Struggle with Balance and Unhappy Corals

[BradVol]

My tank is a RS Reefer 170 and is 4 months old.

Target parameters:
Salinity: 34
Temp: 78
Alk: 11
Ca: 450
Mg: 1400
Nitrate: 5-10
Phosphate: 0.02-0.03

Stocking:
2 clowns
Banggai Cardinal
Purple firefish
6 blue leg hermits
4 banded trochus snails
3 small nassarius snails
2 cerith snails
1 emerald crab
12 small frags - 4 softies, 6 LPS, 2 of the easier SPS

Feeding:
feed fish once per day in the AM
feed corals twice weekly with target/broadcast feeding

Equipment:
Simmer runs 16 hours a day - skimmate is either very wet or it will hardly skim at all
UV sterilizer
Chaeto reactor with almost no chaeto in it
Hydra 26 on a ramp to full SPS level that won't end until mid August
MP 10 at 80% on reefcrest random
Carbon and GFO in a reactor that has been offline for the last 2 months
Bag of carbon and filter floss in a cup in the sump

Dosing:
Dosing into return chamber of sump. Not sure where else to do it.
Alk - Red Sea powder - 1.36 dKH daily - 60ml daily spread over 12 dosings, 2 hours apart
Ca - Red Sea liquid - 16 ppm daily - 12 ml daily spread over 6 dosings, 4 hours apart, 30 min after Alk on nearest dose
Mg - dose manually every 2 weeks or so
Wall of the return chamber has some precipitate on it. Small clumps show up in the sandbed occasionally.

Parameters last night:
Salinity: 34.75 - refractometer
pH - 7.77 - 8.00 - Apex
Temp: 78 - Apex
Alk: 8.9 - Hanna (checked with Red Sea, which reads 0.35 above Hanna)
Ca: 495 - Red Sea
Mg: 1350, dosing back to 1400 over 3 days - Salifert
Nitrate: 5 - Api
Phosphate: 0.00 - Hanna ULR

Symptoms:
Bowerbanki started deflating yesterday, first time it's happened
Acan had 3 of 4 polyps bailout over last week and a half
First SPS, birdsnest and stylo, took a rapid turn for the worse about 2 weeks ago, about a week after I got them. Alk changed about 1dKH the day it happened.
Chaeto reactor has very small amount in it, which was starting to grow well. Yesterday it turned quite light like it had when it wasn't getting enough light.

Parameter changes:
- I'd slowly raised Alk to 10.9 and then over one day early this week it went from 10.9 to 9.2. I refilled the container, since it wasn't empty but was close to the end of the tube. I also slightly increased dosing and it stayed steady for 3 days and then fell from 9.2 to 8.9.
- Ca had been very steady with dosing and rose from 450 to 495 over a week while only dosing 16ppm per day
- Mg got down to 1350, and I'm sure a water change had as much to do with that as consumption
- Phosphate has been 0.01 the last month or so. Then went to 0.00 on the Hanna for the first time last night. Nitrates have been at 5 for 2 months.

I've been fighting cyano for the last month. I blast it off with a turkey baster and it returns after a bit. I didn't change my water for 3-4 weeks because the nutrients stayed so low, but did a 10% WC last week and was going to start doing 5-10% weekly to see if that would help with the Cyano. No chemicals or anything.

Long story short, it's been very difficult to get dosing dialed in. I seem to have two problems - something causing the corals to look bad and not being able to keep things steady. Every time it seems consistent, a big change will pop up unexpectedly. And now things are starting to look worse. I'm curious if the phosphate/nutrients being low is part of the problem. The other question is precipitation, which was a problem previously, but I've cut dosing way way back and had that under control for a while.

I guess I'm looking for input on my dosing issues, nutrient levels and if that's my problem, or if there's something else I don't see that is causing me issues. I tried to put down everything I could think of here. Thanks in advance for any input you might have.

 

[Texas Rick]

Noticed you missed Ammonia. I think you tank is too new for any sps or LPS. But that’s just me. I may be wrong. Someone in here may have a better answer

 

[BradVol]

Noticed you missed Ammonia. I think you tank is too new for any sps or LPS. But that’s just me. I may be wrong. Someone in here may have a better answer

Ammonia and Nitrite have been 0 since my fishless cycle ended. Forgot to mention that.

 

[Dan_P]

Noticed you missed Ammonia. I think you tank is too new for any sps or LPS. But that’s just me. I may be wrong. Someone in here may have a better answer

I had the same thought, too many things introduced into a new system.

 

[WIReefer]

I would suggest on investing in a ATO really helps keep everything stable.

 

[BradVol]

I would suggest on investing in a ATO really helps keep everything stable.

I have a Tunze Osmolator ATO. Works great.

 

[Texas Rick]

I have a Tunze Osmolator ATO. Works great.

Yes, I have a Tunze osmolator 3155 as well. Don’t go with the nano one. Heard they have lots of issues

 

[blasterman]

The rapid dKH drops are the smoking gun.

You've got young tank syndrome and seeing nuisance blooms, cyano being part of the mix. When dKH just drops for no reason 99% of the time it's because algae or bacteria are gobbling it up.

Cyano and the other young tank nuisance blooms arent the direct problem. What happens is they also gobble up phosphate and other trace nutrients which stresses corals. Phosphate levels that's bouncing around is worse than high phosphate. Water changes then make the problem worse.

They way to fix this loop is get the nuisance blooms out of the way ASAP.

 

[GoVols]

Brad,
The process from converting ammonia to nitrites then to nitrates can drag down alk, but I'd make sure that your dosing pump is holding it's calibration day in and day out.

also don't dose alk, cal, and mag at the same time, which can cause precipitation.

With your phosphates and nitrates being that low, no worries on growing chaeto, it would suck up more nutrients.

FWIW:
I'd shoot for an alk at about 8 - 8.5 with those lower nutrient levels.

You can also buy NeoPhos to help lift up your phosphates.

Once you get your phosphates and nitrates to stable out (which takes a while) you will be very happy and the uglies will fade away.

It takes a fairly new reef, and that reefer to really get into a stable rhythm.

 

[SPR1968]

Hi Brad, I agree with @GoVols Freddie I would lower the alkalinity to around 8-8.5 and then keep it there as some corals don’t like the raised alkalinity

As far as SPS corals you can add them from day one in any new system. BUT the water parameters must be stable.

I think the myth about not adding them to a new tank is because many people are learning and of course have stability issues, so the SPS don’t make it. By 12 months or so, they may have learned how to keep it stable so.... I have SPS in a brand new system and they grow like weeds, because the water parameters are correct and stable.

Your current parameters looks fine (calcium a little high), and if my Hanna says 0 phosphate I’m delighted it means I don’t have to change the 1 litre of rowaphos yet to keep it there.

On the dosing, test on day 1 and then don’t add anything for 4 days, test again. Then divide the difference by 4 and that’s the daily usage of each element. Then immediately add enough of each element to bring the levels back to were you want them for alkalinity calcium and magnesium (or not if there raised)

Then turn the doser on to add the daily amount. After 7 day’s test again and then just adjust the amount doses up or down. After a few weeks it will just need minor adjustments and that’s it.

My big tank has a calcium reactor but the S650 is normal dosing and that’s what I do on that system. Just minor adjustments were needed.

On the lights, turn them up and don’t bother with ramping you don’t need it. Just put any new corals at the bottom of the tank to acclimatise for a week and then to there final home. For any existing corals in the system maybe turn to final power settings over the next 10 days or so if you want to be careful. If it were my tank I’d do it straight away, but Im being a little more cautious with the advice!

Watch out for reds and greens as Red sea believe they can cause algae issues. Heres what I’ve always used in the S650 other than going blue at 7pm