Alkalinity remains the same

[Bigfish of La.]

i have an 80G deep blue reef ready Tank with a mixture of soft corals, LPS, and 6 small frags of SPS plus 4 fish. My nitrates are 1-2ppm, phosphate at 0, calcium and magnesium are at preferred levels.
Within the last week my alkalinity has remained almost constant 9.46 to9.35 with no dosing. I was manually dosing till I noticed alkalinity was remaining almost constant. I have several monti caps and there is no PE and look a bit bleached. Everything else in tank looks good. Should I manually lower alkalinity and if so how without affecting other parameters and corals.

 

[Peter K]

That alk level is more than fine (its what I run my tank at), I’ve seen tanks with alk at 11-12. Is your phosphate 0.00 or near 0. If it is dead 0 you might want to consider feeding heavier or dosing some, I run mine at 0.04-0.06. That could be an explanation for them bleaching out a little. Are you dosing any coral foods / amino acids or anything like that?

 

[Bigfish of La.]

I use the Hannah UL checker for phosphate and do not dose. Which product are you dosing for your tank? I feed corals reef chili once a week.
Thanks

 

[Peter K]

I use the Hanna checker too, so I would definitely try to get your phosphate up some and leave your alk stable for now. I also use reef chili along with pohls coral vitalizer from kz, And Acro power but I feed my fish heavily. I don’t have any personal experience dosing phosphate but I have heard you have to be careful and watch it closely, in my opinion, I would suggest feeding maybe 2x a week for now and see if that ups your phosphate levels some before directly dosing it. I’m sure resident chemistry genius Randy has some detailed info on here about dosing phosphate I would check out before starting that if you decide to take that route.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I don’t see any reason to lower alkalinity, but I’d feed more or dose phosphate to be sure it is not too low.

 

[Bigfish of La.]

I wasn’t implying dosing phosphate, but amino acids or similar product designed for coloration of corals.

 

[Bigfish of La.]

I don’t see any reason to lower alkalinity, but I’d feed more or dose phosphate to be sure it is not too low.

If I feed more will this increase my phosphate? What would you consider an optimal phosphate level? Do you recommend any amino acids or other coral food and how often to feed? I’ve always been cautious about over feeling, so maybe I should feed more heavily.Thanks

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

If I feed more will this increase my phosphate? What would you consider an optimal phosphate level? Do you recommend any amino acids or other coral food and how often to feed? I’ve always been cautious about over feeling, so maybe I should feed more heavily.Thanks

Yes. I consider a value like 0.02 ppm phosphate to be a fine goal.

Amino acids can be a fine product, but seem most useful when nitrate is kept very low since they are both sources of N. They shouldn’t be providing much P.