Couple of issues, please help.

So i am having 2 issues with my 90 gal that has been up for 7 weeks.

1. Snails are starting to detach and die. My fish and hermits are doing just fine. My major tank parameters are:

Nitrate: 0
Nitrite: 0
Ammo: 0
pH : 8.4
temp. 78*
SG 1.023, trying to get up to 1.025

2. Coral frag health is not good. Mushrooms and Yuma are shrinking and Zoas won't open anymore. I started dosing aquavitro Calcifaction 1 week ago.

 

Is there enough algae for the snails to eat? There is waayyyyy too much stock in that tank for being only 7 weeks old...especially for corals. Your tank isn't mature enough to support all that life it sounds like. Anything that is doing very poorly, I would give back to the LFS or a friend to hold onto until your tank matures a bit more.

 

I went through my diatom bloom about 3 weeks ago but its all gone and my sand bed is very clean. Now I am starting to see coraline starting to grow. I guess there is not enough algae, can this be bad for my Lawn mower blennie, he has been very active and seems happy.

 

Are you testing for calcium? Not good to dose without testing.

Are you using RO water? tap? snails dying but nothing else yet....copper or other harmfuls in your water source?

The blenny should be fine as long as he's eating something. Mine eat everything and anything including flakes, meaty food, and my skin when I put my arm in. He munches on liverock and diatoms throughout the day too.

 

Yes I top off with an RO/DI water. Only thing dying are snails

 

I would want to know NH4, NO2, NO3, pH, Temp, Ca, Mg and PO4. Those are your basic parameters for a reef tank. And the poster is correct, it is too soon for corals. I wouldn't put those in until the three month mark or a month after the cycle has ended, whichever is more.

Also, you may want to test for copper. Many an errant penny has killed inverts. Kids sometimes regard a fish tank as a wishing well.

A ground probe is another thing you should look into....the kind you actually plug into the wall, not screw into the middle. Those only work some of the time.

And your SG is fine where it is. I would leave it alone for now. Find out what the problem is before making any changes like that. An SG change right now will do nothing but stress the system. The corals will be fine at 23.

 

I had a feeling that my calcium was low and that was the reason for the decline in health of my coral frags. have been dosing very small amounts of Calcifaction by AquaVitro. I finally got my Salifert Calc test kit and I was right. Calcium was at 280ppm. Whats the best and safest way to get this to an acceptable level.

 

280 is not that low for a softy tank. Thats not bad at all. Some people keep that keep SPS keep their SG 1.025-1.026 to keep most of their levels higher. If keeping SPS, you want it around 400-500ppm....for what you have, 280ppm isnt bad. I don't think your SG is the reason your snails are dying.