How do you lower calcium faster

ReefTalk · Oct 3, 2016

Hi I have a calcium of like 600, how do you lower it, because I don't have that many corals that will make it quickly disappear. And I can not add more corals because of high calcium, which means everything will die.

The Rook · Oct 3, 2016

Run a lower ppm salt mix until you need it. Common issue. Then just do weekly 10-15% water changes.

JimWelsh · Oct 3, 2016

ReefTalk said:
And I can not add more corals because of high calcium, which means everything will die.

What do you base this statement on?

mcarroll · Oct 3, 2016

Ya....that's pretty high, I'll admit, but I'm with @JimWelsh – I've not seen high calcium cause a problem with corals.

Also, 600 ppm is out of range of any kit I know of. Dilute your tank sample with RODI by 50% and re-test. Multiply the end result by double. (Pick your favorite dilution/multiplication factor.) See if you get anything different that way.

Resolution is half, but accuracy is still the same since you would hopefully be within your test kit's calibration range. I think accuracy gets bad above the calibration range.

ReefTalk · Oct 4, 2016

JimWelsh said:
What do you base this statement on?

They won't do good most likely, unless you know if like adding a lot of hard corals will lower calcium faster without them starting to die.

ReefTalk · Oct 4, 2016

mcarroll said:
Ya....that's pretty high, I'll admit, but I'm with @JimWelsh – I've not seen high calcium cause a problem with corals.

Also, 600 ppm is out of range of any kit I know of. Dilute your tank sample with RODI by 50% and re-test. Multiply the end result by double. (Pick your favorite dilution/multiplication factor.) See if you get anything different that way.

Resolution is half, but accuracy is still the same since you would hopefully be within your test kit's calibration range. I think accuracy gets bad above the calibration range.

So if calcium won't harm corals, do think there not doing good because of kind of low kh and ph

mcarroll · Oct 4, 2016

Do you know how calcium got that high?

ahammer · Oct 4, 2016

Low alk can definitely kill coral. A 600ppm calcium should not be the issue. What about your nitrate, specific gravity, and phosphate levels?

Randy Holmes-Farley · Oct 4, 2016

I agree that 600 ppm calcium is fine. It is not a problem for corals. They may actually grow faster if alk is high enough so that calcium might become limiting to growth, although i do not know how high the alkalinity needs to be for that to be the case.

ReefTalk · Oct 4, 2016

mcarroll said:
Do you know how calcium got that high?

Overdosed without realizing

ReefTalk · Oct 4, 2016

ahammer said:
Low alk can definitely kill coral. A 600ppm calcium should not be the issue. What about your nitrate, specific gravity, and phosphate levels?

Phosphate at 0.25 or less, salinatiy is at 1.026, nitrate at 20 ppm , kh at 7 ph at 8

The Rook · Oct 4, 2016

Ahh, just some water changes then bro. It'll come down over a couple weeks. Need to try and get the Phosphates down and weekly water changes should help that too.

mcarroll · Oct 4, 2016

As long as it doesn't make alkalinity hard to maintain, I would simply not worry about it.

Your other numbers seem generally OK to me.

I wouldn't let PO4 get any higher though...and below 0.20ppm wouldn't be a bad thing. (Must not be zero though.)