I have been in the hobby for 20 years but other than a few Monti I had not ventured into SPS. I set up my 45 cube over a year ago and once it had a year under it and was stable I decided to add SPS to grow out and then frag and move to the Display tank. While the new SPS were growing I started getting the DT ready for SPS. I am not an "over-night" type person so I set a project plan for upgrading lights and equipment, removing corals that are not SPS compatible, etc. I thought I had everything moving in the right direction. And then I created the Perfect Storm and then made things worse!
Here is the timeline:
Sept 2015: Added Kessil AP700 to SPS tank 15" above water, set at 50% power at high noon for 3 hours with slow ramp up and down.
Kalk drip with manual additions of ALK and CA as needed as new corals added
Accepted a new position which requires I travel international 1-2x a month and US travel 1-2x a month.
OCT 2015: Tank is amazing, all corals growing and happy. Alk 8, CA 440, MAG 1300, SG 1.025, temp 79, PO4 0, NO3 0
Nov 2015: Add doser to SPS tank for Alk and CA monitor for a month, life is good. Everything rocking along perfectly. Corals are growing and started to frag a few.
Add berghia nudibranchs to DT to get rid of aiptasia. On track to move SPS to DT early 2016.
Dec 2015: Start the month with a long trip to Europe. While out of town the light flickers and instead of resetting to iPad, spouse hits the buttons on the light and mistakenly sets to normal program at 100%
Spouse tells me he fixed the issue, tank looks good.
I return with a lovely case of the flu to find corals bleached. I check numbers and find that ALK is over 13, CA at 500, Mag at 1250. All other numbers the same
I do a 20% water change, turn off the doser and crawl into bed.
Over the next 3 weeks I stop the Kalk drip, do water changes to bring the numbers back into alignment. The corals that had made it through the bleach without total bleach are looking a bit better but the others are showing signs of tissue lose. Montis are hit the hardest and most are gone - large colonies are at 80% lose and the frag rack is total lose. ALK is back to 8.5, CA 440, MAG 1300, SG 1.025, temp 79, PO4 0, NO3 0
JAN 2016: Back out of town. I leave just RO/DI ATO going. Corals are not growing so ALK, CA, and MAG are not a big concern at this point.
Return to find more tissue lose and still no significant color change. ALK and CA dropped a bit so I know at least some corals are taking up.
I am frustrated that I have not been able to recover from the bleaching and ALK swing.
And then it hits me - corals without Zooxanthellae need Nitrate. They need readily available food that does not require work. And I am still running at N03 0 and feeding large food. How dumb am I? I can not believe it took me so long to stop and look at the numbers and really see them. I have always let my DT run around N03 5 - 10 so why did I think the SPS needed 0???? I have learned my lesson and will run my SPS tanks at 2.5-5 N03 from now on.
2016 will be the year for a controller so I can see the numbers while cooling my heels at some airport.
Here is the timeline:
Sept 2015: Added Kessil AP700 to SPS tank 15" above water, set at 50% power at high noon for 3 hours with slow ramp up and down.
Kalk drip with manual additions of ALK and CA as needed as new corals added
Accepted a new position which requires I travel international 1-2x a month and US travel 1-2x a month.
OCT 2015: Tank is amazing, all corals growing and happy. Alk 8, CA 440, MAG 1300, SG 1.025, temp 79, PO4 0, NO3 0
Nov 2015: Add doser to SPS tank for Alk and CA monitor for a month, life is good. Everything rocking along perfectly. Corals are growing and started to frag a few.
Add berghia nudibranchs to DT to get rid of aiptasia. On track to move SPS to DT early 2016.
Dec 2015: Start the month with a long trip to Europe. While out of town the light flickers and instead of resetting to iPad, spouse hits the buttons on the light and mistakenly sets to normal program at 100%
Spouse tells me he fixed the issue, tank looks good.
I return with a lovely case of the flu to find corals bleached. I check numbers and find that ALK is over 13, CA at 500, Mag at 1250. All other numbers the same
I do a 20% water change, turn off the doser and crawl into bed.
Over the next 3 weeks I stop the Kalk drip, do water changes to bring the numbers back into alignment. The corals that had made it through the bleach without total bleach are looking a bit better but the others are showing signs of tissue lose. Montis are hit the hardest and most are gone - large colonies are at 80% lose and the frag rack is total lose. ALK is back to 8.5, CA 440, MAG 1300, SG 1.025, temp 79, PO4 0, NO3 0
JAN 2016: Back out of town. I leave just RO/DI ATO going. Corals are not growing so ALK, CA, and MAG are not a big concern at this point.
Return to find more tissue lose and still no significant color change. ALK and CA dropped a bit so I know at least some corals are taking up.
I am frustrated that I have not been able to recover from the bleaching and ALK swing.
And then it hits me - corals without Zooxanthellae need Nitrate. They need readily available food that does not require work. And I am still running at N03 0 and feeding large food. How dumb am I? I can not believe it took me so long to stop and look at the numbers and really see them. I have always let my DT run around N03 5 - 10 so why did I think the SPS needed 0???? I have learned my lesson and will run my SPS tanks at 2.5-5 N03 from now on.
2016 will be the year for a controller so I can see the numbers while cooling my heels at some airport.
