Changing Dosing Schedule

[Nick Rose]

I have been testing my Alk three times a day for the past week in the morning, afternoon and night with Salifert kit. Like others have noticed Alk drops during the day. My numbers are 9am-7.1dkh, 1pm-6.8dkh and 9pm-6.7dkh. Should I dose my Alk during the day or split the dose one at 9pm and then at 9am? The system is 60 gallons and I drip dose 25ml of Alk/Ca from 9pm-10am.

 

[Ron Reefman]

Nick, I wouldn't worry about how you are dosing now. It seems fine to me.

What kind of corals do you have in your tank?

I have a 40g cube with a 40g sump/fuge. Now 90% of my livestock are zoas and RFA's. But I do have some lps and sps. I keep my alk at around 9dKH. I try to dose 50 ml of alk once a day (I don't drip it, I just pour it in slowly in front of a wavemaker). Before I started doing this every day I was doing it once a week. My alk would drop from 9dKH to 6dKH and I'd dose 100-150ml of alk. My big wavemaker blows right at a big orange digi colony and it would retract it's polyps for a few minutes and then they would come back out. Other than that, I see no issues in the tank.

Yes, stable water parameters are important. And some here may say I'm crazy for the way I do it. but it works for me. And I think some reefers take water parameter stability way too seriously. But then remember, my tank is mostly zoas and RFA's which are more tolerant than sps corals.

This is from last January and that small orange digi near the bottom front is 4+ times that size now.

 

[Phil85]

Ca/Alk consumption should typically be consumed during the light cycle as they're tied to photosynthesis. Since your tank is consuming 0.4 dKh per day you could replenish this with one manual dose (I would do afternoon/evening). However, the more doses the better to even out any fluctuations. I believe stability is key.

 

[BestMomEver]

I used to have my doser put everything in my tank at one time. Recently, I decided to reprogram the doser to dose three times a day. I’ve noticed very little, if any, difference.

 

[Nick Rose]

Nick, I wouldn't worry about how you are dosing now. It seems fine to me.

What kind of corals do you have in your tank?

I have a green candy cane, blue candy cane, GSP, Xenia, two acans, Duncan, Mummy Eyed Chalice (which is encrusting nicely. It was put in the tank on August 9th), zoas, frogspawn. I've tried SPS but failed. The first time was a Birdsnest that lasted only a month. This was because I have 9dkh with 0 nutrients or close to 0. I tried a another birdsnest and also a stylo but once again both have failed. My nutrients are now No3 10 and Po4 1. I know the Po4 is very high but I don't have any algae outbreaks. The No3 and Po4 have been steady the past 3 weeks. I will be sending a ICP test in to see if I have anything extremely low or high.

 

[bubblemytip]

I use a GHL dosing pump with my profilux to dose 70% of my alk during the photoperiod and 30% during the "night-time" on my sps tank - each dose is 10mins apart. This minimises the alk swing to about 0.05-0.1dKH/day (according to alkatronic).