I'm lost with my new nano

[Top189h]

I had always been in to reef tanks on a tight budget. I had little to no real success with a 46 now front with black box leds on it. I found a cheap used 125 and bought it and literally swapped everything from the 46 to it and finally got growth out of my corals. A year or so ago while on vacation, I had both my return pump and gyre go out and came back to a tank covered in algae and most of my corals never recovered. I just allowed nature to run its course and eventually the corals that servived started growing again. I have one Kenya tree, two mushrooms, a toadstool leather and what I believe to be a brain coral. Fast forward to now, and me and my wife bought a new house. The 125 didn't fit anywhere, so I moved it to my shop and my corals into a 30 gallon aio cube at the house(6 month ago with old rock). Unfortunately, it looks like I'm back to the way I was with my 46. Everything is alive, but nothing is growing (and I've never had anything spread or reproduce). I'm really just lost at this point. Are there tricks to making a smaller tank work that I'm missing? I've tried skimming, not skimming, weekly water changes, no water changes and just never had any luck with either the 46 or the new 30. The wife tests the water weekly and no issues there (I don't really ever ask her for the numbers, I just made a chart for her to compare to and she doesn't attempt to remember them). I don't have any algae, no pests that I've ever noticed and other than my leather closing up if a piece of food touches it, nothing really ever looks upset.

 

[Top189h]

I did upgrade to current orbit led lights while I still had the 125, and I'm running one of them on the 30.

 

[Albertan22]

I’ve never tried a nano but I do know that bigger tanks are easier because it’s easier to achieve stability. Testing every week doesn’t help if the numbers aren’t staying stable. You want to strive for stability in salinity, Alkalinity, Calcium, and temperature first and foremost. If you can nail all those things down the corals will thrive. I’m guessing you’re seeing some swings given you’re having challenges with softies which are typically pretty hardy and resilient to a wider range of conditions. Check the numbers and look to see not only if they are in an acceptable range, but also whether they’re always changing or not.

 

[Top189h]

What swings should we be looking for the most? To be honest, she really only tests nitrates, phosphates, alkalinity, and pH. The spec sheet I gave her is from .2-.3 for phosphate, .3-.6 for phosphate, 10-11 alkalinity and 8-8.3 for pH. If there's anything out of whack, I would just do a water change on the 125. About a month in to the switch to the 30, my xenia decided to melt. A friend of mine suggested testing iodine and magnesium because of the melting, which I don't have tests for so I took him a sample to test and he said it was comparable to his tank (been a few months and I don't remember the numbers). That was when I stopped doing weekly water changes, but a few weeks in to that, I saw some turf algae forming so I just went back to weekly water changes which I've stuck with.

 

[Albertan22]

Alkalinity is what most people here would tell you to watch the closest. With a tank full of softies it shouldn’t be as important as if you had sps or lps. When you say nano tank I think salinity though. Do you have an auto topoff system set up? With such small water volume the salinity could swing a lot more due to evaporation than in your bigger tank. If it’s being manually topped off and not being done religiously then that could be a factor.

 

[Top189h]

I do run an ato. At first, I had it in the return section, but I have since moved it to the center section I intended to use as a refugium. I also have marks on each section of the tank to keep a close eye on the levels in case it becomes inconsistent. I do check the salinity myself with a refractometer before and after a water change. I also calibrate the refractometer each week when I do so. I made the mistake early in my reefing of not doing so and had a salinity spike that went unnoticed because it was out of adjustment.

 

[Albertan22]

Ok, my other thought is light intensity. Are the tank depths different? Are you maybe blasting brighter light because of a shallower tank?

 

[Top189h]

They are, the old tank was 2 feet deep, this one is 12 inches deep. I ran 4 lights on the 125 all at 100% blue, 65% white and 0 on red and green. On the new tank, I'm only running one. I worked up to 75% blue and 30% white, and again 0 on red and green. I had went up to 85 and 40, but my mushrooms and kenya tree wouldn't open all the way so I went back down.

 

[ReefParrot]

I had always been in to reef tanks on a tight budget. I had little to no real success with a 46 now front with black box leds on it. I found a cheap used 125 and bought it and literally swapped everything from the 46 to it and finally got growth out of my corals. A year or so ago while on vacation, I had both my return pump and gyre go out and came back to a tank covered in algae and most of my corals never recovered. I just allowed nature to run its course and eventually the corals that servived started growing again. I have one Kenya tree, two mushrooms, a toadstool leather and what I believe to be a brain coral. Fast forward to now, and me and my wife bought a new house. The 125 didn't fit anywhere, so I moved it to my shop and my corals into a 30 gallon aio cube at the house(6 month ago with old rock). Unfortunately, it looks like I'm back to the way I was with my 46. Everything is alive, but nothing is growing (and I've never had anything spread or reproduce). I'm really just lost at this point. Are there tricks to making a smaller tank work that I'm missing? I've tried skimming, not skimming, weekly water changes, no water changes and just never had any luck with either the 46 or the new 30. The wife tests the water weekly and no issues there (I don't really ever ask her for the numbers, I just made a chart for her to compare to and she doesn't attempt to remember them). I don't have any algae, no pests that I've ever noticed and other than my leather closing up if a piece of food touches it, nothing really ever looks upset.

RODI Ppm?

 

[Top189h]

I'm not sure, my wife gets me double distilled water from her lab. I'm assuming it's relatively pure.

 

[Top189h]

Just a quick update, my wife surprised me with a couple of WWC frag packs (I was so nervous about adding anything to the tank). It was some zoas, a Duncan, a war coral, and a Monti cap she added because it was the cheapest one on the website and she needed a few dollars for free shipping. It had been about 3 weeks and the monti and war coral are growing like absolute weeds. The Duncan is about the size of a 50 cent piece now too. All of a sudden I am seeing an outbreak of diatoms.