Up Water Change Amount

[Nick Rose]

I have a 60 gallon system (40 gallon Tank, 20 gallon sump). My candy cane, and acans have been receding, which for my Candy cane its the second time. The first time it happened I did a iodide dip to see if it would help and it did but only lasted maybe a month. Anyway then my frogspawns was starting to recede so I decided to do a large water change of 25 gallons so around 42% yesterday(July26th). Today all the corals are perked up. A side note I did have a Green Birdsnest frag die because I had ALK at 9 but didn't realize I didn't have enough nutrients in the system.

Anyway normally I'm doing a 4 gallon/6.7% WC once a week which is 16 gallons/26.7% a month. So with the results I got from yesterdays WC, should I be doing a 6gallon/10% WC a week.

Tank Water before WC: 1.026, 425Ca, 1380Mag, 7.15Alk, NO3 1, PO4 0-.03
Tank Water after WC : 1.026, 430Ca, 1370Mag, 7.1Alk, didn't test NO3/PO4

 

[GThompson]

I think most everyone that does regular water changes usually do about 10% a week. You seem to get pretty good results that way

 

[Ike]

Since you're having problems I'd do a couple consecutive 25% changes... Just make sure it's mixed well and that the salinity is really close. Are you dosing anything? No carbon or nitrogen dosing?

 

[Nick Rose]

If I were to do that how far a part should they be?

 

[Ike]

If I were to do that how far a part should they be?

Few days to a week...

 

[Nick Rose]

Since you're having problems I'd do a couple consecutive 25% changes... Just make sure it's mixed well and that the salinity is really close. Are you dosing anything? No carbon or nitrogen dosing?

Forgot to answer your other part. I only dose Ca&Alk. No carbon no nitrogen dosing no GFO. Its a bare bone setup. It has a AquaC EV 180 skimmer, two AI Vegas, Icecap 1k Gyre. I only use a sock when doing water changes. I have 6 fish.

 

[Ike]

Forgot to answer your other part. I only dose Ca&Alk. No carbon no nitrogen dosing no GFO. Its a bare bone setup. It has a AquaC EV 180 skimmer, two AI Vegas, Icecap 1k Gyre. I only use a sock when doing water changes. I have 6 fish.

I'd start feeding a little more flake food daily as well. Worst case you get a little more algae and the fish are fatter...

 

[Nick Rose]

I actually bought Formula 1 Pellets last Saturday. They didn't have flakes. I grinneded up the pellets so they float in the water longer. Before the pellets I was feeding a cube of brine shrimp in the morning and another at night. So now I'm also adding some of the crushed pellets during those feedings and in the middle of the day. Today I was looking at DIY fish food on here and watching BRS's DIY Food from February. My dad use to make his own fish food but stopped a long time ago.

 

[roberthu526]

I do at least 10% every week. I used to be lazy on water changes and my corals did fine short term but after a year or so things started going down hill. Now I do regular water changes everything is just happy much longer. Hopefully forever lol

 

[EW_Fish]

10%-15% Weekly, once the system is stable you can relax to bi-weekly. I had gotten to the point where it was every other month then I broke that system down.

 

[Nick Rose]

I did a 25% WC yesterday and things look even happier. I wont do another 25%. I'll just get back to the normal WC schedule of Saturday but up the amount to the 10%. Does anyone do a 50% or larger WC once a year?

 

[brandon429]

here's the harshest water change on the whole site or any other site at least in recent years


take a 13 yr old nano reef doing fine (this is preventative maintenance occasionally, you can see it perks up corals nice find)


drain entire reef empty.

wait 33 mins with corals ranging 16 yrs old - 10 yrs old (some from a prior reef) all hanging in cold winter air, seemingly dried when refilled.

refill

film/update in 12 hours.

# of times this system has had 100%-500% (5x in one sitting) flushing water changes= hundreds I cannot count them, just barely started filming. you can do water changes to the degree your fish permit, the corals tolerate extremes just fine unless you have an ultra rare sps system, most sps tolerate the action above I have 3x strains of monti jerky in there ha, good strains like red w blue polyps, all yellow and all blueberry pie monti all are fine with long air contact.

-live rock does not recycle with minor air contact

-nothing recycles, reefs do this in nature commonly they're adapted. nobody says you have to wait 30 mins to refill, that was for effect~ and demo that bac are strong, not weak. they don't die from a minor air drain. the system continues on....


12 hours later


I have the kinds of corals you have. they're not frags, they're whole colonies because corals like this kind of treatment/ what they hate is hands off starving where people feed less so they don't pollute. I feed heavy, pollute, then evacuate occasionally.