Controlling CA and MG

My CA is 420 and my MG is 1100.

I dose Seachem Reef advantage calcium. I was wanting to do a Calcium drip and was wondering if anyone else has done one before. And how well it works.

I also want to raise my MG up to 1400. Do I raise the MG and let the CA drop then raise the CA? as you can see I am a little confused how to accomplish this

Thanks,

Will

 

I would start dosing Magnesium, and just leave your Cal alone until your magnesium levels get raised. While dosing keep and eye on your Alk, PH and Cal levels too. What kind of Magnesium supplement do you have??

 

for mg I have Seachem Reef also. right now dkh is 11 and ph is 8.4 so those are good. I'll dose some Mg Saturday and get it up then Ill get back to the ca.

I am still interested in a ca drip

 

My Mag was low around 1200 at one time, I used Seachem Advantage Magnesium with good results. It took some time (about 3-4 weeks) and a lot of dosing (Seachems maximum recommendation) to get to 1350.

Now as for a "calcium drip" do you mean dosing Calcium as your top-off??
If so I would look into using Kalkwasser. I just started topping off with Kalk, and it is working great. I barely use my regular supplements now. Check out my thread for more info. Kalkwasser info

 

I dose nightly kalk and twice a week magnesium. IMO your levels except your mag is right on. And your mag is not all that low...I keep mine around 1350

I found dosing nightly kalk maintained my levels at the perfect level. Once my levels were where I wanted them to be I just used the recommended dose of kalk (currently use 3 tsp in 2 seperate gallon containers) I need to get the 5g container but I cant find it around here and the 2 work well (not enough water..still have to top off a smaller amount at least 1x week)

I dose my mag 2x a week on Wed and on Saturday. It has stayed constant also.

But when you switch over do very frequent testing... I tested almost daily for a couple weeks when I first started...now I test weekly (only been doing this for a couple months) But drip the kalk at night when the lights go out and drip into the sump so it mixes well.

I am eventually going to get a calcium reactor but until then this works and is A LOT cheaper

 

That was an informative post Chuckdee. The reason i was thinking of the CA drip is that it talks about it on the bottle of Seachem I use?

 

Okay so I was thinking I would do my drip into my Sump since my ATO tank is buried deep behind stuff making it hard to get to. I guess I will get a bottle with an air line hose and a adjustable valve and let it go slow and test then adjust as needed.

Thanks for the help guys.

 

Yea I've read that too. Few people do that type of dosing. With a tank like your size, that can get very expensive. I would use Kalkwasser. Same concept of using Seachem's stuff, except for the fact you won't have to worry about Alk. Kalk is a balanced additive. If you can afford a Calcium reactor, that would beyour best bet, though.

 

May I suggest IV tubing? You can control your drip rate quite well- it works wonders! You can set up a 1 litre bag filled with kalk, set the drip rate to whatever you like, and then just let it run (obviously check the drip rate occasionally to make sure it hasnt sped up or slowed down at all).

 

vegasfish, if you're still at 1100 mag in your 200gallon, then you need to add at LEAST a pound of epsom salt to raise that up.