Dosing
- Thread starter justinparker
- Start date
- Tagged users None
mcarroll
10K Club member
Water changes should be plenty for a while.
Especially at the rate you will be doing them to keep up with those fish!
Use an enhanced salt like Reef Crystals if you find regular salts like Instant Ocean begin not to be enough.
You can decide between two-part, kalkwasser, or a calcium reactor while you're learning to keep everything alive.
That said....there won't be room to swim if your corals grow!
Any short term plan to move all of this into a large aquarium? The fish I can see are deserved of at least a 125 to grow out in. Bigger would not hurt.
Be advised: you might have to ask the puffer's permission to keep coral in this tank. Sometimes people have good luck.
Be advised: you might have to ask the eel's permission to keep the other fish in the tank. Sometimes people have good luck.
(How old is this tank? Seems new-looking for how well stocked it is. You might slow down if it's a new tank.)
Especially at the rate you will be doing them to keep up with those fish!
Use an enhanced salt like Reef Crystals if you find regular salts like Instant Ocean begin not to be enough.
You can decide between two-part, kalkwasser, or a calcium reactor while you're learning to keep everything alive.
That said....there won't be room to swim if your corals grow!
Any short term plan to move all of this into a large aquarium? The fish I can see are deserved of at least a 125 to grow out in. Bigger would not hurt.
Be advised: you might have to ask the puffer's permission to keep coral in this tank. Sometimes people have good luck.
Be advised: you might have to ask the eel's permission to keep the other fish in the tank. Sometimes people have good luck.
(How old is this tank? Seems new-looking for how well stocked it is. You might slow down if it's a new tank.)
+1 on water changes, should take care of mag and other trace supplements. Once you find that your tank uses more calcium than water changes replace, you can start adding lime(kalk) to your top off water starting at .5 tsp/gallon up to 2, even adding vinegar after that to get the most out of it.
Kalk will also help with ph, lower phosphates.
Good read - http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-01/rhf/
Kalk will also help with ph, lower phosphates.
Good read - http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-01/rhf/
Last edited:
I mean I've been in this hobby for 3 years now and I've had the tank 2 years and 7 months. I'm just starting to make it a reefn I wanted to learn how to make my fish happy first. I do water changes about every 3 to 3.5 weeks
dbrewsky
Active Member
Depending on how frequently/large your water changes are with a fortified reef salt, you should be able to maintain adequate calcium levels. If you are finding that your frequency of water changes is not supporting high enough alk/calcium levels through testing, you will want to supplement those elements to increase stability. Probably the easiest to implement system is two-part which is available in a ready to use solution or by mixing stock solutions with dried chemicals available at most fish stores or online. The beauty of two part is knowing that if you dose ___ amount of each it will raise alk or calcium consistently the same amount. ie 20ml of alkalinity solution will raise alkalinity .5dkh, depending on the size of your aquarium.
It also scales easily to your system, you may only need to dose some two part once between water changes to maintain your alk/calcium levels now, but as you add more corals or go with a larger tank you can increase the amount of two part you dose and the frequency. Many reefers after a while will utilize dosers to help remove some of the maintenance of dosing frequently when their tanks start to really demand these elements.
Bulk reef supply has a you tube channel which does a great job of explaining many aspects of calcium and alkalinity maintenance if you jump over there!.
It also scales easily to your system, you may only need to dose some two part once between water changes to maintain your alk/calcium levels now, but as you add more corals or go with a larger tank you can increase the amount of two part you dose and the frequency. Many reefers after a while will utilize dosers to help remove some of the maintenance of dosing frequently when their tanks start to really demand these elements.
Bulk reef supply has a you tube channel which does a great job of explaining many aspects of calcium and alkalinity maintenance if you jump over there!.
What's your calc at now? Start using a reef salt that keeps it at arouhd 440 (reef crystals was mentioned, Red Sea pro) Test calc after a water change and then again before your next regular water change to see how much calc your using. depending how much it drops, change water more frequently or start using kalk
Water changes should be plenty for a while.
Especially at the rate you will be doing them to keep up with those fish!
Use an enhanced salt like Reef Crystals if you find regular salts like Instant Ocean begin not to be enough.
You can decide between two-part, kalkwasser, or a calcium reactor while you're learning to keep everything alive.
That said....there won't be room to swim if your corals grow!
Any short term plan to move all of this into a large aquarium? The fish I can see are deserved of at least a 125 to grow out in. Bigger would not hurt.
Be advised: you might have to ask the puffer's permission to keep coral in this tank. Sometimes people have good luck.
Be advised: you might have to ask the eel's permission to keep the other fish in the tank. Sometimes people have good luck.
(How old is this tank? Seems new-looking for how well stocked it is. You might slow down if it's a new tank.)
2 years and 7 months I've had the tank and I've had two crashes due to a family member dumping soda and the other one silicone poisonin.
I've had my Puffer in there since the beginning of my third try and he does not bother the coral nor does my eel have problems with the fish I guess I'm one lucky guy
