Stupid mistake and now trying fix....

OceanDiver · Apr 12, 2020

So everything was growing fine And water stable. I had a little bit bleaching do to low phosphate and nitrate. Starting doing NeoNtrio and stopped GFO. That was a few months ago. And everything was great. Stable water condition.

a few months goes by and i decide to rent a PAR meter and my PAR around the middle of the tank was 250-285 depending where you were and 700-750 at the water surface. My local fish store said i should raise my intensity and of course I listened and raised intensity from 60 to 70 over a few weeks on my radions (I am running the AB+ spectrum/program).

and now I have burnt tips and algae growing on my SPS tips. I read a few posts on here and started clipping off the tips but I feel like every few days i need to clip more. Also, since this issue started, I switched back to my original lighting schedule as well over 10 days or so. So the intensity is now 58-60.

here are my parameters;

CAL - 431
ALK - 8.03 to 8.06
MAG - 1325
PO4 - .01 to .02
NO3 - 5 to 6
SALT - 34.6 to 35
TMP - 78

Testing by Trident, Hanna, and Salifert.

is there something I am missing or something i need do or try?

I lost two small frag but I am more worried about my larger pieces.

tha is for the help in advance

Neoalchemist · Apr 12, 2020

For now keep everything stable and keep the tank fed.
Raising your lights up higher would, I think, increase your spread and par on the edges at the cost of a bit of par in the hot spots but it seems your hot spots have plenty of par to share.

homer1475 · Apr 12, 2020

You have plenty of par the way your lights were.

Wondering why your LFS wanted you to bump them up?

OceanDiver · Apr 12, 2020

I know right.... slightly ticked. But It’s my own fault. I have keeping reef tanks for 15 years or so. But this is my first run at SPS and after 6 months I was doing great. I know better. Usually I run a question by this group or research before I do anything drastic.

so should I keep cutting back or should maintain and tank and see how it goes.

i am still great polyp extension. After our easter egg hunt I’ll post a pic

OceanDiver · Apr 12, 2020

I am using the RMS mounts for the radion. I don’t think there is a way for me to raise them unless I change my mounting system. I could potentially do that but I don’t think another change with lighting would be good right now

Cuong · Apr 12, 2020

most sps guys raise their lights to above 10". It gives a more even/forgiving spread. I'm at 14" with about 250 par at the top of my acros

Phildago · Apr 12, 2020

I wouldn't clip anything. I read those posts too and lost large portions of colonies that I kept clipping away at. Yet on the tips that I didn't clip the tissue loss never progressed.

Stop clipping and just go back to what you had the lights at.

PSU4ME · Apr 12, 2020

I’d try to keep things stable and just let it recover. I’ll be honest, most lfs around me don’t know anything about sps. They buy, sell and help people start up tanks. Past that I see them on forums asking the same questions as everyone else. Now there are some studs out there that know next level stuff but each of them will say it was learned and is specific to their tank. For me it’s research, pick an approach and fine tune it!