Trouble shooting STL

[coralseas]

Well I have a thread going over in general sps.

To sum it up. I have a base recession going on 19 colonies at this moment. It’s crazy. I have rigorously been testing my parameters.
Second guessing my test kits so I bought more test kits. Bought a icp test and still having issues

Red Sea test kits
Alk 11.6
Cal 470
Mag 1700
NO3 5
P03 .06
K 380
I .06
FE .10

Salifert
Alk 13.1
Cal 510
Mag 1620

These where done the day of the icp test

Here are the test results

Dose this look ok?

I normally run a bit lower but corals have not bin talking as much as normal and I am trying to run it in for lower intake

Here a pic of the tank

 

[Luno]

Generally as I'm sure you know RTN is usually swinging alk or temp. And there actually is unknown causes out there that's the big thing. Some causes we just don't know.

Just at a quick glance how long has your alk been that high? I don't like high alk as a personal preference

 

[briancarterkc]

Your alkalinity is really high, especially if the salifert test is the correct one. Is it always this high or is this a recent spike? I would work to bring your alk down to 9-10.

 

[coralseas]

I normally run it about 10-10.5 on Red Sea tests

But it has bin steady, just slowly up . I unplugged my reactor for a day and it’s bin running at 11 for a couple days. I have reduced my bubble count so it slowly drops

Mag is high but don’t know if that would affect it much but Red Sea mag test if way off. And salifert it 125 differ than the icp test...?

 

[Dennis Cartier]

Have you tested your salinity? When I see the big 3 all elevated, it makes me wonder if your salinity is also elevated.

Dennis

 

[coralseas]

Have you tested your salinity? When I see the big 3 all elevated, it makes me wonder if your salinity is also elevated.

Dennis

I keep it right at 35ppt. That was one of the things they troubleshooting, I recalibrated my roof rack to meter. It is spot on.

I use reef crystals, I know it’s values are high. I was going you do a water change with IO this weekend and try to bring things down just a tad with that.

Also I removed the gyre pump I had and put in the pump I had previously. But I don’t think it’s a flow issue.. i’m just doing everything I can to try to get things to stabilize.

Does anyone see anything wrong with the values off my ICP test?

 

[Dennis Cartier]

Your Sodium looks like it is varying on your ICP. Your reading is elevated by about 20% over the highest comparison location (Triton recommends 10,700). Your Mg and Ca are also elevated, but those do not usually cause problems at the levels you have.

Also you iodine level is about half what is typically dosed for (0.06). Iodine is a controversial element. Randy suggests dosing it is not needed, but many of the old pros swear by it. Base recession is one of the symptoms mentioned of too little iodine (from those that swear by it). I can't find the thread right now, but was able to find a mention of it on R2R (https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/what-do-you-use-for-iodine-dosing.338872/page-2#post-4218012) . Also all the additive systems include iodine as one of the elements that they supplement. It is also not very easy to test accurately for, so dosing it externally to a pre-made additive system can be a challenge. As an example, my recent Triton results showed 176 ug/L where I was shooting for the recommended 60 ug/L (0.06).

Update: I just looked at your original post, and your I is showing 0.06 from your Red Sea test. I would normally trust ICP over a test kit, except your ICP is showing 0.03, but also shows 0.03 for all the comparison locations. That leads me to believe this ICP vendor is not showing accurate iodine. The accepted NSW value for this is 0.06.

Dennis

 

[sghera64]

Well I have a thread going over in general sps.

To sum it up. I have a base recession going on 19 colonies at this moment. It’s crazy. I have rigorously been testing my parameters.
Second guessing my test kits so I bought more test kits. Bought a icp test and still having issues

Red Sea test kits
Alk 11.6
Cal 470
Mag 1700
NO3 5
P03 .06
K 380
I .06
FE .10

Salifert
Alk 13.1
Cal 510
Mag 1620

These where done the day of the icp test

Here are the test results

Dose this look ok?

I normally run a bit lower but corals have not bin talking as much as normal and I am trying to run it in for lower intake

Here a pic of the tank

Sounds like you have LED lighting only.

Tell us more about what you see:
Are all SPS experiencing this?
If not, what is unique about the ones not experiencing it (thin branches, young)?
How are other inverts doing?
Did you change lighting in the past 12 months?
Have you seen changes in coralline algae growth?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I don't see any obvious problem from the ICP, but I'd have to say that this company isn't my favorite for ICP either.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I agree the salinity looks very high from the cations (Na, Ca, K, Mg), and not very high from the anions (Cl, S), which means there's likely a test error. They must balance (counting all ions, but these others will not likely make up that difference) I'm not sure how to interpret it.

 

[coralseas]

Sounds like you have LED lighting only.

Tell us more about what you see:
Are all SPS experiencing this?
If not, what is unique about the ones not experiencing it (thin branches, young)?
How are other inverts doing?
Did you change lighting in the past 12 months?
Have you seen changes in coralline algae growth?

Same lighting for the past year, all Invertebrates are doing well. Most of the larger colonies that are having recession or over a year and a half in tank. Have not made any real changes in my sump. I’ll post some pictures of the recession as of a few days ago. Which has gotten worse.

Coralline algae has been lightening in the past few weeks. I replaced my florescence bulbs a couple weeks ago but but dang on a different fixture for 48 hours to break them in. But I was having reception issues before I replace the bulbs