Dosing alkalinity and calcium

[FRANK48]

I have a 50 gallon tank and have some corals
Alveopora
Zoas
GSP
trumpets
Cabbage
Plate
Frogspawn
Hammerhead
Fingerleather
Mushroom
Toadstool

my alk is 7.25 and my calcium is 400

I’m thinking of dosing seachem reef carbonate and seachem reef complete.
Is this a bad idea or should I start dosing

thanks

 

[blaxsun]

Both of those Seachem products will work. Reef Complete also contains magnesium and strontium - so you won't have to dose those separately.

 

[PatW]

Your alkalinity is a bit low and boosting it would help. There are all sorts of products out there to do it.

I use Bulk Reef Supply 2 part which is Calcium Chloride (for the calcium) and Soda Ash for the alkalinity. It also has the magnesium component (so it is really 3 part or maybe 4 part, the magnesium is 2 things mixed together).

In your case, you do not have anything that will be forming a bunch of calcium carbonate so you do not need much dosing.

If you want to get into the nuts and bolts of the various methods, go over to the reef chemistry section. Randy Holmes Farley (and we are lucky to benefit from his expertise) has a bunch of stickies that go into the details.