Tank too Sterile?

mike810 said:
i'm having the same problem as you right now. My tank size is similar to yours. 36x24x18. with 8x39 ati pm. I have raised my lights, cut my phtoperiod and feeding more heavily. Hoping to see results in the next few weeks. GL with your tank. My thread is also in this forum if you want to take a look at it
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How long has your tank been up? I was thinking about the 8 bulb PM, but if you're having trouble with growth also, it may not be my lighting at all. I'm so confused as to what might be the issue.
 
tank has been setup since april of this year. transferred from my old 30G. My problem is mostly faded colors of my sps and zoas. Some say I have too much light from my pm, others say I have too little nutrients and i'm starving my colors. So I assume I have too much light + i'm starving my corals. So I am addressing both of these issues at the same time.
 
I had this problem. I raised my alk and changed bulbs, fixed it. Im not running ulns stuff though. Maybe try some bigger waterchanges weekly. imo dont trust testkits.
 
Just my $.02

Your lighting is probably fine. I have 6 54w bulbs over a 60 x 18 x 20 (LWH) and have trouble with bleaching coral if not careful (ATI Bulbs).

You may have a problem with flow. Your params look like they wouldn't be the source of the problems IMHO. I've seen quite a few tanks with your issue and IME it has most often been attributed to low flow. Can you please post what equipment you have for water movement? I have an SPS tank and have 70 times turnover per hour. Whats your total tank turnover per hour?
 
CUNAReefer said:
Just my $.02

Your lighting is probably fine. I have 6 54w bulbs over a 60 x 18 x 20 (LWH) and have trouble with bleaching coral if not careful (ATI Bulbs).

You may have a problem with flow. Your params look like they wouldn't be the source of the problems IMHO. I've seen quite a few tanks with your issue and IME it has most often been attributed to low flow. Can you please post what equipment you have for water movement? I have an SPS tank and have 70 times turnover per hour. Whats your total tank turnover per hour?
Click to expand...

I'm using 2 MP10's for water movement, so I don't think it's flow. I'm going to change my lighting schedule and start running the T5's for 10 hrs. and the halides for 6 hrs. a day and see what happens.

Thanks for the reply!
 
I have about half the light you do and have some good growth from my acros, birdsnest, etc.

I run a single 175w and 2x 39w T5s on an Oceanic 58.

I don't think lighting is your problem.

I only have 4 fish, the biggest one being a midas blenny. I doubt "too sterile" is your problem with 7 fish one being a tang...
 
my 2 cents.

1. Dont make any drastic changes to the tank, that'll only make things worse.
2. maybe upgrade your bulbs to a 14k or a 20k. I run 150watt phoenix 14k on my sps tank and i am very pleased with my colors.
3. if youre going to change your photo period, do it SLOW.
4. Don't make any drastic changes! ha
5. Find a routine you like and stick with it for an extended amount of time without changing anything to give the corals a constant environment.See if they like what you are doing and give them a chance to tell you, you arent going to get immediate results, give them time. Constantly changing little things in the tank that you think are making things better most times make things worse.

I have a 40g breeder with 2x150watt MH 4xT5 and there isn't a place in the tank that is too shady for sps.
 
turkey baste your acros and make sure you don't have aefw! I added gfo a year ago and thought I stripped the phosphate out too fast. I checked everything no changes in products, feeding, additions or anything.

I basted my valida the size of both of your hands (grown from a 1.5" frag) and got 300 aefw off of it alone. All the others that were pale had them on it too.
 
what i meant by counter productive, is that by ramping up your light cycle, you are actuallyl stressing out the zoanxthelle in the coral body, causing growth to slow and discoloration in the coral itself
 
mutateddogbone said:
what i meant by counter productive, is that by ramping up your light cycle, you are actuallyl stressing out the zoanxthelle in the coral body, causing growth to slow and discoloration in the coral itself
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I've stopped at 6 hrs. on the halides and 10 hrs. for the T5's.

Thanks for all the input everyone. Hopefully things will improve.
 
I'm starting to get excessive algae growth now. It's growing on the rocks and in some spots on the sand. It looks like it's black algae of some sort. This is really weird because my PO4 and NO3 is non detectable using a Hannah meter and Salifert test.

There is also some redish and green cotton looking algae that I've had from the begining starting to take off again. I guess my system isn't so sterile after all. Any thoughts??
 
The only big problem i see here is alkalinity. I raised my alk when i was having this problem, and they shot up like trees.
 
What kind of nog is your skimmer pulling out? This will be a good indication if your tank is to sterile. Really look into pests. I would dip a few corals that look drab, and see what, if anything comes off them. IMO i would bump the alk up to 9-10. Your lights are fine, same with flow.
 
I read somewhere that if you don't dose vodka right, you can over populate the bacteria causing some black "algae" and cotton like substance. I don't know if this applys to the zeo system though, I could be completely wrong too :lol:
 
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