Hi guys, just started my 300 mixed reef aquarium about 7 weeks ago. Got a couple lps and softies in right now as well as some inverts,3 fire fish,yellow sailfin, and a coral beauty angel. How often do i need to be doing the calcium additions? Any help would be great.
Calcium feedings
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tj w
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Great, thank you. How's your 300 going? This is my first saltwater tank but wanted to have plenty of room for my live stock. Definitely a different world. Been doing lots of research but there is quite a bit of contradictory info out there. So i guess trial and error will have to do.
Emac909
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My 300 is great. I love it. The 300 has to b the easiest system I've ever had. It runs on auto pilot
Here's my build thread
https://www.reef2reef.com/index.php?posts/2473105/
Also the best way to find your consumption rate is to keep a log of the tests your do. But really calcium isn't the most important parameter u want to look at yes it's a key parameter. Along the side of magnesium. But alkalinity is your make or break parameter. I've found the steadier u can keep your alkalinity the better your tank will do.
Here's my build thread
https://www.reef2reef.com/index.php?posts/2473105/
Also the best way to find your consumption rate is to keep a log of the tests your do. But really calcium isn't the most important parameter u want to look at yes it's a key parameter. Along the side of magnesium. But alkalinity is your make or break parameter. I've found the steadier u can keep your alkalinity the better your tank will do.
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tj w
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Wow, what a beautiful display!! Truly amazing. Thanks for the info, will start daily logs tomorrow and see how it goes. Thought about getting a calc reactor but dont know if i truly need it or its just an amenity.
Emac909
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I would never have another tank with out a calcium reactor. But that's cause I'm lazy. Right now your probably good but once u start getting a packed tank with corals. It gets to be a pita to add/mix chemicals daily. And even if u get a doser the chemicals add up to b a lot of money quick.
For a while I didn't do much testing and my cal and mag feel. The brs calculator says it's going to take 3 cups of calcium chloride to bring my cal back up to 400ppm. My guess it's going to take 5 or 6. Cause I'm not going to just dump a c*** load of cal in at once. No I'll bring it up over a period of 2 months maybe 3.
Even worse brs says its going to take 8 cups of magnesium chloride to bring the mag up to 1400ppm. I'm going to double that's too cause just like cal I'll take my time bringing up mag too. But I'll test b4 dosing to make sure not to over do it.
But I setup a doser that doses about 5 gallons a week. So I mixed up 2 5 gallon bucket with ro/di one mag the other cal. I mixed 3 cup mag chloride and 2 mag sulfate in one bucket. Then 3 cup of cal chloride in the other. Then setup the doser to dose them within a few hours of each other. So it will dose 60ml of cal mix then 4 hours later 60ml of mag mix then 4 hours later back to cal. One then the other.
For a while I didn't do much testing and my cal and mag feel. The brs calculator says it's going to take 3 cups of calcium chloride to bring my cal back up to 400ppm. My guess it's going to take 5 or 6. Cause I'm not going to just dump a c*** load of cal in at once. No I'll bring it up over a period of 2 months maybe 3.
Even worse brs says its going to take 8 cups of magnesium chloride to bring the mag up to 1400ppm. I'm going to double that's too cause just like cal I'll take my time bringing up mag too. But I'll test b4 dosing to make sure not to over do it.
But I setup a doser that doses about 5 gallons a week. So I mixed up 2 5 gallon bucket with ro/di one mag the other cal. I mixed 3 cup mag chloride and 2 mag sulfate in one bucket. Then 3 cup of cal chloride in the other. Then setup the doser to dose them within a few hours of each other. So it will dose 60ml of cal mix then 4 hours later 60ml of mag mix then 4 hours later back to cal. One then the other.
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tj w
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Yes, definitely will have to do that as well. Going to be a bit until i have that many coral. Calc and mag are lifelines to the coral so whats another grand. When setting up my system i did t realize i'd have 8 grand just to start but its a hobby that i absolutely enjoy. Dont really trust my lfs so which site would u recommend ordering from? Ive used liveaquaria once and was a lil disappointed in quality but it did arrive alive.
Emac909
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Yep it's a goniopora. Most people like to put those on the sand bed. It's actually not a softy it's a LPS (large polyp story)
Randy Holmes-Farley
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I'd start by measuring alkalinity. If it is OK in the absence of supplements, then you likely do not need calcium or magnesium.
Your tank will have quite little demand for these at this point unless coralline is growing strongly, which it likey is not in a 7 week old tank.
