New 29 Gallon Build

[Dkmoo]

That's a lot of nitrate control for your tank size. Esp from the pics showing how much bioload is in there

As your corals grow i won't be surprised if you find your self struggling to keep nutrient up. Esp once you switch to rodi as I suspect your non - rodied water is a big piece of yiur nitrate source. It just doesn't seem right that so little biomass in your tank can make that much nitrate waste unless you are overfeeding a ton.

I feed my 4 year 29g tank a ton and maintain 5ppm NO3 with only skimmer. Just added fuge last week with a small macro bc I wanted to feed even more and already no3 dropped to 2ppm after 1 week.

 

[Drew1600]

2/20/21 Update:

Curve 5 still overflowing like crazy, I just took the collection cup off.

Finally got an Inkbird, lol (welcome to the 20th century)

Added my final fish, a Lawnmower Blenny named Jabba, last night. He seems to be doing well. If anyone has any tips on feeding please let me know. I have a decent bit of algae/detritus and supplemental seaweed on a clip, though he hasnt gone for it yet.

Hair algae is mostly defeated. Added about 10 Astrea & 3 large Turbos this week to help.

Since the implementation of the sulfur reactor, and after just 3 days of NoPoX dosing, nitrates have dropped from 25ppm to 1ppm. I have switched to using natural seawater as well, as I have yet to install an ro/di. I highly recommend this to anyone with nitrate problems, as it has been the cheapest and most effective thing I have discovered ($20 BRS Reactor, $20 2 lbs Sulfur Pellets, $20 for the smallest return pump you can find). Set the pump speed to drip about 2 drops per second. Do this by teeing off the line and adding a ball valve to the line you've created, thus allowing fine tuning of the pump speed through adjustment of the valve.

Started dosing Red Sea's ABCD Trace Colors (3mL weekly for now), stay tuned for results. Daily Coral Amino dosing, my coral love this stuff. Back to feeding a heaping 1/2 tsp of Reef Roids, Zoo & Phyto, Coral-Vite, and a dash of frozen food, on Monday and Friday. Fish eat frozen daily now that nutrients are under control.

Started a weekly dosing of Microbe-Lift Special Blend (bacteria), so I will keep you all updated, curious to see if I will see results as far as water qaulity/waste breakdown goes. This could have also had an effect on my N and P levels, though its hard to say. Weekly dosing also includes (per each water change) - Seachem's Prime (simply precatuionary), Stability, Pristine, Clarity, and Amquel, just in case there is ever any ammonia for some reason.

I am trying to cut back on the number of chemicals I add to my tank, but I have yet to find the right combination that works for me. Would love some suggestions on additives/supplementation.

Parameters are as follows:
Temp - 25.5C/77.9F
Nitrate - 1
Phosphate - 0-.25 (very hard to tell, API test kit, suggestions on a new one not Hanna?)
pH - 7.8
Alkalinity - 7.7
Calcium - 360 (I am starting the Red Sea Foundation program this week to bring Calcium and Alkalinity back up, Kalk dripping to maintain. I believe I am using about 20-30 ppm Calcium per week, but I am unsure. This seems rather high for softie dominant tank. Any input, or does this seem about right? I have about 30 coral. This is my first "non-nano" tank so I have never had to dable in 2-part dosing.

Chaeto should hopefully arrive tomorrow.

I will be posting a coral and fish gallery very soon! Until then, thanks for reading & happy reefing!

 

[Hermie]

calcium seems really low tbh. i thought 400 was standard minimum

 

[Drew1600]

calcium seems really low tbh. i thought 400 was standard minimum

It is very low! Evidently the Petco brand seawater is low in calcium. I should test more frequently, but I was used to mixing my own salt in the past for my nano tanks, so adding calcium/alk supplements (and testing for such) wasnt really on the radar, tested a couple times and wc always sufficied. Now that I have a larger system and am currently not mixing my own water, things are different.

Red Sea's Foundation will be here in the mail in 2 days so I can begin to raise, no LFS..

 

[Drew1600]

Update: 3/1/21

The tank is very quickly beginning to reach maturity, easing out of the "ugly phase" as we speak.

Coral doing fantastic, in the process of raising Alk (to 11.5) in hopes of speeding up growth a bit.

Params:
Nitrate - 0-1
Phosphate - 0-.25
Calcium - 460
Alk - 8.9
pH - 7.8
Salinity - 1.025

Final stocking list:
Pair True Percs
Pair Juv. Engineer Gobies (moving to 75 gallon in a year or two)
Female Blueside/Purpleside Fairy Wrasse (not exactly sure which)
Female Blue Devil Damsel
Lawnmower Blenny
Feather Duster
Sand Sifting Sea Star
20 Astrea
5-6 Turbo

Coral stock:
GSP (2)
Asst. Mushrooms (6)
Clove Polyp Colony
Wall Hammer (2)
Neon Green Cabbage
Neon Green Toadstool
Pink Toadstool
Duncan (3)
Kenya Tree
Devil's Hand Leather
Asst. Zoa's (4)
Green Sinularia
Asst. Finger Leathers (5)
Yellow Finger Leather
Pink/Green Torch
Bubble Coral

 

[Dkmoo]

Ph a bit low but probably doesn't matter too much for you since you have mostly softies so for now consistency stillbhas value. If you plan to get more stonies id suggest read up on some safe and correct ways to address your low pH. 7.8pH OK but not ideal for coral bone growth. That torch can probably still grow and split but the branch is more likely to be brittle and sensitive to stressors. 9 dkh alk under normal conditions should be around 8.3pH.

How's the coraline growth? That usually is a good indication of how well the calcification process is going

For 20-30ppm calcium consumption per week you should have about 2.8 - 4dkh of alk consumption since the calcification process use both in a fixed ratio. It doesn't sound that far off - my 29g mixed reef use 10ppm/1.4dkh daily. Are you seeing a lot of coraline or precipitation? That would suck up ca/alk. Whats your MG? Low mg would increase precipitation. Try to keepnit above 1350.

On dosing ABCD rnt you ODing them? They pegged their dosage to their calcium supplement at 1ml per 10ml of calcium supplement (redsea foundation A). Their calcium is 1ml = 2ppm per 25g. So even if assuming you have 25G of water volume, you would have only be dosing and equivalent of 10ml to 15ml of redsea calcium, which means you should be dosing 1 to 1.5ml of ABCD. By comparison - I do 2ml a week even tho I consume close to 70ppm of ca a week. I purposely do 1/2 the recommend dose bc you can have way worse problems from overdosing than underdosing.

I would also further caution dosing trace elements unless you have a way of testing for them. The ABCD dosing formula is based on calcium consumption which they approximate based on typical mixed reef. Since for your softie dominant, CA consumption isn't a good proxy for coral growth, it will be harder to approximate the actual trace element demand because of it. This is further an issue if most of your CA consumption is precipitation - this will make your risk of ODing them even higher even if you followed the correct dosage.

 

[Drew1600]

Thank you so much!! Definitely going to switch to 1.5-2mL of ABCD weekly.

Coraline has yet to start, beginning to see some spots of light pink though I believe.

I have tried everything to raise pH besides running a line outside, because I cannot. Any tips?

 

[Drew1600]

3/3/21 Update:

Adopted out the Gobies due to aggression.

Alk slowly rising (about 9 rn)

Chaeto to arrive Thursday

 

[Drew1600]

3/4/21 Update:

Chaeto arrived! After a month, the fuge is finally up and running! (Purchased from a seller on Ebay, great quality/price - 3 cups for $40)

The seller also threw in a frag of dragons breath, super nice of him & a great looking piece. Mounted on the leftmost rockface.

Did some coral rearrangement last night. Colt coral is now solo on the leftmost rock to prevent any aggression. Baby Devil's Hand is now in front of the powerhead, already so much happier.

My Eagle Eye Zoa's continue to grow and change colors. Bubble coral is starting to make a comeback (melted after acclimation during the dark days of high nitrate)

Calcium and Alk have finally reached ideal params (460 & 11.5 in my case). Hoping this will improve coral growth.

I would like to add pictures of each coral sometime in the next few weeks.

All in all, after just a month I could not be any happier with the progression of this tank. Can't wait to see what's to come.

 

[Drew1600]

3/6/21 Update:

Removed Sulfur Reactor to bring nitrates up from 0. Fuge, skimmer, and wc now prime sources of nutrient export.

I have noticed crazy growth in my hammer coral the past couple of weeks, along with new/cheap softies coloring up to neons. I'm guessing this has to do with raising the alkalinity, along with increased feeding & trace dosing. Now dosing 1 mL ABCD weekly.