Tank prep for coral

[harsha22]

Hello, Can someone please advise on this.
I have a new 35 gallon waterbox. Have 4 fishes and I am planning to add corals starting with hardy softy ones. I started prepping my tank by adding 5 ml of "All for Reef" in order to have the right CA,Mg and Alk parameters before I add the corals. Is this even needed or should I just add corals and then add the 1 part dosing?

 

[Dburr1014]

Using the Apex neptune probe.

I don't understand this thread at all.

You have no coral.
A few fish.
You are dosing already.
You are trying to keep no3 down. No mention of po4.
And you are skimmerless.

What are you trying to accomplish?
From what I gather, you are new to reefing, want to add coral but are afraid to because your not sure your water is right.

Let me/us help you.

Skimmer gets out fish poop. Will help aid the no3 stay down.

Coral uptake calcium, alkalinity and magnesium. Along with no3/po4.

If you have no coral, nothing is uptaking those things. No need to dose for something your tank is not using.

Turn on that skimmer and dial it in. Pics if you need some help with the micro bubbles.
Take out those blocks for now, you don't need it.

Ph is low; who cares? No coral, fish won't mind.

But, when you do get coral, do you have surface agitation? Can you run an air line from the skimmer to outside? Those two things will help tremendously.

Alk is high; not the best spot to be in. But again, the fish don't care.
Coral does care. What is the alk of your salt? That plays a part of how your tank runs.
Think of high alk as a steriod, coral are all hyped up and want to eat. They start building skeleton and flesh (lps/sps), but wait, they need po4/no3 to keep doing this. Oh no, your no3 is less than 2 (<2). (no mention of po4) your coral will eat that up in a few days, then what? Burnt tips. (sps) no more food.
I run at 8 alk. Slower growth but it's steady, I have the availible food for them at no3 2 and po4 0.05. I feed enough to keep them there.

I hope this will help you in some way.

Edit: soft coral don't take up anything really in cal, mag. So if that's your plan disregard this post except the don't need to be dosing part and the skimmer part.

 

[harsha22]

I don't understand this thread at all.

You have no coral.
A few fish.
You are dosing already.
You are trying to keep no3 down. No mention of po4.
And you are skimmerless.

What are you trying to accomplish?
From what I gather, you are new to reefing, want to add coral but are afraid to because your not sure your water is right.

Let me/us help you.

Skimmer gets out fish poop. Will help aid the no3 stay down.

Coral uptake calcium, alkalinity and magnesium. Along with no3/po4.

If you have no coral, nothing is uptaking those things. No need to dose for something your tank is not using.

Turn on that skimmer and dial it in. Pics if you need some help with the micro bubbles.
Take out those blocks for now, you don't need it.

Ph is low; who cares? No coral, fish won't mind.

But, when you do get coral, do you have surface agitation? Can you run an air line from the skimmer to outside? Those two things will help tremendously.

Alk is high; not the best spot to be in. But again, the fish don't care.
Coral does care. What is the alk of your salt? That plays a part of how your tank runs.
Think of high alk as a steriod, coral are all hyped up and want to eat. They start building skeleton and flesh (lps/sps), but wait, they need po4/no3 to keep doing this. Oh no, your no3 is less than 2 (<2). (no mention of po4) your coral will eat that up in a few days, then what? Burnt tips. (sps) no more food.
I run at 8 alk. Slower growth but it's steady, I have the availible food for them at no3 2 and po4 0.05. I feed enough to keep them there.

I hope this will help you in some way.

Edit: soft coral don't take up anything really in cal, mag. So if that's your plan disregard this post except the don't need to be dosing part and the skimmer part.

You are right, i was trying to prep before adding the coral but learnt my lesson now.
Added 1 each of sps, lps and a mushroom 2 days ago. Stopped dosing since posting this thread. I have no skimmer since the bio load is less but for now the no3 is steady with the blocks. Will test Phosphate once I get a kit today. Will either add skimmer or i have a UV filter which also has a pump with air intake. Will add a co2 scrubber to that line or just do a weekly water change.
Will test again in a week and see what is low and high and then repost again in this thread.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

You are right, i was trying to prep before adding the coral but learnt my lesson now.
Added 1 each of sps, lps and a mushroom 2 days ago. Stopped dosing since posting this thread. I have no skimmer since the bio load is less but for now the no3 is steady with the blocks. Will test Phosphate once I get a kit today. Will either add skimmer or i have a UV filter which also has a pump with air intake. Will add a co2 scrubber to that line or just do a weekly water change.
Will test again in a week and see what is low and high and then repost again in this thread.

Show us some pics of new coral added, my new mushroom (tiny)

 

[Tiki_Reef]

You are right, i was trying to prep before adding the coral but learnt my lesson now.
Added 1 each of sps, lps and a mushroom 2 days ago. Stopped dosing since posting this thread. I have no skimmer since the bio load is less but for now the no3 is steady with the blocks. Will test Phosphate once I get a kit today. Will either add skimmer or i have a UV filter which also has a pump with air intake. Will add a co2 scrubber to that line or just do a weekly water change.
Will test again in a week and see what is low and high and then repost again in this thread.

Run the skimmer with the CO2 scrubber, the skimmer will provide more surface area for gas exchange. As said in several other comments pH can be raised over time it took me learning about Kalk and running a airline outside to get it pegged at 8.3 enjoy the journey keep it stable and you will see results.

 

[Cali Reef Life]

I don't understand this thread at all.

You have no coral.
A few fish.
You are dosing already.
You are trying to keep no3 down. No mention of po4.
And you are skimmerless.

What are you trying to accomplish?
From what I gather, you are new to reefing, want to add coral but are afraid to because your not sure your water is right.

Let me/us help you.

Skimmer gets out fish poop. Will help aid the no3 stay down.

Coral uptake calcium, alkalinity and magnesium. Along with no3/po4.

If you have no coral, nothing is uptaking those things. No need to dose for something your tank is not using.

Turn on that skimmer and dial it in. Pics if you need some help with the micro bubbles.
Take out those blocks for now, you don't need it.

Ph is low; who cares? No coral, fish won't mind.

But, when you do get coral, do you have surface agitation? Can you run an air line from the skimmer to outside? Those two things will help tremendously.

Alk is high; not the best spot to be in. But again, the fish don't care.
Coral does care. What is the alk of your salt? That plays a part of how your tank runs.
Think of high alk as a steriod, coral are all hyped up and want to eat. They start building skeleton and flesh (lps/sps), but wait, they need po4/no3 to keep doing this. Oh no, your no3 is less than 2 (<2). (no mention of po4) your coral will eat that up in a few days, then what? Burnt tips. (sps) no more food.
I run at 8 alk. Slower growth but it's steady, I have the availible food for them at no3 2 and po4 0.05. I feed enough to keep them there.

I hope this will help you in some way.

Edit: soft coral don't take up anything really in cal, mag. So if that's your plan disregard this post except the don't need to be dosing part and the skimmer part.

I would keep it simple like the person above me said. Don't try running a marathon before you can run a mile. The difference in PH is only for very hard to keep corals colors. Just keep your system stable and unless your a gear head start simple and slowly try new things. Chasing numbers will never make you happy. Master keeping easy corals and then move up the ladder. It's way harder to tell what's wrong if you have 15 different things that could be wrong with the tank and not know which is causing it.

 

[Duncan62]

I do check with Red Sea and noticed that all parameters were in the nominal range except clacium which was slowly shooting up. Is it because there are no corals to consume these elements and I keep dosing All-for-Reef?

Yes

 

[Dburr1014]

You are right, i was trying to prep before adding the coral but learnt my lesson now.
Added 1 each of sps, lps and a mushroom 2 days ago. Stopped dosing since posting this thread. I have no skimmer since the bio load is less but for now the no3 is steady with the blocks. Will test Phosphate once I get a kit today. Will either add skimmer or i have a UV filter which also has a pump with air intake. Will add a co2 scrubber to that line or just do a weekly water change.
Will test again in a week and see what is low and high and then repost again in this thread.

As said by seasquirt, the co2 scrubber is strickly for a skimmer intake. What it does is inject air that is void of co2(for lack of a better term). Millions of bubbles added to your system.
The scrubber is not something to be added to any old pump and expect it to work.
Surface agitation and skimmer line to outside are extremely cheap and effective way to go for now and may solve your problem today.