Water quality talk

[Sexytang]

Ok so I’ve been in the hobby over 6 months now I have a 36g bowfront which is thrivin. Over the 6 months I’ve made lots of rookie mistakes and still learning. Over this time I have picked up a lot of corals loads of money
The question is over the 6 months I’ve did 5 gallon water changes every week. But the past two water changes have been more like 2 weeks apart and the corals seem to be doing fine. Im not going to lie I never check my water all my corals seem to do great so had no need. I’m not running any protein skimmer or anything
Equipment
HIPARGERO LED Aquarium Light – Aquarium LED Lights 30W Saltwater Lighting with Touch Control and 3W Cree Chips for Coral Reef Fish Nano Tank
Small hob filter (pillow stuffing and media and bag of carbon) and
Aquaon Heater
Koralia 565 I think
Small water pump on other side
Dose reef roids every few days
Coral list all have grow and slip good
Frogspawn
Purple hammer
Pulsing Xenia
Green trumpet
Toadstool (new)
Devils hand (new)
Green giant Yuma
Orange giant Yuma
Red bullseye
Duncan
Red cap (new)
Green star polyps (matalic and long stem)
Rose bubble tip anemone
One small purple normal mushroom (new)
Purple torch

Temp stays around 80
Salt 1.24/1.25
Fish
Yellow tang
Maroon clown (hosts anemone)
Fire scallop
Feed brime shrimp and nori

 

[Sexytang]

 

[road_runner]

Careful some nutrients accumulate and creep to suddenly hit and you get a tank crash or mini cycle.
It is not a good thing not to test your water parameters. At least once a month you need to test major parameters like salinity, kh, no3 and po4.
Good luck.

 

[Sexytang]

Should I do wc 5 gal a week

 

[road_runner]

Should I do wc 5 gal a week

You see that's what am trying to tell you. It's not a fixed formula.
10% to 20% weekly
Or 20 to 25% bi weekly is common. I do the latter.
But, some times you might need to do bigger water change if you have an issue you are trying to correct like nutrient spik.
Also, at some point water change alone might not be enough to replenish all elements like alk and ca. Hence you need to test so you know where your system stand.
Indeed you can depend on how corals look to decide if you have an issue or not, but I do not like this method to be the sole thing, some times by the time coral show stress signs, it's too late to correcr.
Moral of the story, I recommend you test at least once or twice a month. If you end up going more sensitive coral. You will need to test more frequent than once a month.

 

[ZoWhat]

I've been reefing for 15yrs. A multitude of problems are avoided if you test for 4 items at least twice a month:

Calc
Alk
Mag
Salinity (at least once a week using refractometer)

If you keep those in-range by dosing a low range element...you'll dodge 95% of problems

I ONLY chase down NO3 & PO4 #s if I see excess algae come on more than normal glass film algae

.

 

[road_runner]

I've been reefing for 15yrs. A multitude of problems are avoided if you test for 4 items at least twice a month:

Calc
Alk
Mag
Salinity (at least once a week using refractometer)

If you keep those in-range by dosing a low range element...you'll dodge 95% of problems

I ONLY chase down NO3 & PO4 #s if I see excess algae come on more than normal glass film algae

.

testing would avoid you the algae do not you think? Why not testing po4 and no3 like monthly? Just curious...

 

[ZoWhat]

testing would avoid you the algae do not you think? Why not testing po4 and no3 like monthly? Just curious...

NO3 & PO4 would only come if I stepped outside my husbandry regiment (overfeeding food or changing food)

I know how much "acceptable" green film algae collects on the front glass over the week. If i see more then I start questioning what has changed and then do NO3 & PO4 testing to aid in figuring out what's changed



.

 

[WVNed]

You have to do what your tank needs. There are almost no rules that hold over time with a marine tank. What you have to do depends on what is in your tank and how much you feed the tank and the water components your corals use up. The more you feed the more stuff you have to do on the back side to take the waste out.
The more your corals use up the more you have to add back.

This is what this is all about. No hard and fast rules to success. They just get you started. Everybodys tank is different.