Advice for a complete supplement dosing that utilizes Kalkwasser

[jx fang]

@Randy Holmes-Farley I agree that it's kind of funny. But we don't consider potassium technically a "trace" element as it is in such high concentrations. In my opinion it falls more into the "main" or "minor" category.

So, what the issue, why not adding potassium?
Can I just add pottasium to the mix?
And how much to add?
And which other elements are missing in this AllforReef?

Thanks in advance
Jx

 

[Moe K]

I am curious as to what happened here as I am kind of heading towards a somewhat similar path of dosing kalkwasser and TM trace elements. My tank is about 6 months old with a lot of torch corals and few pieces of sps. I was dosing 600ml per day to maintain right at about 8dkh. I decided to see if I could benefit from All for Reef so I cut my kalkwasser dosing in half to 300ml at night to maintain a more stable ph and AFR during the day currently at 20ml. So far it has been 2 days and I am seeing a very small increase in alk, ca, and mg. I will be leaving it at that rate for another day or 2 and then adjust accordingly.

After starting the All for Reef I felt I will only be getting half the benefits so I am thinking of doubling the TM Trace A and K in the diy mix to fulfill the missing half that is supplemented with kalk.

Another thing to note is by my maths I am at roughly 6ml (6.6ml to be exact) All for reef dose to 100ml kalk. This would be my guestimate if I was to completely switch 100% to All for reef and would need a total of near 36ml per day to replace 600ml per day of kalk.

 

[arking_mark]

Here is where I ended up for ULM automated supplements and water changes:

• Incremental 1% daily water change integrated with ATO to maintain salinity based on salinity reading
• Continuous Kalkwasser roughly to my evaporation limit ~1% delivering roughly 1dKH
• TM All-for-reef dosing based on dKH measurements. Due to delayed Alk impact getting the dosing automated was a little tricky.
• DiY NOPOX carbon dosing

With regard to locking in pH:

• Reverse daylight refugium
• Super-sized skimmer with solenoid controlled CO2 scrubber

As the tank matured and I had good coral growth, I no longer cared as much about pH and focused in on nutrients. Carbon dosing worked well for NO3, but over time, I could no longer maintain low PO4 by tweaking wet/dry feeding and skimming. I now run GFO.

Every quarter I run an ICP test to see how the tank is doing.

Typically, I have to adjust Calcium down every 9 months or so. Trace ions/elements have been fine with the exception of iodine. I've done nothing to supplement iodine...

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I am curious as to what happened here as I am kind of heading towards a somewhat similar path of dosing kalkwasser and TM trace elements. My tank is about 6 months old with a lot of torch corals and few pieces of sps. I was dosing 600ml per day to maintain right at about 8dkh. I decided to see if I could benefit from All for Reef so I cut my kalkwasser dosing in half to 300ml at night to maintain a more stable ph and AFR during the day currently at 20ml. So far it has been 2 days and I am seeing a very small increase in alk, ca, and mg. I will be leaving it at that rate for another day or 2 and then adjust accordingly.

After starting the All for Reef I felt I will only be getting half the benefits so I am thinking of doubling the TM Trace A and K in the diy mix to fulfill the missing half that is supplemented with kalk.

Another thing to note is by my maths I am at roughly 6ml (6.6ml to be exact) All for reef dose to 100ml kalk. This would be my guestimate if I was to completely switch 100% to All for reef and would need a total of near 36ml per day to replace 600ml per day of kalk.

I cannot see a reason you'd benefit from AFR plus kalkwasser and TM trace elements compared to TM trace elements plus kalkwasser, except for magnesium.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Here is where I ended up for ULM automated supplements and water changes:

• Incremental 1% daily water change integrated with ATO to maintain salinity based on salinity reading
• Continuous Kalkwasser roughly to my evaporation limit ~1% delivering roughly 1dKH
• TM All-for-reef dosing based on dKH measurements. Due to delayed Alk impact getting the dosing automated was a little tricky.
• DiY NOPOX carbon dosing

With regard to locking in pH:

• Reverse daylight refugium
• Super-sized skimmer with solenoid controlled CO2 scrubber

As the tank matured and I had good coral growth, I no longer cared as much about pH and focused in on nutrients. Carbon dosing worked well for NO3, but over time, I could no longer maintain low PO4 by tweaking wet/dry feeding and skimming. I now run GFO.

Every quarter I run an ICP test to see how the tank is doing.

Typically, I have to adjust Calcium down every 9 months or so. Trace ions/elements have been fine with the exception of iodine. I've done nothing to supplement iodine...

Sounds like a nice plan.

 

[Garf]

I have to adjust Calcium down every 9 months or so.

How are you doing that? Cheers

 

[arking_mark]

How are you doing that? Cheers

I stop TM AFR and/or Kalwasser and does a 1-part alk for a wèek or two...depending how far I need to lower it. It's typically 50ppm higher than my target. My Tank consumes about 1.5-2dKH per day = 10-14ppm Ca. I usually just pause AFR for 2 weeks as Kalkwasser provides about 1dkh per day. I don't really fret about Ca, I just like to keep it below 500ppm...I target about 450ppm as I know it will very slowly rise with my balanced dosing.

 

[arking_mark]

I stop TM AFR and/or Kalwasser and does a 1-part alk for a wèek or two...depending how far I need to lower it. It's typically 50ppm higher than my target. My Tank consumes about 1.5-2dKH per day = 10-14ppm Ca. I usually just pause AFR for 2 weeks as Kalkwasser provides about 1dkh per day. I don't really fret about Ca, I just like to keep it below 500ppm...I target about 450ppm as I know it will very slowly rise with my balanced dosing.

Also, don't trust your hobby grade Ca tests. I have found them to be inaccurate +/- about 10%. So a 500ppm reading could be 450 or 550...that's why I just rely on quarterly ICPs...which probably aren't accurate either...but better than my measurements.

 

[Moe K]

I cannot see a reason you'd benefit from AFR plus kalkwasser and TM trace elements compared to TM trace elements plus kalkwasser, except for magnesium.

Basically just to get a baseline of how much All for Reef it takes to match my kalk consumption. It would be simpler to just switch to all for reef all together but I enjoy the benefits of the ph boost and affordability of kalk.

I have half a jar of the diy AFR powder left so might as well continue to use that and then I will switch to just the trace and mag.

Then from experience with kalk in a loaded reef tank it eventually will not be enough to completely satisfy my alk/calcium consumption so I will loop back around and fill the gap with the full All for Reef recipe.