Red Sea Reef Care Program - request help meeting their suggested parameters

[Joe Mac]

Hi Everyone!

I'm interested in implementing Red Sea's RCP for my "soon to come" 300g SPS tank. I've ordered all of the components (accept for their Reef Foundation products) but want to test the system on my 12g nano first.

My conundrum is that I cannot seem to get anywhere close to their recommended baseline parameters of Mg, Ca and Alk. I am using B-Ionic products to try to accomplish this because I've used their products for over a decade, love them and have them on hand. My first thought is that perhaps I should give Red Sea's Reef Foundation products a whirl since I can't seem to accomplish their recommended Mg, Ca and Alk levels with B-Ionic solutions... but it just doesn't make sense to me why I can't. In fact, I was planning on switching to BRS's two part solution (actually three part, of course) in order to nail these three basic parameters because they are much more economical and appear to be quite pure.

Anyway, Red Sea recommends the following for "SPS, Frags/Clams Accelerated Growth":

(with Salinity @35 ppt and temp @ 78 Degrees F)

Alkalinity: 12.6 dKH, Calcium: 465 mg/l, Magnesium 1390.

The closest that I have been able to get to this ratio using B-Ionic products has been:

Alkalinity: 11.1, Calcium 380 and Magnesium at the recommended 1390.

All of my attempts to raise either the Alk or CA beyond these levels results in precipitation and plunging numbers no matter the incrementally small values that I attempt to raise each over time. Per Red Sea's instructions, I always adjust the parameters in the following order: Mg, Alk and then CA.

This 12g reef "test tank" is a very mature (5+ years) Fluval nano with only live rock (heavily encrusted with coralline algae), shallow sand bed, a few blue legged hermit crabs, several snails and no fish at this time. One thing that may be a factor is that I'm not using a skimmer at this early stage in trying to achieve/balance these basic parameters. Would that make a difference? The Red Sea RCP does call for thorough/heavy skimming. I "assumed" that this was for the NOPOX and "Coral Colors" additives to come after establishing the baseline (Foundation) parameters. Is it necessary to skim in order to achieve 12.6 dKH Alk, 465 PPM CA and 1390 PPM Mg at the same time?

Your time, thoughts and insight are REALLY appreciated!

Joe Mac

 

[ebushrow]

I would suggest using all of their products exclusively. On the back of each of the products they have a dosing chart depending on your results from their test kits.

I do not know the formulation of what they use, but if you have a calcium reading of xxx and you have 12 gallons of water.. And you want to raise it to yyy, you use 5 ml of this product to get to yyy.

They the the guess work out of it, however, they kind of make you dependent on the products as well...and it's not cheap...especially in a 300 gal sps tank. I spoke with the Red Sea guys at MACNA, and they walked me through it....really cool concept.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

You will be able to get the alkalinity, calcium, and magnesium at the right levels using B-ionic and B-ionic magnesium (or similar additives), unless they are already too high.

IMO, the Red Sea recommendations are not necessarily optimal (the alk seems higher than "necessary", for example), but we can leave that for a different discussion. In any case, don't obsess over small differences in either calcium or magnesium as they seem to not matter all that much as long as they are adequately high.

Can you tell us what the current parameters are in that tank?

Then we'll use this calculator to help guide the dosing of anything that is needed. We would dose each of the three additives independently for this purpose. We will not (and generally cannot) stick to equal parts dosing of the two part to make these sorts of corrections, especially to calcium).

http://reef.diesyst.com/chemcalc/chem_calc3.html

 

[Joe Mac]

ebushrow and Randy,
Thank you both so much for your quick replies. I was thinking that using all Red Sea products may be the "easiest" solution b/c they do link/relate the correct amounts of their dosing products to the uptake rates of the easier to measure ones (Ca/Alk) which I agree is a pretty cool idea , especially for chemistry layman like myself. However, it's great to know that I should easily be able to approximate their suggest parameters of Ca, Alk and Mg using other two part products such as available from BRS since they are much more affordable.

It's awesome that you have faith in the relative accuracy of JDieks' Reef Chemistry Calculator, because I have found his and BRS's calculators to be quite disparate and didn't know which one to depend on. I decided to use BRS's b/c I figured that it was newer... however, those large discrepancies in their recommended dosages may be my underlying problem... I will stick to JDieks' for the time being since I am using B-Ionic additives for the time being. I have a feeling that their calculator is much more accurate if you use their products and will compare the results from each if I go that route.

Anyway, here are my current measurements:

Mg = 1400 ppm (Red Sea Test Kit)
Alk = 10.65 dKH (average between Hanna Checker and Red Sea, 10.7 and 10.6, respectively)
Ca = 360 ppm (average between Red Sea and Salifert at 350 and 370, respectively)
PO4 = 7 ppb per Hanna ULR (Salifert zero)
pH = 7.88 (average between Etekcity pH Pen and API, 7.96 and 7.8, respectively)
Strontium = 10ppm per Salifert
Temp = 78 degrees F

It seems that I have been dueling between CA and ALK levels for the most part, with CA mostly losing that battle. However, like I mentioned, I have been using the BRS calculations, which were much higher dosing suggestions than those given by JDieks, so perhaps that is my main issue.

My Alk is "almost there" and probably high enough as you (Randy) probably concur with. As I am sure that you are aware, Red Sea believes that the super high levels that they recommend helps corals to expend far less energy to incorporate them, thereby enhancing growth. I certainly don't know the veracity of those statements, but I would certainly like to give it a try if it won't do any harm and I can get them that high.

My CA level is by far the worst and my pH is certainly sub-optimal.

Although Red Sea recommends that adjustments be made in the following order (Mg first, then Alk and last Ca), should I concentrate on raising the Ca first since the Mg is almost spot on and the Alk is certainly "OK" or go ahead and work on the Alk next using JDieks' calculator recommendations and then the Calcium? At this point, I would be thrilled to "get there from here" on each of the three just to prove to myself that I can, LOL!

BTW, I did look into using the Zeovit system, but I don't think that I have the gray matter (or the time for all of the required constant/consistent testing) to successfully implement it.

Thanks again guys!

Best,

Joe Mac

P.S.- Ha! I just read JDieks' "thank you" to you (Randy) at the bottom of his calculator page... wish I would have read that earlier, then I would have known that it was awesomesauce!

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

ebushrow and Randy,
Thank you both so much for your quick replies. I was thinking that using all Red Sea products may be the "easiest" solution b/c they do link/relate the correct amounts of their dosing products to the uptake rates of the easier to measure ones (Ca/Alk) which I agree is a pretty cool idea , especially for chemistry layman like myself.

FWIW, all two part systems do that. THat is the benefit of them relative to independent dosing. For example, my DIY two part keeps all of calcium, alkalinity, magnesium, sulfate, and chloride in the correct proportions.

The Dieck calculator is certainly accurate since it is simply chemistry math. There's nothing uncertain that could be involved except for your inputs, such as water volume or selecting the right product to enter (and gallons vs liters, dKH vs meq/L, etc). BRS is likely the same, although I've not reviewed it.

So it looks like all you need to dose at the moment is a big slug of calcium supplement.

What supplement do you want to use for that?

pH is NOT something you can add supplements to adjust. But there are other ways to go at that.

 

[biom]

Yes, don't chase for high numbers, there are no advantages (no matter what they say). In my current tank param are following Alk 7, Ca 390-400, Mg 1225, K 390, and corals (mainly Acropora), showing beautiful colors and growing really fast. Just to have room for testing inaccuracy and mistakes it is good to keep parameters a little bit higher let say Alk 7-9, Ca 390-440.