Maintainence Tips

If it's embarrassing, we're here to make it.. Unembarrasing? Heck, we'd be fine with just parameters and a description. Do you have a test kit, or a LFS where you can get your water tested? Do you know how strong your lights are? I know a frogspon and most anemones require strong lighting. Are you using the lights that might have come with the tank? Do you have any small power heads to circulate water? How long has the tank been set up? Sorry for the questions, but it'd be the start to finding the right solution.

 

You always have the option of private messaging members. I can not think of one person on this forum that would be so judgemental that you would need to feel embarassed.

If you have an anemone alive in the system it can not be that bad.

The assistance has been provided to you all you have to do is accept it.

 

Personally, I disagree. I haven't seen anyone post anything hurtful. It's pretty obvious that you have a basic misunderstanding of what is going on, but you are not taking good advice from good people. The reason that you keep getting the same responses is because they are correct and true. It's up to YOU to take the good advice from the good people and follow it to help yourself.

 

We won't judge if you are trying to improve the tank. The only time I actually see people turn on people is if they abuse there animals and act like its fine.

I know this isn't my tank but its a tank I see often, My dad's tank had nitrates of around 170 and a phosphate level of 2.9. Very bad levels especially for someone who has a anemone. But when he finally acknowledged the problem we worked together to get his levels better. Currently at 40 nitrates and probably around 1 ppm phosphate. They have slowly been going down over time and still dropping.

Alot of us have had ugly tanks when we first started, I kinda don't think I know a single person on this site that did it right from the start, regardless of extensive planning and work.

 

My maintance for my 28 gal JBJ is basically the same as it was for my 10, 12 and 6 gal nano.

Quality Carbon such as chemipure elite, and replacement every 2 months. Anything with some GFO or some purigen or a combonation of both when housing leathers or anemones.

Water changes of 10% bi-monthly. I prefer smaller water changes.

The reason I dose is because I am attempting to keep sps, I have a large amount of coralline, which sucks up the ca and the requirements of the sps are better met by addition of parts A/B and magnesium for me.

When keeping soft corals and many lps my corals always seemed happier with addition of no products other than fish food for target feeding.

Addition of supplemental powerheads or replacement of stock powerheads has proven to be benefical as well.

 

+10 to all above,nobody is belittleing you,if you really want a nice reef you need to post those numbers,we are all here to help one another.You have many right here on this thread trying to help,but you need to answer the questions asked,give your tanks parameters,what is your water source?Posting a pic on this forum a while back got me a diagnosis,the recommended treatment instructions of a major problem i was having,and helped me through the trouble with 100 % great results.Please post all this info so we can help you do the same.

 

Oceansurf

Some thoughts from me

I had a 4ft tank with just soft corals in
I performed 10% water changes each week
I did test, but being completely honest it did seem a waste of time
because I could have predicted the results before doing the test

the utilisation of the big 3 was minimal - with a tank full of soft corals the numbers stayed the same week in week out
I ran GFO , and had minimal algae so I knew my Salifert phosphate kit was going to give me a 0

although I continued to test the above , Nitrate was the only test that I figured was actually worthwhile, as my Nitrates did get to 20 or so and the water changes where primarily a chance for me to clean equipment, filters etc, to make sure they never got above 20

Its fair to say that in priniciple with your tank, and those few corals if your changing water with a quality salt brand then IMHO there is no reason why your Mag, Calcium and Alkalinity should not be fine

Alkalinity would be the one from 3 that could have issues as its linked to PH
and if your tank had excess CO2 for example, Alkalinity ions get used up holding the PH up for you

The thing is

in a tank that we cant see, we naturally want to eliminate the basics 1st before we can give you and quality advice

making suggestions about carbon use etc. are good advice
but if later you come back on and say "My DKH is 6" then many people could tell you that your below the generally accepted reef minimum and need to increase that to at least 7

That is why having those numbers is ideal

I would suggest that testing every week would be extreme
but that testing once per month, would be an option you could consider and getting the LFS to do that to save the initial outlay on test kits is a good option IMO

just check they would use liquid test kits and not strips
as you do want the results to be accurate otherwise you may end up trying to fix a problem that does not exist

Steve

 

Agree 100% Steve. My first coral tank was a 40 breeder with two powerheads, a heater and a light. No dosing, just a 5 gallon water change once a week. No sump, no skimmer. Very easy maintenance.

 

I have a box/cannister filter. It hangs on the back of the tank, pulls the water out of the tank, puts it through a sponge & charcoal & deposits it back in the tank. It has a small skimmer attached.

In my aquarium I have a clown, a large anenome, 1 nassarius snail, a Kenya tree frag, a ricordea coral & a button coral. The corals don't seem to be doing that well.

I just got new bulbs.

The salinity is 1.02. I think that is a bit low, so I'm going to top off with salt for awhile. I think that is what I should do. ( ? )

Nitrates are 0.

Calcium is 320, also a bit low although one member said they would not dose it in such a small tank. Just keep doing those weekly water changes.

That is all I test.

As for the pic, I don't know how to do it. I think it was Steve ( I could be wrong ) who kindly explained it to me, but still I did not understand. I guess I must be slow. Really, I don''t think a pic would help anyway. You'd see live rock, an anenome & a clown. The coral is too small to show up.

As far as yesterday's episode, there was actually only one person who I found actually rude & hurtful. I think the comment could have been made in pvt which would have given me the chance to explain & apologize for my actions. That person seemed to pounce on me although what he/she had to say was true.

Anyway, that is water under the bridge & all is forgiven. I like this site & have only dealt with kind helpful people. Have a great day everyone ! ))))

OceanSurf.

 

That salinity is low - you want something more like 1.026.
Are you measuring with a hydrometer or a refractometer? The hydrometers are good for ballpark - but when you are already low - you may be even lower if you are not measuring with a more precise refractometer.

Also, it would help to know what your pH, Alk, and Magnesium are - as these are crucial "vital" signs of your tank.

Your nitrates being 0 is great - but you may have very low Alk/Mag/pH and that may well be your simple problem. Especially if your salinity is low, you are going to have a hard time getting the tank to hold the other elements.

Also, what kinds of test kits are you using? Are they expired? Old test kits will often give false/bad readings and even a new test kit that is not a good brand can give bad numbers.

A picture would help, believe it or not. We would not ask you to post one just because we like pics (well, maybe just a little ) but what you do not see in a picture - maybe someone else will - it's impossible to say until we actually see it.

Maybe you are getting zero nitrates because you have so much hair algae that it is absorbing it right away - the same can go for phospates - you can have a zero reading with a ton of algae because the algae is "uptaking" the excess nutrients before they are allowed into the water column.