All Anemones died.

[Hotelbravo]

All 12 of my Anemones died over the course of 2 days. i did multiple water changes, including a 40% water change. my parameters are:
Salinty 1.026
Nitrate 40
Phosphate 0.25
Calcium 440
Mag unknown (ran out of testing supplies)
Alkalinity low at 5...

Does low alk have an adverse affect on anemones, and does the unknown Mag levels play any kind of role?

 

[Hincapiej4]

I'm going to try my very very best not to be a jerk here...

Get it together. You're asking, but you already know the answer. Fix it.

 

[kutcha]

you need to get your parameters in check yes a alk of 5 is to low also need to get that nitrate and phos down i can only imaging what these parameters were BEFORE the 40% water change

 

[Hot2na]

nitrate not good either for anemones

 

[Alvaro_Spain]

you need to get your parameters in check yes a alk of 5 is to low also need to get that nitrate and phos down i can only imaging what these parameters were BEFORE the 40% water change

before the 40% water change:
- NO3 --> 40/0,6 = 67
- PO4 --> 0,25/0,6 = 0,42

I would have done a 100% water change with that data. Even more with alk. at 5.

 

[kutcha]

before the 40% water change:
- NO3 --> 40/0,6 = 67
- PO4 --> 0,25/0,6 = 0,42

I would have done a 100% water change with that data. Even more with alk. at 5.

I suppose thats one way lol but we also dont know how low that alk was before the Water change either and unless we knew the exact ALK of the replaced salt we wouldnt be able to calculate it that way

 

[Alvaro_Spain]

Yeah, I agree the alk before is the real problem.

 

[MartinM]

Also, pH wasn’t listed, with that alk, it was probably low. If you know enough to test for these parameters, you know enough to know why your anemones died. The real question is, why the neglect?

 

[dvgyfresh]

nitrate not good either for anemones

Anemones use nitrate in the water column as a food source, nitrate didn’t harm them, I’m suspecting the low alk was just one of the problems

 

[Hincapiej4]

Anemones use nitrate in the water column as a food source, nitrate didn’t harm them, I’m suspecting the low alk was just one of the problems

It's well known high nitrate will p off anemones...

 

[dvgyfresh]

It's well known high nitrate will p off anemones...

Possibly , but 40 isn’t very high in my experience , I’m thinking over 100 you might start to get issues (just guessing I’ve seen some very high nitrate tanks ) I currently aim for 20ppm of nitrate in my nem tank and the corals / nems never looked happier. I’m also scarred from dinos early on so I try to keep a lot of nutrients available lol

 

[Hotelbravo]

you need to get your parameters in check yes a alk of 5 is to low also need to get that nitrate and phos down i can only imaging what these parameters were BEFORE the 40% water change

I am running a reactor with a decent amount of Xport-PO4 to combat the phosphates, i have been doing this for a while, i dont feed my tank very often anymore, maybe once every 3 days, i do water changes of about 20% weekly, i use instant ocean reef crystals and RODI water for water changes. I dont know what else to do to "get my parameters in check".

 

[Rickybobby]

You know what the proper parameters are! Work hard to get there

 

[Hotelbravo]

Also, pH wasn’t listed, with that alk, it was probably low. If you know enough to test for these parameters, you know enough to know why your anemones died. The real question is, why the neglect?

The real question is, why the assumption?

I am running a reactor with a decent amount of Xport-PO4 to combat the phosphates, i have been doing this for a while, i dont feed my tank very often anymore, maybe once every 3 days, i do water changes of about 20% weekly, i use instant ocean reef crystals and RODI water for water changes.
since my tank is low stocked, only a few clownfish and chromis, i dont feed very much, all my coral is doing fine, i have a few SPS, Gonis, and Euphyllia, These all look fine, nothing abnormal. With my REGULAR water changes, lack of feeding, and having more sensitive corals looking perfectly fine, what indicator was i supposed to look for leading up to this?

 

[Deep]

The real question is, why the assumption?

I am running a reactor with a decent amount of Xport-PO4 to combat the phosphates, i have been doing this for a while, i dont feed my tank very often anymore, maybe once every 3 days, i do water changes of about 20% weekly, i use instant ocean reef crystals and RODI water for water changes.
since my tank is low stocked, only a few clownfish and chromis, i dont feed very much, all my coral is doing fine, i have a few SPS, Gonis, and Euphyllia, These all look fine, nothing abnormal. With my REGULAR water changes, lack of feeding, and having more sensitive corals looking perfectly fine, what indicator was i supposed to look for leading up to this?

So if you were testing regularly , was the low alk by design ? You are lucky your sps is doing fine at that Alk.

 

[Hotelbravo]

I have been keeping reef tanks for 11 years, have never had any issues with mag or alkalinity. Not once have i ever tested below or above normal parameters for alk, calcium, and mag.
I ran a 300 gallon predator tank for almost 5 years that tested a constant 80-100ppm for Nitrates, this tank had several very large basketball sized BTAs that never had any issues with the high nitrate tank, PO4 on that tank was also always high.
My 180 sps/lps tank had a constant 40-60ppm nitrate for years without incident.
the issue is in my 60 gallon cube. This tank is considerably understocked, like i mentioned i rarely feed, it was just a nem/clown tank. I didnt feed the nems often because i am running a radion xr30 gen 4 pro on this tank.
This tank was not showing signs of being dirty, the 1 large sps colony i have is doing good, the large goni is doing good, the euphyllia is doing good, i have no algae growth outside the refugium, i change water very frequently with RODI/Reef crystals.
what would cause the alk to drop in this tank?

 

[Hotelbravo]

So if you were testing regularly , was the low alk by design ? You are lucky your sps is doing fine at that Alk.

I dont normally test Alk/Cal/Mag since it has never been an issue, instead of my weekly tests for nitrate/phosphate, i only test Alk/Cal/Mag monthly or about every 1.5 months. Not sure what you mean "low by design" unless you are just being a smart butt. of course i wouldnt purposefully lower the alkalinity.

 

[Coralcitos]

All 12 of my Anemones died over the course of 2 days. i did multiple water changes, including a 40% water change. my parameters are:
Salinty 1.026
Nitrate 40
Phosphate 0.25
Calcium 440
Mag unknown (ran out of testing supplies)
Alkalinity low at 5...

Does low alk have an adverse affect on anemones, and does the unknown Mag levels play any kind of role?

I added calcium and Mag to my tank thinking it was low and my smallest anemone... RIP

 

[sam.veilleux30]

I dont normally test Alk/Cal/Mag since it has never been an issue, instead of my weekly tests for nitrate/phosphate, i only test Alk/Cal/Mag monthly or about every 1.5 months. Not sure what you mean "low by design" unless you are just being a smart butt. of course i wouldnt purposefully lower the alkalinity.

What he mean is that 5 is low, kind of waaaay low.
Usualy 7 dkh is considered on the low end of the spectrum.

 

[dvgyfresh]

I have been keeping reef tanks for 11 years, have never had any issues with mag or alkalinity. Not once have i ever tested below or above normal parameters for alk, calcium, and mag.
I ran a 300 gallon predator tank for almost 5 years that tested a constant 80-100ppm for Nitrates, this tank had several very large basketball sized BTAs that never had any issues with the high nitrate tank, PO4 on that tank was also always high.
My 180 sps/lps tank had a constant 40-60ppm nitrate for years without incident.
the issue is in my 60 gallon cube. This tank is considerably understocked, like i mentioned i rarely feed, it was just a nem/clown tank. I didnt feed the nems often because i am running a radion xr30 gen 4 pro on this tank.
This tank was not showing signs of being dirty, the 1 large sps colony i have is doing good, the large goni is doing good, the euphyllia is doing good, i have no algae growth outside the refugium, i change water very frequently with RODI/Reef crystals.
what would cause the alk to drop in this tank?

Maybe when you did water change , the salt was a bad batch with very low alkalinity and wasn’t being replenished with water changes , an important reason to test even when doing everything right