Montis loosing color

[Dmb092182]

Calcium 440 alk is 9.3 mag is 1350 phosphate is 0 and nitrate is 0.
Monti digi and cherry tree monti and starburst Cap is not looking g well.
What do you all think? All acros look great.

 

[Ashish Patel]

Definitely looks like Low nutrient issue.

I am having a similar issue with my Cap -acros are fine.. Mine came from low light and while I acclimated it slowly the low nutrients and high light was likely the culprit.. I think they tend to do better with higher nitrates.. You could have too much light..

 

[Dmb092182]

Definitely looks like Low nutrient issue.

I am having a similar issue with my Cap -acros are fine.. Mine came from low light and while I acclimated it slowly the low nutrients and high light was likely the culprit.. I think they tend to do better with higher nitrates.. You could have too much light..

I have 6 54 watt t5 fixture over a 75 gallon. I went ahead and took my gfo offline for a while.

 

[CodyRVA]

Could be low nutrients, but your ALK is too high to be testing 0,0 for PO4 and NO3. Shouldn't be above 8 dKH when running low nutrients... just my 2 cents.

 

[ReeferBee]

@CodyRVA is right you are setting yourself up for burnt tips. Acro won't stay happy long if you're truly nutrient deficient. They need some to keep color and grow

 

[Ashish Patel]

I was running chemi pure elite - which has GFO,,,big mistake.. My alk was around 8-8.5 during this ordeal so its always many factors that result in this but if you want to maintain at 9DKH then just add more nutrients. Removing the GFO is a good start and will make a hugh difference.. Start overfeeding a bit more and try to get your PO to .03 and nirates to 5PPM.. Reduce the skimmer to dry skimming will help some.. adding amino acids also seems to help

 

[madweazl]

Are you using something like the Hanna ULR for PO4? You could slow down or discontinue dosing alkalinity for a few days to drop that to around 8 and see how things respond. Last December my montis started to loose color and I lost a couple (along with a couple acros); I wasn't able figure out exactly what happened.

Water parameters at the time things were going bad
Sg - 1.025 (very stable with ATO)
Temp - 78.8° (extremely stable)
pH - 8.27 (generally fluctuates between 8.2-8.3)
dKH - 8.57 (fluctuated 8-8.5)
PO4 - .058 (was slowly rising .028)
NO3 - 7.5 (was slowly rising from about 2.5)
Ca - 440
Mg - 1365

I'm not sure what caused it and my water parameters are very similar now with everything doing great (including one of the montis that was almost dead). PO4 is generally .02-.04 these days. Even though things seemed to be good in regard to test gets, I had gotten lazy around the time and was trying some different things out (very limited water changes being one of them since I didn't have nutrient issues). I got back to doing 15% water changes every two weeks and keeping everything maintained better and things turned around very quickly. Wish I could say I had a clue as to what actually made the difference.

Couple days before Christmas '16

Now

 

[Dmb092182]

That looks really good. I am bringing alk down right now. It is now 8.6. I hope with some feedings my nutrients will go up and everything should be happy again. What do you guys think? If I raise phosphate and nitrates then keep alk right at 8 then.

 

[CodyRVA]

That looks really good. I am bringing alk down right now. It is now 8.6. I hope with some feedings my nutrients will go up and everything should be happy again. What do you guys think? If I raise phosphate and nitrates then keep alk right at 8 then.

Good place to start, just don't drop your ALK too fast.

 

[Dmb092182]

Good place to start, just don't drop your ALK too fast.

Thanks for everyone's advice.