i think it also has to do that you have a lot more nutrients in your tank now. no algae before and you can clearly see some now which a lot of the SPS like a small amount and color up a lot faster that way.
Before pictures have pristine white bottom. The after algae everywhere. Clearly a difference in nutrients. I don't know if I'd champion the salt on that change.
Normally, I would think this too. Sorry if I didn't explain this very well in the original post. I used to run the tank with no fish, which I thought was causing the light colored corals. I added the fish in December, which caused a slight algae bloom. The corals deepened in color
slightly but stayed tan and brown. I unfortunately did not take pictures of the corals in this state for better comparison. The tank stayed like this until February when the new salt mix was tried.
Before pic may have been long before the salt change? OP did say months went by without color. And I often forget to take before pictures and only find ancient ones. But good catch I didn't notice.
This is exactly it. If I had the pictures, you would see brown acros in a tank with more algae. Still no color. I didn't anticipate the color change, or else I would have documented things better.
That is amazing SPS growth in 2 days. Please PM me the salt brand before and after! I've used IO for years, but won some buckets of Fritz RPM to try.
The growth occurred over a few months. I've never seen that much growth in two days either! Lots of people get quicker growth than I do. Usually they have much larger tanks with more stable parameters.
It was the color change that surprisingly took only two days to occur.
Also a crop of aiptasia is brewing not to mention hair algae. I suspect, as mentioned earlier, that this "color up" had more to do with the massive water change than any particular salt mix.
+1
Might have had some elements that were really low and doing the very large wc got them back up to where they should be. Corals said thank you.:love1:
I do large (80% or more) water changes every one or two months. I guess you could be right, but I think I would have seen it happen before now?
When you said your saltwater was cloudy before, were you adding the salt before the water? I know if you add the salt first your get precipitation and the water will be cloudy and will not clear up.
I add the water first and then put the salt in. I always mix the salt thoroughly beforehand to prevent settling.
...
Since no one seems to care, I'll tell you what the salt mixes were. I'm not affiliated with any of the companies.
Before: Coralife Marine Salt Mix
After: Aquaforest Reef Salt
The Coralife was newly purchased from PetCo (on sale), it was a bucket that makes 150 gallons. I've used this salt for years with no problems. It mixed up clear in my glass mixing jug, but became cloudy when added to the tank.
The Aquaforest salt mix was purchased at the LFS (also on sale). The LFS reported it wasn't being sold very quickly, possibly because most customers had never heard of it. It came in smaller buckets that mix to 37 gallons of water.
I have seen some huge differences between salt mixes over several years. I have tried several "reef" salt mixes but found they are inconsistent. I am to the point now of using a cheaper salt that mixes well and clears up quick so I can add the elements at the levels I want. I'm sure someone will come up with a good option that gives the same results every time. Has anyone tried the aquaforest products yet? I haven't seen any reviews from SPS guys yet.
I think this is very true. I originally switched to Coralife because Instant Ocean kept mixing up cloudy, and my tank looked much better afterwards. Every salt brand will vary in quality to some degree at some point in time.