The Mystery I can't figure out!

[P3FE]

What two part are you using? And are the corals growing just not good color? If you use randy's two part its good to add some strontium on top of that. I dont know that this would affect color but is important for skeleton.

I agree with trying aminos and more flow, can't hurt. How long have the corals been in your system? If they've been moved within the last 6 months or so, might just be adapting...

I'm using BRS two part, growth and polyp extension is there, color is not. They have been there for over a year now.

 

[P3FE]

I agree p04 is low, I get my best colors above .05 and target .08 to .1

If you are running gfo I would take off line, your water is stripped. I also run my Nitrates no less than 5.

That's my next move, going to stop the GFO and see what happens

 

[Touring]

I'm running Radions in my tank, and they are set to the 14,000 setting for four hours of the day. I don't think lighting is an issue.

Wait a sec..... You think LEDs can replace a mh bulb? Not trying to beat a dead horse. Might be your lights.

 

[Diesel]

It's a combination from a few things but nothing major.
PO4 and ALK, if you run a ULNS your ALK need to be close to 8 or under.
Slowly reduce your ALK dosing and feed your fish a bit more, it won't hurt to feed you corals too.
Not sure if you dose MAG as ALK/CAL only be effective if there's enough MAG in the water, I noticed yours is close to 1400.
Mag should be good to go but keep an eye out on this.
You can also set your skimmer on a timer to start with 4 hour period OFF, to see if that will help to raise your PO4 if you don't want to change your feeding schedule.
Ease off on your GFO, sometimes just have it in a filter bag hanging in a high flow area in your sump will do the trick.
While all doing this test for ALK and PO4 on a daily schedule, preferred everyday at the same time.
What's your PH schedule for a 24hr period?
Mine is from about 9:30am the lowest (7.89) and high at 7pm (8.18).
Lights is a complete different topic, only reason to find out if that can be a issue is to do a PAR test.
Post us some pics too from your tank and corals.
Good luck!

 

[rovster]

My first question is where did you get your sps from? Are they proven aquacultured or LFS Mari an wild specials? If the latter, this may be a losing battle. Not saying it can't be done but the cards are stacked against you. If these are aquacultured, maybe try upping the feeding and possibly reducing the intensity of your lights a bit.

 

[Harold Green]

If your water quality is as good as the tests show and your temperature is right along with good flow, I mean almost excessive then I would narrow down the issue to lighting. I was running about 500 watts of leds on my 210 g and getting little growth or color. Raised the wattage to around a thousand and cut back the white to about 20% and coral growth and color started to improve rapidly. I'm a believer in led's but I think they require a lot of adjusting to find the best color and intensity to suit your tank conditions. I also feed green water along with a bit of filter feeding foods daily and corals remain open most of the day. Good luck in getting your corals to color up.

 

[Ike]

Yeah, it's most likely low PO4, an essential for life... Feed more and more often, and do so for an extended period of time. Low nitrogen may be a factor as well and in that case feeding more will help, but adding more fish and feeding more will be more effective there,

 

[Triggreef]

Po4

Undetectable

I should have been more specific. The lack of po4 is your problem. Your starving your corals. I also agree with others that the alk should be lower in the 8 range but thats a matter of personal preference and I don't think that will affect your colors. Stability is more important than anything else.

 

[jt17]

Probably the cleanest triton test I've seen. I agree with the others to take GFO offline and let phosphates slowly creep up to .05-.08 and feed more. I noticed that some of the minor elements are absent also. Z, Mn, Ni, and I are all at 0 and Mo is low. Have you done the correction doses on these. Most likely it's the low phosphates but sometimes 1 element can be the limiting factor.

 

[P3FE]

Wait a sec..... You think LEDs can replace a mh bulb? Not trying to beat a dead horse. Might be your lights.

No, I think every light has its own benefit. I like LEDs and I get plenty of PAR in my tank, the reason why i dont think is my lights is because I try to raise the intensity 5% and within 24 hours the tips of my acros started to bleach.

 

[P3FE]

It's a combination from a few things but nothing major.
PO4 and ALK, if you run a ULNS your ALK need to be close to 8 or under.
Slowly reduce your ALK dosing and feed your fish a bit more, it won't hurt to feed you corals too.
Not sure if you dose MAG as ALK/CAL only be effective if there's enough MAG in the water, I noticed yours is close to 1400.
Mag should be good to go but keep an eye out on this.
You can also set your skimmer on a timer to start with 4 hour period OFF, to see if that will help to raise your PO4 if you don't want to change your feeding schedule.
Ease off on your GFO, sometimes just have it in a filter bag hanging in a high flow area in your sump will do the trick.
While all doing this test for ALK and PO4 on a daily schedule, preferred everyday at the same time.
What's your PH schedule for a 24hr period?
Mine is from about 9:30am the lowest (7.89) and high at 7pm (8.18).
Lights is a complete different topic, only reason to find out if that can be a issue is to do a PAR test.
Post us some pics too from your tank and corals.
Good luck!

Thanks for the tips, I stopped dosing ALK to get it around that 8 number, test every day and its going down about .1 every day, so it probably take a couple of weeks to get down there. I stooped using GFO sunday and Im testing for PO4 every day, so far still at 0. My PH stays around 7.91 during the day and drops to around 7.79 at night. Im going to wait and see what the ALK and GFO changes do for a couple of weeks before trying anything else. I will post some pics as soon as i get home.

 

[P3FE]

My first question is where did you get your sps from? Are they proven aquacultured or LFS Mari an wild specials? If the latter, this may be a losing battle. Not saying it can't be done but the cards are stacked against you. If these are aquacultured, maybe try upping the feeding and possibly reducing the intensity of your lights a bit.

I only buy aquaculture frags from proven vendors. Nothing against mariculture or wild specimens, but i try to set myself for success all the time.

 

[P3FE]

Probably the cleanest triton test I've seen. I agree with the others to take GFO offline and let phosphates slowly creep up to .05-.08 and feed more. I noticed that some of the minor elements are absent also. Z, Mn, Ni, and I are all at 0 and Mo is low. Have you done the correction doses on these. Most likely it's the low phosphates but sometimes 1 element can be the limiting factor.

Havent done any elemets corrections. Started with raising PO4 and Lowering Alk and see what happens.

 

[spotlessaqua]

Ok, I by no means do not know of this is an answer to your problems. But you might try this. Dose amino acids, sometimes it will make acros turn fuzzy. And maybe try knocking flow up a bit. I have a 78 gal. Half circle. I run two mp10s at a 100% and coralvue gyre at 60 percent. And who knows if this will help, but everytime I have and acro that seems off, if I increase flow to him, he will get happy. Do you dose mag? Acros eat up mag. Like crazy. I dose 50ml daily. And it could be that you are doing nothing wrong, but at some point you ****** them off unknowingly, and it is just taking a longtime for them to get happy. I had a similar problem to yours, and after sometime, they got happy again. Just do not do anything fast. Experiment slowly.

I agree with the amino acids addition I started using my own cold pressed seed oils to dose amino and omega 3&4 I found after 4 months carbohydrates were the next thing I was lacking and the experiment continues

 

[Diesel]

Thanks for the tips, I stopped dosing ALK to get it around that 8 number, test every day and its going down about .1 every day, so it probably take a couple of weeks to get down there. I stooped using GFO sunday and Im testing for PO4 every day, so far still at 0. My PH stays around 7.91 during the day and drops to around 7.79 at night. Im going to wait and see what the ALK and GFO changes do for a couple of weeks before trying anything else. I will post some pics as soon as i get home.

Great, don't skip a day of testing as you never know, it's dropping now only .1 but sometimes be surprised.
I'm not a fan on chasing # on the PH but I recommend to get it at least over 8.0 during the day. This may also contribute to your color loss cause of the lack of stability and less PE for food and elements consumption.
What are your # on ALK-CAL-MAG and PH on your new salt water before you do a WC?
As I said it can be few things that you need to correct but go slow on this as only BAD things happens fast in this hobby.
AA is not a bad thing to start dosing but do it moderate in the beginning, as in just dose 50% of the recommended dose or even less.

 

[spotlessaqua]

I ran a 60 gal. Broad range coral experiment with lots of light 300watts hqi 130watts pc and couple blue led! I ran the Red Sea coral color program on pieces I had already healthy and established in another system did great

 

[P3FE]

Great, don't skip a day of testing as you never know, it's dropping now only .1 but sometimes be surprised.
I'm not a fan on chasing # on the PH but I recommend to get it at least over 8.0 during the day. This may also contribute to your color loss cause of the lack of stability and less PE for food and elements consumption.
What are your # on ALK-CAL-MAG and PH on your new salt water before you do a WC?
As I said it can be few things that you need to correct but go slow on this as only BAD things happens fast in this hobby.
AA is not a bad thing to start dosing but do it moderate in the beginning, as in just dose 50% of the recommended dose or even less.

I use CoralSeaPro, i tested my last batch sunday and the numbers are 12.4ALK 460CAL 1400MAG. Didnt test PH. I also test the water before and after water change and even know the ALK is high on the new water it only raises my ALK .1. I keep a log of all my testing, I like looking back and look for any significant changes, my levels stay pretty stable, and like you said I dont like to chase numbers either, i keep them within a range and they dont change much, hopefully the answer is on the PO4.

 

[WetWhistle]

Not trying to cause an argument here but actually yes LED can replace a MH bulb. There are plenty of successful thriving reef tanks with SPS that run LED. I have run MH for over 20+ years and I now run LED on my DT. I have just as good color and growth as I did with MH for SPS. For a fraction of the wattage. Sorry but MH is NOT the only lights that can grow and color sps and lighting is not the only factor in influencing coral color and growth. Don't get me wrong I love MH but each light has its own benefits and negatives. The light bulb war of what is best has been going on for years.

Like people mentioned I would let your PO4 raise up a little and spot feed more. Since the tips bleached when you turned up the lights a little I would lean towards to low of nutrients. If you adjust and it still doesn't do anything look at the light spectrum.

 

[P3FE]

 

[P3FE]

Not trying to cause an argument here but actually yes LED can replace a MH bulb. There are plenty of successful thriving reef tanks with SPS that run LED. I have run MH for over 20+ years and I now run LED on my DT. I have just as good color and growth as I did with MH for SPS. For a fraction of the wattage. Sorry but MH is NOT the only lights that can grow and color sps and lighting is not the only factor in influencing coral color and growth. Don't get me wrong I love MH but each light has its own benefits and negatives. The light bulb war of what is best has been going on for years.

Like people mentioned I would let your PO4 raise up a little and spot feed more. Since the tips bleached when you turned up the lights a little I would lean towards to low of nutrients. If you adjust and it still doesn't do anything look at the light spectrum.

Do you think that changing spectrum from 20k to 14k to 20k through the day has something to do with it?