Everything is a disaster

[Pridedcloth3]

22 years of owning a reef tank learned me that succes and mishap are a “normal” manifestation in a tank. Firstly: be slow, patience is important. You are way to inpatient. Please Sps corals only after years. Second: corals like ‘dirty” water. A too good functionning Skimmer, roller mat and frequent water changing are imo too much. I change < 2% water per week. Third: check only the most important parameters and try to be constant with them: flow, light, temp, salt level, PH, KH, Calcium, Magnesium, Nitrate and Phosfate. I have never understand why people test (much) more, you will be anxious cq mad to correct a too high or too low extreme ingredient of the water. One warning: people are inclined only to publish pictures on R2R or RC when there tank is blossoming and beautiful. No one is proud to show his /her tank when things are going extremely bad /dirty. So there is a publication bias. Let that not distract you, when your tank is sometimes not functionning. Most reefers know or knew that too.

Lol my sand bed is 50% dinos right now the other half is pure white but nothing seems bothered by it so I'm not. They'll go away when they decide to.

 

[Uncle99]

Parameters seems to be stable now, but they have not been too stable if you look back a month.

I started with Red Sea Pro Coral salt and this seems to increase the Mg significantly. I have now decided to switch to Red Sea Blue Bucket. I can't really remove the Al and Zn with Polyfilter or Chemipure as its apparently not available in Europe. The same goes for Metasorb. I think the only way to get the values down is by water change. You suggest I disconnect the reef mat. Will this not have a negative effect on the cleanliness of the water? Thanks.

To me, those numbers are fine (the 1720 is odd).
When you change salt you change water chemistry in your case, a big drop in Alk. Not a good thing so real slow downwards if you must.

Stopping the mat will result in higher nitrate and phosphate levels. If levels are lower than 5ppm nitrate and 0.05ppm phosphate then yup, too “clean” and little to feed your micro-fauna. It’s these guys (the good ones) we want to increase and when they increase, they outcompete the bad and they just disappear within days. But it takes super stable chemistry to encourage the good guys, bad guys like unstable Alk, Salinity and zero in either or both nutrients.

If your now a month past the instability you experienced, it may take a few months to get a noticeable difference, but, it will happen.

 

[Coinzmans Reef]

Yes, I'm using RODI water. How often do you do water change (and how much). I'm getting VERY different advises on this. I probably have to do some significant water changes myself to bring down the Al and Zn values but hopefully can slow down later when its in place.

The biggest self inflicted wound to my tank was a 10% water change four weeks in a row. It took months for the corals to recover. Before and after have always been 10% monthly and that is what keeps my tank happy. I also have used the Coral Pro but now use the Blue bucket so parameters do not jump, mainly the DKH as I have a mixed reef and keep it at 8.5

 

[TbSaysNo]

The biggest self inflicted wound to my tank was a 10% water change four weeks in a row. It took months for the corals to recover. Before and after have always been 10% monthly and that is what keeps my tank happy. I also have used the Coral Pro but now use the Blue bucket so parameters do not jump, mainly the DKH as I have a mixed reef and keep it at 8.5

im wondering if it would be a good idea to mix 50/50 of the purple pro coral salt with the blue bucket, to get slightly higher parameters, but not as high as the purple one gives you... what do you think?

 

[zdrc]

im wondering if it would be a good idea to mix 50/50 of the purple pro coral salt with the blue bucket, to get slightly higher parameters, but not as high as the purple one gives you... what do you think?

I don't think this is a great idea. I think it's pretty clear that your Sg, Alk, Ca, and Mg are all fine as they are now (the 1700 Mg was too high). Your alk is even in high part of the ideal range, so I wouldn't try raising it at all.

I don't think the salt currently has anything to do with your problems. I think you need to focus on keeping things steady for a while, and switching to a 50/50 salt mix would be the exact opposite of that.

Also, what are your nitrate and phosphate numbers? I don't think you mentioned them.

 

[Andreas' Reef]

I know it can be very exciting but it is a bad idea to add so much to your tank so fast. adding 3 corals and having them die is better than adding 20 and having them die.

 

[TbSaysNo]

I don't think this is a great idea. I think it's pretty clear that your Sg, Alk, Ca, and Mg are all fine as they are now (the 1700 Mg was too high). Your alk is even in high part of the ideal range, so I wouldn't try raising it at all.

I don't think the salt currently has anything to do with your problems. I think you need to focus on keeping things steady for a while, and switching to a 50/50 salt mix would be the exact opposite of that.

Also, what are your nitrate and phosphate numbers? I don't think you mentioned them.

8 ppm Nitrate, 0.01 Phosphate

 

[Coinzmans Reef]

im wondering if it would be a good idea to mix 50/50 of the purple pro coral salt with the blue bucket, to get slightly higher parameters, but not as high as the purple one gives you... what do you think?

I would just stick to the blue bucket.