around 130. According to the water folks out here we have been on well water for the past 4 years. It sounds like we are the only area like this. And I've talked to a lot of water districts. Most moved to we'll water about 4 months ago.

All the things I am doing has seemed to stop the coral death. But I still getting cyano everywhere and a constant reading of 4 ppm nitrates when I have always read 0 on the nitrates with the red sea algae pro nitrates test kit. And I haven't changed anything. As a matter of fact my bio load is less than ever. Only 1 small blue tang in the system. 4 wrasses, 1 foxface, 2 anthias, 2 clowns, 2 bengais, engineer goby, and an algae blenny. Not much for a 210 gallon system.
 
No carbon dosing and no fuge. I only feed PE mysis. I used to feed a variety of coral foods and dry foods to the fish. But stopped a couple months ago when the first signs of this started as I thought it may be a nutrients problem. But it has only gotten worse. I have a small bio load for my system. Less than I have ever ran before. And before I was always able to keep nutrients at an undetectable level. Whatever bis causing this is either creating excess nutrients or damaging my good bacteria so it can not do what it is supposed to. Jeff runs a large macro algae tank on his system and has the same excess nitrates. Has recently even experienced some of his macro algae dying off while his nitrates are still reading the exact same as mine. I am now getting an oily film at the top of my tank. Jeff has seen the same substance in his RODI unit.

It's no guess here Glenn, whatever is happening is in the source water. No other way to explain it. One big indicator is my orp reading. If I dump 1 gallon of clean freshly made rodi water in my tank my orp drops by 30 points and my large foxface starts sucking air from the top of tank. This has never happened before this whole water thing started to happen.

Getting water from another source may help, but I loose 2 to 3 gallons a day in evap. At that rate I would be running down to your reef all the time. I do want to get a larger storage container I can keep in the van so I can stop by when I am in the area and top it off but just haven't been able to find one yet.
 
One big indicator is my orp reading. If I dump 1 gallon of clean freshly made rodi water in my tank my orp drops by 30 points and my large foxface starts sucking air from the top of tank. This has never happened before this whole water thing started to happen.
I am not surprised your ORP drops after a water change, there are residual organics in the container and salt mixes that will break down. It's similar to the temporary drop after you feed. The foxface sucking air might be a good indicator though.
 
I am not surprised your ORP drops after a water change, there are residual organics in the container and salt mixes that will break down. It's similar to the temporary drop after you feed. The foxface sucking air might be a good indicator though.
You misread my post. I see orp drop all the time with new salt water added. This is fresh RODI water I am talking about. Before this started I never saw orp effected by RODI water unless container was contaminated. I have tried several different containers.

Oh yeah and when I added RODI water from your reef I saw no change in orp whatsoever. .
 
Don't know if anyone else got one in the mail, but BRS just sent me a kit to test the local water. I thought it is pretty cool that they are starting a little database to help reefers throughout the nation.. Feel free to use the code if you would like! I know its not going to find heavy metals, but its a start.


-Mutt


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I'm in Loomis and my only source of water is my own well. From what I understand from many different plumbing and well repair companies, well water tends to be more acidic because of higher amounts of dissolved CO2 in it. This does a couple things. First, it attacks copper plumbing and releases copper ions into the water. Second the CO2 exhausts your anion resin very quickly. I only get about 40 gals of RODI water before my anion resin is spent, so I don't even bother recharging it. this is also the resin that would be removing phosphate but it gets outcompeted by CO2. I did add a fifth stage to my RODI system with a cartridge filled with cuprisorb to absorb the copper ions that make it past the anion and cation stages.

Just my two cents. Cleaning up well water has unique challenges.
 
Forgot to mention that I have to run GFO continually to keep phosphates in my tank in check. Had done a series of water changes and my phosphates had climbed to 0.8 ppm! Not 0.08...
 

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