Can’t keep color

[lickyricky]

I’ve always wanted a beautiful tank with vivid color. Guess I’m doing something wrong my birds nest has lost most of its green and so has my watermelon. What am I don wrong? I’ve played with my different light cycles but nothing seems to help. I’m running the stock Hydra 26 HD that came with my Red Sea Max E-170.

I dose Red Sea Colors A-D twice a week according to my calcium dosing schedule and do a 5 gallon water change once per week with Red Sea Coral Pro salt

Parameters: SG 1.025, am 0, nitrite 0, nitrate 1 ppm, po4 0.02 ppm, Ak 10.8, Ca 440 ppm

Light settings below Any help is appreciated! Have no way to get my hands on a PAR meter

 

[reefndude]

How long have they been in your tank? About 50% of acros and other sps will brown out on me when I first put in tank. Sometimes they just need a little time to settle in

 

[lickyricky]

How long have they been in your tank? About 50% of acros and other sps will brown out on me when I first put in tank. Sometimes they just need a little time to settle in

They have been in for about 2 months. They were bright green when I added them

 

[reefndude]

Your alk may be a little on the high side. Are they getting good flow?

 

[lickyricky]

Your alk may be a little on the high side. Are they getting good flow?

Yes I think so. I ordered a Gyre to increase it.
I’m running based on Red Sea recipes which put AK at 11.5. They say it makes coral grow faster?

 

[reefndude]

Higher alk will but with lack of nutrients could cause tips to burn. I've never used the red sea stuff so have no opinion on that.
May also be getting to much light?

 

[Mal11224]

I agree that your Alk is a little high for the amount of nutrients in your tank. Looks like some fading is happening. I started my reef using Red Sea and had higher alk and I changed to tropic Marin to get my Alk lower and to mimic my dosing pattern and it helped a lot with maintaining sps corals. So, I used to run 10.4 and got it down to about 8.0 because my NO3 is about 1 ppm and my Phos around .07 ppm. It worked out well for me. I do small water changes weekly. About 10%.