Does low alk with high nutrients have a negative effect like high alk with low nutrients?

2Wheelsonly · May 26, 2017

I am trying to simplify things and wanting to weigh the + and - of running low alk vs high. It seems to me that it's way riskier to run higher alk because now you have to control / test your nutrients. If you slip up and your nutrients drop you can burn your corals.

Unless of course high nutrients and low alk doesn't mix.

My goal it to remain at 7.5 alk and feed ammino every day until I see algae. I find testing for po4 seems useless...it never matches with what's actually going on visually in my tank.

I have never ever fed my SPS, but have always experiences very very pale corals even with mid-high nitrates (5ppm) and (0.02-04) po4. Based on those numbers my corals should not starve but for the first time ever i'm dosing amino acids daily to see if I can change this.

prsnlty · May 27, 2017

This is my observation in my tank with lots of SPS and lps. If your alk drops too low it is as much of a problem as when it creeps up too high. 8 is about as low as I would go with po4 at or near .04 and no3 at or below 5ppm. If you're running no3 above 5 ppm and no more than 10 raise the alk to 8.5, respectively up 0.5^ with every 5ppm no3. While keeping p04 never above .06 with higher no3. I dosed aminos 2x weekly but I also fed the corals reef chili, rotifers and reef roids those nights too. Live phyto in very small amounts in between. My corals had great color and growth. Whenever I was being lazy or simply not able to do water changes I did dose Trace elements as well.

I did find that high nutrients and low alk did not mix well. Nor did low nutrients and high alk. For whatever it's worth I feel like you still need to test for those nutrients. It's about keeping things in balance.

2Wheelsonly · May 27, 2017

Would it be a bad thing to have high no3 but low po4? What alk would you run if I ran 10 no3 and 0.02 po4?

prsnlty · May 27, 2017

2Wheelsonly said:
Would it be a bad thing to have high no3 but low po4? What alk would you run if I ran 10 no3 and 0.02 po4?

I would run 8-8.5. Low p04 is better than 0 po4. .02 is fine.

2Wheelsonly · May 27, 2017

Sorry to ask so many questions, i'm in the second guessing myself phase again

What would you consider "too high" po4 that would turn corals brown?

prsnlty · May 27, 2017

I would not go over .06. However keep in mind that most tests are not accurate and have a .04 degree difference either up or down on average from what I have read and heard. That's why I say .02 is okay. If you have any signs of any kind of algae in your system then you know it's not really .02 it is a bit higher in reality. If you have absolutely no signs of algae whatsoever then you are probably right on the mark or lower than .02. But if you're lower than that your corals will look very light in color generally particularly the green ones. If your green ones are pretty green then you have a decent amount of po4. I've noticed with my green ones when they get super dark green I have to test my po4 and I've noticed every time it's up higher than usual. And when that happens I do a water change and I back off the live phyto.

Questions are good everybody has them and you may not be the only one wondering the same thing. [emoji12] And I second-guess myself quite often especially when I get in a panic over something LOL ( getting in a panic is always my downfall)

2Wheelsonly · May 27, 2017

That's my problem, for the longest time my greens are very very pale. Lost alot of color...my hanna kit shows 0.02 but I have to think it's lower. I have been dosing amino acids and am seeing my po4 raise a bit. Since this is a tank restart I don't have many sps, just my old lps colonies that survived. Feeding my fish doesn't seem to be working to feed my corals...

prsnlty · May 27, 2017

2Wheelsonly said:
That's my problem, for the longest time my greens are very very pale. Lost alot of color...my hanna kit shows 0.02 but I have to think it's lower. I have been dosing amino acids and am seeing my po4 raise a bit. Since this is a tank restart I don't have many sps, just my old lps colonies that survived. Feeding my fish doesn't seem to be working to feed my corals...

Are all colors faded? You might want to try red sea coral colors. Get your tank balanced out and keep it where you want it . I would say to bring your po4 to .04 if you can then dose in small increments the Red Sea Coral colors ABC and D. Be careful with the ones for greens because too much iron can be a problem. It'll take about a week to notice the difference but believe me you're going to notice it. And only dose about half of what they recommend.

prsnlty · May 27, 2017

I think once you get your tank balanced it shouldn't be a problem anyway corals take a little while to respond.

2Wheelsonly · May 27, 2017

prsnlty said:
Are all colors faded? You might want to try red sea coral colors. Get your tank balanced out and keep it where you want it . I would say to bring your po4 to .04 if you can then dose in small increments the Red Sea Coral colors ABC and D. Be careful with the ones for greens because too much iron can be a problem. It'll take about a week to notice the difference but believe me you're going to notice it. And only dose about half of what they recommend.

I have coral colors but have not started yet due to my test kits showing potassium at 410 stront 7.3 and iodine 0.04 ( all reasonable levels) I don't bother testing iron because it never shows up in my kits.