What's happening to my digitata

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You should be dosing at least calcium and carbonate, especially if you are trying to grow hard corals and/or coralline, and you have some substantial pieces. Definitely look into at least manual dosing of Calcium and Alk - Dr. Holmes-Farley has a cheap and easy two-part recipe that is made out of baking soda and driveway ice melt (you can also get the stuff at tennis supply shops). Dosing pump and system are common, cheaper but also more failure prone, so get a system that fails "off" and is not known to overdose. Calcium reactor is a good choice for long-running solution... it takes a bit to get them dialed in, but they they can usually run for months and months without touching them - they are not cheap to buy, either. There are many ways to skin this cat.

Other than this, turn the whites down on the light and just wait it out. Keep on changing water - this is likely what is keeping your stonies alive.

You are feeding enough to have good throughput. Do not chase N or P and just keep them under a reasonable amount like 5-10N and .25 P. Do not sweat not being able to read any N on a test kit - seriously, just leave this alone. If you want to care about P, then Hannah Ultra Low Checker is a must - keep P above 1 or 3 PPB and you will be OK (this should be no problem).
 
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This is what I am using. It seems to jump from .05 to .06ppm.
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I have looked into this recipe before. I'l revisit it. And trust me I am very sceptical person. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/w...ck-up-brstv-investigates.413113/#post-4866337
 
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Thanks everyone for all the help. I have foolishly chased things with no testing and it seems I have hit a new reefing enlightenment. We live we grow we learn. I will be making changes to my 18month old habits.
Ill Look into doseing and testing a lot more often from now on. Maybe increase my water change size till then. I'll move away from mechanical filtration for now. Work on steadying my parameters first and work from there. I'll keep you guys updated on how things go.
 
BoomCorals said:
That tester has an error range of .03. So if you get .05 it could be .02-.08 actual. I’d get the low range phosphorus checker. Far more accurate.
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I thought that the lr on the reagent package was for low range. It says low range on the package I thought as well i will check.
 
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I am guessing you mean ulr? @BoomCorals
What is the ideal phosphate level?
 
Just my .02 id ditch the red sea alk test kit. They are garbage and horrible. I was always trying to chase my alk using that test kit. Trying to see when the color change is leaves to much to human error and if you are not in the right lighting you will get a wrong reading. Do your self a huge favor and grab the hanna checker. You will get much closer to your actual alk then with the red sea. Not bashing all red sea testing just their alk. I used it and always had swings. Since using my hanna for the last 6 months I haven't experienced any swings. But I also test every morning at almost the same time.

I saw it mentioned as well but I wouldnt want 0 on nitrates. In my opinion you want some I keep my tank between .5-2ppm. My sps and corals were fine with 0 but they didnt have any color to them. Within 2 weeks of nitrates my colors keep getting better by the week.
 
Sean1986 said:
Just my .02 id ditch the red sea alk test kit. They are garbage and horrible. I was always trying to chase my alk using that test kit. Trying to see when the color change is leaves to much to human error and if you are not in the right lighting you will get a wrong reading. Do your self a huge favor and grab the hanna checker. You will get much closer to your actual alk then with the red sea. Not bashing all red sea testing just their alk. I used it and always had swings. Since using my hanna for the last 6 months I haven't experienced any swings. But I also test every morning at almost the same time.

I saw it mentioned as well but I wouldnt want 0 on nitrates. In my opinion you want some I keep my tank between .5-2ppm. My sps and corals were fine with 0 but they didnt have any color to them. Within 2 weeks of nitrates my colors keep getting better by the week.
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I know exactly what your saying about the all test. It leaves you guessing and feeling frustrated. I am like, Is this green or blue or yellowish, well let's add some more drops looks like hell I don't now. Lol.

I am grabbing one today.

Iam also thinking about shutting my skimmer off. It will be on a timer. Just haven't figured out how long I want it off.
 
DancingShark said:
I know exactly what your saying about the all test. It leaves you guessing and feeling frustrated. I am like, Is this green or blue or yellowish, well let's add some more drops looks like hell I don't now. Lol.

I am grabbing one today.

Iam also thinking about shutting my skimmer off. It will be on a timer. Just haven't figured out how long I want it off.
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Just jumping in on the Red Sea thing. Problem in this hobby are numbers. Everyone thinks that numbers have to be on point. In the case of Alk you don’t have to have a solid number. With Red Sea, it will always give you the correct range though. Once you stop chasing numbers and understand ranges the Red Sea test becomes understandable. It doesn’t matter ok exacts. If you are chasing exacts in this hobby, you will drive yourself nuts. Even Hanna checkers have ranges. You are not doing yourself a favor with digital read outs. There is still a range of +\- .03 or .04. So technically an 8 in alk can be anywhere from 7.6 to 8.4 on a Hanna. My .02
 
reefmann said:
Just jumping in on the Red Sea thing. Problem in this hobby are numbers. Everyone thinks that numbers have to be on point. In the case of Alk you don’t have to have a solid number. With Red Sea, it will always give you the correct range though. Once you stop chasing numbers and understand ranges the Red Sea test becomes understandable. It doesn’t matter ok exacts. If you are chasing exacts in this hobby, you will drive yourself nuts. Even Hanna checkers have ranges. You are not doing yourself a favor with digital read outs. There is still a range of +\- .03 or .04. So technically an 8 in alk can be anywhere from 7.6 to 8.4 on a Hanna. My .02
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It's not so much of "chasing" as it is consistency. Testing for changes in regards to swings in Alkalinity, is extremely important for any SPS system. Testing and adjusting to maintain that consistency is key.
 
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Flippers4pups said:
It's not so much of "chasing" as it is consistency. Testing for changes in regards to swings in Alkalinity, is extremely important for any SPS system. Testing and adjusting to maintain that consistency is key.
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Red Sea is very consistent in their numbers though. I have used them for years and never had an issue. It’s not hard to know your range using them. You just have to know you don’t HAVE to get a solid 8. It’s okay to get 8.2 You just have to know that if you get 7.6 then hit it a lick with what ever alk you use. Trust me. It’s easy. People make it hard.
 
reefmann said:
Red Sea is very consistent in their numbers though. I have used them for years and never had an issue. It’s not hard to know your range using them. You just have to know you don’t HAVE to get a solid 8. It’s okay to get 8.2 You just have to know that if you get 7.6 then hit it a lick with what ever alk you use. Trust me. It’s easy. People make it hard.
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Used red sea for years, switched to hannah and would never go back. Much easier and quicker to use and that's a plus when your trying to keep consistency in your tank. I'm not saying red sea doesn't work, hannah just makes it easier. I disagree with you saying people make it hard. For some it's harder to read colors than a digital number.
 
DSC reef said:
Used red sea for years, switched to hannah and would never go back. Much easier and quicker to use and that's a plus when your trying to keep consistency in your tank. I'm not saying red sea doesn't work, hannah just makes it easier. I disagree with you saying people make it hard. For some it's harder to read colors than a digital number.
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We don’t need to derail this thread arguing test however Red Sea takes all of a minute to test alk. It’s very easy as well. There is no way Hanna is easier. In either of those aspects. You can disagree all you want on the other matter. Maybe you like the digital read out and that’s easier for you but the test themselves are simple as all get out.
 
reefmann said:
We don’t need to derail this thread arguing test however Red Sea takes all of a minute to test alk. It’s very easy as well. There is no way Hanna is easier. In either of those aspects. You can disagree all you want on the other matter. Maybe you like the digital read out and that’s easier for you but the test themselves are simple as all get out.
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Nobody is derailing, just conversation. You jumped in on the "red sea" kit and gave your opinion so I gave mine on the hannah. It's ok to disagree;), in the end were all just trying to help.
 
DSC reef said:
Nobody is derailing, just conversation. You jumped in on the "red sea" kit and gave your opinion so I gave mine on the hannah. It's ok to disagree;), in the end were all just trying to help.
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Agreed. But I don’t think the test kit was the reason for the OP’s problem.
 
Red sea is easy but the ambiguity of the color is the problem at least for me. Going from light blue to light green to yellow is something I myself find hard to detect the shift in color when it happens. Add that not the Kelvin of your light source can had to that confusing.

I get what your saying from what looks like green to yellow there is not a lot of tritant used. I will say this I was just at my lfs and we talked about this same thing and he showed me the salifert test and it turned from blue to pink with just one drop added. It was precise. Not the reading because of + or - but the color reading.
 
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reefmann said:
Agreed. But I don’t think the test kit was the reason for the OP’s problem.
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No test kit's were not. You are right about that. Number of things I have to fix.
 
I wasnt trying to bash red sea test kits. I use them for my calcium, mag, no3 and p04 I love their test kits its just that alk one sucks in my opinion. Im not chasing numbers kind of guy i just want stability, I just want a number any number that thing is more accurate then my eye trying to figure out if the red sea has changed to the proper color. I can tell u this i have my doser dialed in perfectly since having the hanna. I dont have more then a .1 to .2 swing a day on my alk and my tanks thriving because of it.
 
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