SPS Keepers (please chime in)

B

Bryan

Did a few parameter tests after about 2 weeks of automated dosing 5ml every 3days of ESV B-Ionic 2 part, and had these results :

cal - 420 (hanna checker)
alk - 7.6 (hanna checker)
P04- 0.01 (hanna checker)
Mag - ~1460 (salifert)
SG - 1.026

Salt is Aquavitro Salinity 5g WC's every sunday

The tank is 8g with 20 long sump/fuge, and AI Nano and is SPS dominant but all are small frags. My concern is that my alk may be a bit low, what do you guys have as a target range or what have you found to work best ?

I am new to the SPS world and there are SO many conflicting threads that my head is spinning. Any help would be awsome.

Thanks in advance
 
Hi,
Your numbers are techically in range and you should not have a problem. Stability is better than trying to force a "good" number however, let your livestock help you decide. It's always good to include your daily PH average/swing in with the parm's but it is usually not something to worry about as long as the big three (Alk/Ca/Mg) are good.

Cheers,
 
Everything looks good for the most part. My issue is my blue torts, they are receeding from the base, it is super slow and only started when I lowered my lighting intensity to acclimate some new frags. I have started raisng my lights again but it seems that the popular alk # is around 9 so I want to make sure that with me being at 7.6 that im not harming anything.
 
Bimmerz is without doubt correct that stability is more important. My sps seem to do well at around 9 but definitely no higher. I think that with max water volume of 28 gallons I would only do a 2-3 gallon w/c weekly. Or at least make sure the big three values of the new salt water was closely matched to the tank. Also how about temp? Is it staying consistent? What kind of sps is receding? Do you have any fairly hardy sps like montis? If so how are they doing compared to the torte?
 
I have about 25+ pieces of SPS , I lost a couple of small millie frags but they were questionable when i got them. My red planet lost some of the green when I first put it in, but now its coming back really well.

Temp stays at 78* with my RKE, and I also compare the reading of the RKE against a lab grade liquid thermometer.

Im not sure what the PH drops to overnight, but I have a NET module on order to start logging it. I know that during the day its around 8.1

Only my blue tort is receding , and it is starting at the base.
 
It is awesome that the green is coming back in the red planet. I assume that you are running LEDs over the tank due to being able to increase/decrease intensity. I would like to hear how your sps do "colorwise" over time as I am very interested in LEDs but worry about sps coloration with just LEDs.

With that said, I would let your magnesium go down to around 1400 and then you will be able to get your alk close to 9 easier. Are the sps really small (25+ in an 8 gallon display)? Maybe it's just a little guy that wanted to be bigger?
 
yeah they are all tiny frags right now. On my 40b that I had back in the day, I ran T5/MH combo and loved it. The LED world is definitely different, but I still have this voice in my head saying (go back to what worked). Its really hard to fight the urge to buy the ATI powermodule that I have my eyes on.
 
I have only witnessed a few reasons for sps base recession:
1. Alk/PH swing's due to dosing method(too much at once etc.)
2. Alk too low
3. AEFW's (check for tell tale bite mark's)
4. Salinity issues
5. Overall chemistry, temp issues
 
I have witnessed an additional reason:

1. Cut a living animal and then put superglue on damaged area from cut and not enough healthy tissue remaining to allow specimen to recover.
 
That stinks. I wouldn't sweat it too much it happens. Keep your params were they need to be and keep it up.
 
7.6 while its natural sea water levels, is probably still too low long-term. You'll want to get it up over 8. I'd also check your salinity with a calibrated refractometer to insure its correct. Salinity being off will effect your tests. Also, the tests should be double checked by a friend or LFS with a different kit. Kits can be off by a wide margin and at 7ish can be lower since kits tend to be less accurate at lower levels.
 
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