Over filtration is without a doubt one of the most common issues in reefing these days. So much cool tech that is super efficient at removing nutrients before corals can. I can’t run a fuge without dosing. Dirty class is a good sign, I chose to add a UV to limit how often I need to clean it but am worried if it doesn’t get a little hazy.
I highly recommend you invest in the the Hanna ultra low phosphate checker and add it to your daily regimen of checks. I aim for .03-.09 for my mixed sps/lps system and since bringing it up to this level I haven't had any more sps die off events. I use the same neonitro and neophos to keep them in the sweet spot.
Interesting that you say that. My phosphate levels are confusing. I’ve been as scientific as I can but I find the Hanna Phosphorus tester very unreliable. I’ve tested the same sample and had results from 0 to 16ppb using the same water, two different Hanna test kits and the different vials. I found the Salifert phosphate kit hard to read, but now I’m used to it I actually find it more reliable. I now do ICP tests with Triton almost every month now as it’s the only reliable way.
Exact same thing happened to me about 6months ago and I made the mistake of overcorrecting the low Nitrates and dosing too much Nitrogen - with the exact product you showed. End result was that it shocked all my corals and i lost nearly every SPS in the tank and some of my prized LPS....absolutely devastating. Corals continued to die for 2-3 months so be prepared for that. I then had months of cyano and algae issues as I screwed the bacterial balance....You learn some painful and costly lessons in this hobby! My advice is just go really++ slow. As they say, nothing good happens quickly in reefing...
I removed all cheato as it was sucking out everything I was chucking in the tank. Have now replaced with caulerpa prolifera which seems to grow slower. I'm not trying to ride them ultra low levels anymore as its caused me many of headaches with dino. I try to stay somewhere near 0.1 p04 and 10ish no3.
Wondering why I even set it up in the first place and now I’m just embarrassed 😩 I think i’ve been getting too excited with this build and I need to slow things down. I hate low levels…absolute nightmare. Hopefully no dino’s here to come myself!
I would keep skimmer running and I would remove the Chateo. It is probably removing more stuff that you are adding to the tank. You also could feed more frozen food. It will increase NO3 and Po4
I second this notion. I don't have a big tank, but the chaeto I had running on my tank completely decimated any nutrients I had. Completely bottomed to the point it threw off all the elements in my tank to. Needless to say I threw the Chaeto out and keep the skimmer running. I pour the skimmate back in the tank and shut it off for a day.
Sorry to see your bump in the road but thankful you’re sharing your journey. I’m sure a lot of us will learn something from this. At least this hobby is never boring!
Had a very similar issue when i set up my new tank after about 4-6mo. Couldn't get chaeto to grow and tank glass was filthy all the time. I ended up buying chaeto one more time. I ended up using Neo Nitro (like you) and also Neo Phos as well as Chaeto grow all from brightwell and dosed slowly to the parameters i wanted. Turned my lights off on the tank and skimmer off for a few days and let the fuge light run itself for 12-14hrs to try to out compete the algae funk in the display. After about three days I started with a 6hr schedule on the display (still running the 12-14hr fuge light) i noticed the chaeto growing and the glass was only being cleaned 1-2 times a week. To me, this meant the fuge was out competing the display and I kept testing and kept the parameters at 10-12ppm for Nitrate, 0.06-0.08 for phosphates. Once this happened, I slowly ramped on the display from 6,8,10, and finally the 12hr. schedule previously. Since then, the chaeto is full blown and have had no issues with film algae and nutrients are stable. I do still dose slight ChaetoGro here and there though. It may not work but just figured I'd put my 2cents in. GL and Keep up the fight! :-)
I dose NeoNitro and NeoPhos. The product literally changed everything about reefing for me. I have always run low nutrient systems, as I don't keep many fish because I'm gone 2 weeks a month, and the Neo products have been a game changer.
Icp tests will give you a wider window of view for water chemistry. Also are you running an opposite lighting schedule for the chaeto or same time as main display? Also one other thing did you make sure the foxface isn't getting to friendly by nipping on the acro polyps?
Found your channel a few days ago and binged the last few months of your content. The new aquarium has definitely been a challenge for you, but you're not giving up - you'll get there! Thanks for taking us along for the journey.
I would have also left the acros in the tank as they could jump back, you'd be surprised by some of them, just because they lose color doesn't always mean they are dead. Cannot hurt to have them in there for a couple months to see if there is any progress.
Had this issue also. I have just started with Microbacter 7 and plus NP until I can get readings. starting to see color again on the test kits now and I will switch to Balance np for carbon dosing. But very difficult so far.
Brightwell solved My ULN issue. After 2 weeks my PO4 and NO3 Back to normal. I recomend to start with small dosage, especialy NeoPhos, its a fosfate bomb Inf you read the instructions. Good luck, keep reefing.
Make sure your parameters from your mixing station match up with your parameters from your tank. You might have a bad bucket with low alk, cal, mag. Im currently dealing with this issue. This would definitely mess with your SPS.
The same thing just happened to my tank! Chaeto turned to mush, nutrients bottomed out 0. Picked up the Hanna ultra checkers. Neo nitro and phos are my life savers right now but I’m struggling to get nutrient levels back up. Ugh!! So frustrating!!
Might run some carbon a few days in case the dead SPS released something in the water. Also if you start dosing nitrate and phosphate start out with have the recommended dose. You need to slowly get to the levels needed. A quick jump will just cause more headache. Also might try running the skimmer on a 18 on 6 off to see if that helps.
sorry for your coral loss, really feel for you as my tank does this every now and then that's why I always have a bottle of Nyos nitrate on hand and as soon as my no3 drops to 2.5 I bump it back up to 5
I would say dirty up that tank and consider doing an ICP test to rule anything else out. I’m definitely following you sista! Hope you find a solution quickly.
I have been fighting this for the past year. If you were to see in some of my videos, Any SPS I put inside my tank are STN within a couple weeks. Hopefully you get a quick turn around. I have thought about turning off my skimmer however it is constantly pulling out nasty skim mate so not thinking that would be wise.
I recently started following you. Noticed in 1 of your videos you say you're from TX. As am I. I live in San Antonio. If you're in the surrounding area 1 of our lfs got a batch of acro black bugs. The warehouse distributor is out of Dallas. Hope this helps. How I caught it was waited till lights out and did a zoom on camera. I was gutted. All my other sps are gtg
Since the corals bounce back after a water change which would at worst be LOWERING your nutrients as the cause, I would rule that out although too low isn't good. Perhaps adding some other "chemical filter" might help such as some ROX Carbon, Chemi Pure or perhaps Polyfilter. I would start with the ROX Carbon first and see if the corals seem to respond well to that and go from there.
Yep pretty much what I thought! Everything’s seemed to have stopped/bouncing back now. Have managed to bring my nutrients up, but this whole thing is still really odd. Watching and waiting atm (don’t want to make too many changes at once you know?)
More fish, more feeding. I'm a firm believer that heavy fish/feeding loads with heavy export is the best way to go with SPS. Also, nice rock work; great minimalist style.
Agreed! New fish coming in two weeks, have increased feeding and feeding corals now (not too much, don’t want to shock though). Things are looking so much better already 😅 And thank you!!
Definitely send an ICP test and see where the depletion in elements are. You may need to dose some trace elements either weekly or daily in your case. The algae film on the glass also helps feed your corals as you clean it off. I wouldn’t jump the gun and start changing things quickly as you will create more problems. Your going to create a swing affect. Great one week. Not so the other. I would just continue your water changes and replenish the elements being consumed by your animals once you get your ICP. You probably need more sulfate and potassium and boron. But who knows until you get a more idea on your ICP test. Know your parameters before you start continuing dosing more of what’s not needed. You will crash your tank. Take it slow and you will have a flourishing reef system. Dosing more elements seem to be in your near future. Happy New Year Oh yah. Your answers could be at Hydrospace LLC. Check it out. Since you have a nutrient issue.
Why dose everyone run to the icp test the trace elements are so minimal that the water changes will already have replenish them. The only reason to get icp test is if you are experimenting with potassium for better color on your acro so you don't dose too much which is so easy because there levels are so low. The real problem is acidity in our tanks from low PH and or high PO4. Mostly the low ph everyone thinks is ok. The biggest hidden secret ever successful reefer has is they keep there ph between 8.3 and 8.4 and no one ever asks about this they only ask what are you dosing and check your icp. Just get your ph up.
@@erikreagan2339 It’s all about water volume. If your system has depleted elements. Water changes aren’t the only answer these days. Our equipment operates so well that with the life in your system with the mechanics involved. Water changes just aren’t the answer anymore. Also to chase ph requires elements like boron and others. So ICP test isn’t the grand all answer. But as a hobbyists it helps get you closer to a solution to a persistent problem. Test helps. Regardless. Also not all salts are the same. They aren’t regardless what people say. I wouldn’t knock down anything that helps a hobbyists succeed. Testing is all we got. So use it..
My phosphates have been rising they are at .12 now, I have a bunch of algae but I now have a phosphate reactor so phosphates should be going down. My nitrates are at 0 for a while, should I get more fish to raise nitrates or dose that nitrate in a bottle?
Yep, a lot of truth in this. This kept happening to me until I realized I needed to keep my ALK between 6.5 - 8.0 ...this kept happening to me and the odd thing was everytime my ALK was above 8.
Could something else be leaching into the tank? Some other contaminant? Seems like you had a decent amount of nitrates if the algae was going crazy immediately after you removed the chaeto, you’d think the Acros would have been able to use some of that too.
From some googling, I saw some others have their acros die due to stray voltage. Essentially some piece of faulty equipment leaking a weak electric current into the water. Just another potential culprit to maybe check out.
@@QueenofReef you could have a salt problem with a trace element. could also have a pump or magnet leeching into the tank. definitely get an icp test. also buy nitrate and phosphate kits from red sea. then make an algae control kit that has both tests for cheaper. also you shouldn't need to test alk and Cal frequently because with your water volume changes will happen slower.
Hi First of all, sorry for bad englisch im Form Germany. ;-) I don't think it's a phosphate or nitrate problem otherwise the LPS would be much earlier. If necessary, I would filter activated carbon and do an ICP test where you also get the other values that you don't get with the drop tests. I'm guessing here on an iron or copper problem, something like that. I have a redox measuring device permanently installed, if something dies or goes bad the value drops and I see it immediately, in addition I add ozone until the value is back to approx. 350mv
I'm sorry for your loss I have a 94 gallon aquarium with a 40 gallon sump it's been setup going on a year now had major trouble with ammonia in the beginning I use dr. Tim one and only my ammonia stayed majorly High for about a month-and-a-half after that got straight I did a couple of water changes and I can say since August 21st ammonia, phosphate,no2,no3 have been at 0PPM and everyone that I've talked to about this cannot explain why I feed my fish a lot I have had a few people tell me they think it's from the dry Rock that I used three bags of live sand but I don't know
Have you considered getting an icp test? I always worry about things like heavy metals and stuff like that when i have a few loses. Only takes a bit of equipment breaking down and leaching something bad. Probably is the low nutrients but always good to test
Ordered one to come! Definitely need one to make sure, especially considering the water change made everything stop/look better (which makes me think more than one problem here…😥)
A couple thoughts.. 1: The cheato was removing/keeping something in check. When the cheato died...that component irritated your acros. I found that it is absolutely necessary to dose iron to keep my cheato flourishing. 2: When nutrients are too low, acros can't handle too much light. Their metabolic process gets out of whack. I'm not sure what your PAR is at...but once nutrients bottom out.. .acros can get pretty fickle. I make homemade KNO3, Na3PO4, and Iron solutions...it's very easy and cheap. Once I dosed these, my acros exploded with growth.
I'd suggest keeping your skimmer on even if you take the collection cup off or turn it down so you're not skimming. You could drop your ph a lot not having a skimmer running and exacerbate your problem. I feed hpd with reef chili and nori to keep my phosphate up, and am dosing sodium nitrate when my nitrate gets low.
Reduce the time your refugium light is on. Cheato is very efficient as you’ve witnessed. I run my fuge light for 4 hours that’s it. Even then I still find myself dosing nitrogen. A fellow reefer I know has their fuge light on every other night instead of nightly for 6 hours. Works for them.
When ever I added my ATS I was having problems with low nutrients and what i did first was add more fish like anthias which help but was not enough, so I just started feeding the fish more(5x a day with reef roids mixed within the auto feeder). Which solved my problems. I also don’t think the change in light spectrum on the refugium caused the chaeto to die, because I have used the kessil in the all blue and all white spectrum to grow chaeto and didn’t see any difference in growth. I also did have a lot of acros die of non existing nutrients when I first started using the ATS. I forgot to ask but are you using any type of supplements like cheatoGro to replenish the elements the chaeto is using?
Keeping your skimmer off isn't going to help your PH level at all, turn it back on and just leave the top off so your not removing nutrients. Your going to need Neo Phos as well. Are you testing Phosphorous (PPB)? You might want to get the ULN test kits at this point (Red Sea Pro nitrates and Hanna phosphorus). Salifert isn't going to help you anymore. Dose Phos and Nitrates. Dose and then test your water in 1 hr. then test the next day. You can then gauge the consumption rate. If the rates are going down compared to that 1hr test then the system is still using the nitrates and phosphates. Don't over compensate on this cause typically the system will consume consume consume and look like it needs it, but eventually it's going to stop like it hit a brick wall and you don't want to overshoot it. It's like a freight train once it gets moving and very slow to stop moving in a direction. I'm not sure why you started Chaeto. Where your nitrates and phosphates high? If they weren't then it's worthless cause the Chaeto will just die unless your dosing fertilizer. I also highly doubt your nutrients were totally zero. Your LFS probably didn't use test kits made to detect ULNS, but I'm sure your probably pretty low since the acros are dyeing and keeping them under ULNS conditions is very risky. You get awesome colorization with ULNS, but it makes the corals very susceptible to changes. You even said in your video you could see the corals colors getting deeper and more vibrant each and every day (#Signs of trouble). Also it's just my guess here, but you recently added Chaeto to your tank, cause the last video I really didn't see anything in your refuge under that Kesil light and you were already struggling with low nutrients. You are also doing massive water changes and also cleaning your sand. THIS IS NOT HELPING lol. Stop doing water changes, stop vacuuming your sand.. Let your system get dirty and your bacteria develop and monitor your Nitrates and Phosphates/Phosphorous. I would immediately start getting as much diverse bacteria as you can. Get a piece of live rock (from a trust worthy source), get some BioDigest Prodibio bacteria dosed, get some AF Life Source, Dr. Tims Refresh. You need to add these things, because your cleaning routine although fun to watch; ok painful to watch by means that you go through a ton of manual work to accomplish it, is depleting your good bacteria. *On a side note - If you are seriously having algae issues where you need to clean the glass and back wall all the time, Neo Nitro and Neo Phos is going to make you pull your hair out in a minute. Cause guess what happens when Algae gets nutrients and light? You will just be feeding this issue and making it worse. This brings me back to your bacteria diversity Biome. See previous paragraph on getting some bacteria and dose microbacter 7 and clean right away, but remember that microbacter 7 and clean is not going to resolve your problem long term. The bacteria in those bottles does not live long within the system. You need to develop the long lasting diverse biome. If you're scratching your head as to why your having problems now, well it's because all that cleaning was actually helping while bacteria was developing, but now slowly over time you have been hurting it and algae is starting to gain an upper hand and depleting the system because the cleaning is removing what you worked so hard to develop. I also don't understand why so many people are suggesting getting an ICP test for you; i guess if you think you have candles in your tank it would be a good test lol. I get them every month, but really they are just for my trace elements and corrections I need to dose. Your water changes are already replenishing your trace elements (ps to get your biome setup dose trace elements while your not doing water changes). there are a ton of manufactures that make trace elements that are easy to dose (tropic marine makes a great one). I use the ICP test because I dose each element individually, which I doubt you want to do right now with a system so young anyways. Now what will benefit you as in a water test would be a AquaBiome DNA water test. Once you achieve a good result from that test, then you are ready for SPS. Ok one more rant and then I'm done for the night lol. I don't think there is any pro-reefer that utilizes chaeto. Chaeto is a unbalanced system just like carbon, gfo or anything else within a system that depletes or gets removed from a system. I get it tho cause it's kinda cool cause Chaeto grows fast and it's fun. Kinda like the Chia pet; ok I seriously aged myself there. Cha Cha Chia. So if you want stability ... Chaeto isn't it , because say you're nitrate and phosphates are 5ppm and .03ppm with chaeto running and now you need to remove some cause it's overgrown; well now your nitrates and phosphates are on the rise cause because you removed it. Then you start seeing your sps start to STN or RTN due to nutrient imbalance. GFO and carbon are the same; slowly depleted and cause system instability. One would say well carbon depletion doesn't hurt anything; Well Wrongo it does, cause it effects your lights ability to penetrate the water and SPS don't like changes in lighting all of the sudden. You may start off with 350 PAR at the start of carbon and end up with a slow depletion to 250 PAR. You won't notice anything until you replace the carbon and within 8 hrs your right back to 350 PAR. So most of us just run Ozone and never have to worry about it. Ok time for bed and keep fighting the good fight. Nutrients are the biggest pain in the !@#!@#. I have one tank that is bare bottom and i've been fighting that tank everyday for 2 years. Never will I do a bare bottom again :) On a positive note. NO WATER CHANGES AND STOP VACUUMING YOUR SAND! if you want clean sand get a clean up crew and a couple sand sifting gobies lol.
Yes someone who knows what there talking about. I assumed after a year she would have a very diverse bio load by now. But i have heard with these dead rock people use it can take 2 years for good bio diversity to accumulate.
Whats is up with the ozone i have always used carbon but a reefer that i really respect and think he knows what he is doing uses ozone az well. Does it affect ph at all?
@@erikreagan2339 carbon isn’t bad, it’s just a media that doesn’t contribute to stability. Your light penetration of the water as it depletes vis water clarity. Ozone never depletes and is static. It doesn’t effect Ph, but it will cause plastic to deteriorate, so may sure your skimmer is compatible and your using ozone safe fittings.
Those acros you have on your palm, doesn't look like dead. I know acros will bleached out if they're dying or maybe your light settings is not for sps. I can tell you lps/torches are happy on that level and your sps were looks like almost the same level. Sometimes acros opens up when they're new then start dying because of lighting. It's kinda hard to keep mix reef tank because of lighting compatibility.
What was your phosphate and nitrates. If your cleaning your glass you have phosphate in your tank. If your nitrates bottom out. The only thing they would loss color. Did your alkalinity drop or go up. If Alk ok did you check your salinity?
Alk 8.3 salinity 1.025 stable. I’m starting to think it’s an issue unrelated to my nonexistent phos/nit because the wc helped and my tank seems a tad cloudy
I didn’t hear what your levels actually were. Were they undetectable? I wouldn’t use salifert for phosphate testing. It’s not sensitive enough for low nutrient systems. I would be using Hanna Phosphorus ULR. It measures in parts per billion and then you can convert to ppm.
I would check your potassium. I have heard salifert makes a decent test kit. The seachem nitrogen and phosphate work fine in my experience as well if you ever feel you need something right away.
I think adding the nitrate may help, but do you have a way to test the trace elements? The ICP is great, but takes several weeks to get your results. When you did your water change you were most likely adding back many trace elements that the corals and algae strip out of the water. I had the idea of not adding anything that I cannot test for. Your up near Dallas, right?? Have you checked with Dallas North Aquarium??
when i see this happen i think about 1) ph swing in the day if your spending more time inside more c02 entering the tank 2) increase alk demand causing larger drops in the day due to coral growth 3) larger alk demand with ph fluctuating due to being inside more in winter. 4)swings in alk or other parameters in weeks past (genetic processes take time to adapt). 4) to much calcium or potassium etc added 5) added an alk bolus to fast 6) I look at Macro algae's when they die do release a lot fo endogenous chemicals this need water change and carbon. 6) other coral losses release chemicals that have now triggered RTN 7) Bacterial blooms . the fact that water changes helped the coral suggests it is chemical/bacterial/biological as apposed to nitrate and phosphate alone. The nitrate and phosphate issue would be addressing the corals nutrition and ability to immunologically adapt or heal damage (as with humans when we get sick and malnourished). You may want to do some micro element dosing to increase coral immunity. These are things that I have had to address over the past 25 years in maintaining my own and other peoples tanks for similar reasons. I hope you figure it all out!! happy new years!
i dose my tank with all for reef everyday for my 250. i use to dose calcuim and alk but switched. my acros are doing fine and growing. maybe use all for reef.
Calc and dkh intake would not just kill her coral. You only add that stuff when you have so many coral growing so fast that they are depleting all the Calcium. And you can add so much calc without hurting your coral.
Sehr schade das du diese schönen Acropen verloren hast, Kopf hoch. Einige wichtige Parameter für Acroporen: Wenn der PO4 sehr tief steht, also bei 0,01-0,02, darf die KH niemals über 7,5 steigen, sonst sterben sie. Allgemein würde ich die KH immer bei 7,0 halten wenn man Acropora hält. Habe immer Stickstoff zuhause falls du Nährstoffe nachdosieren musst. Das Kalium/Calcium Verhältnis ist sehr wichtig für Acroporas. Mach einmal im Monat eine ICP... Und lass die Algen weg - sie sind absolut unnötig in deinem System. Greets from Germany :)
Send an ICP now. Being that you don’t have a lot of fish…and you have a fuge…might be low nutrients. What are your numbers? Nyos for Nitrate. Hanna phosphorus ULR. Those are very accurate for me.
@@QueenofReef only raise by 2 ppm max with NO3 or it will brown out your Acro’s. Also dose some aminos if you have some. James planted tank has a calculator and you can pick either sodium or potassium nitrate to figure the dose for your system. Doesn’t matter which one. Spoke to Randy Farley about it.
Try amino acids in low nutrient. Helps strengthen the acros to handle more shifts. Go slow raising nitrate. There are a lot of questions not answered. How do you know you didn't get an alk shift? I've noticed alk will dip or rise depending on nitrates and phosphate adding or removal. Possibly something in the water. Icp might show something . Could be numerous things that went wrong. I know from personal experience that bottoming out phosphate will cause rtn and raising them too fast will do the same. I'd concentrate on raising the phosphate over the nitrate slowly .Welcome to sps
If you're ever in a pinch and can't find neo-nitro or neo-phos, get sodium nitrate or tri-sodium phosphate use the jamesplantedtank calculator to mix it up to the same concentration if you ever need to raise nitrate and phosphate. Also, I had lost a fair number of acros a while back and ran an ICP test and found that my iodine had bottom out. So if in doubt run an ICP test.
I would add some Polyplab rocks and add up some Genesis. I think you should maybe add more fish slowly. Are you dosing amino acids? Poly booster does wonder. What is your PH? Did you had PH swings?
I’m no expert but you could easily try adding maybe 2-3 more fish something small to medium size that’ll bump up your nutrients for sure ! Or just keep up with the reef roofs lol
I would hazard a guess that doing big water changes made the situation a lot worse and is the potential cause of the acros dying. The quickest way to reduce nutrients is water changes after all. If I see a couple of corals not doing great but all the rest seem fine I try not to freak out and change anything, and if there is an issue with chemistry I will change it slowly over weeks, regardless if the current chemistry is upsetting a couple of corals. It's not worth upsetting all the rest. Of course, that method doesn't always apply but it's served me well
Don’t normally comment just a viewer but 1-Water change allowed you to completely remove any nutrients available. 2- running high par you must keep available nutrients this is key especially witht he stock of corals you have . I run multiple radions and yes it’s over kill but am a light and flow guy and you must keep nutrients at those par levels.
Definitely feel for you , by the way great tank and new subscriber 👍, I found with mine and a few friends that obviously when nutrients completely bottom out RTN is inevitable, totally agree that the algae on your back of the tank and glass was definitely sucking the life out the corals. Definitely the brightwell stuff will work but I would dose half of the recommended dose, as you don't want any other issues, I used to run a ULNS, but since I raised it up to nitrates 5-10 and phosphate 0.07 - 0.11 the tank looks great, take it slowly and you will get it right ,👍👍🙏🙏
Have you considered turning off that refugium, switching to frozen large particulate foods, and keeping the skimmer on at a lower rate? (take these suggestions with a grain of salt, I'm incredibly new to the hobby and don't even have a tank). I would think that refugium, especially with fresh healthy chaeto, is sucking a lot from your tank
Icp test on both your tank and fresh saltwater you are doing changes with. Marc on Melevs reef had a similar issue and turned out his salt had no potassium and the more water changes he did the worse it got. Positive thing though is your sand looks perfect
I had this issue were my nutrients bottomed out too like a month ago, I don’t want to lead you the wrong way but I don’t stopped my water changes completely to not remove any more nutrients, however my issue evolved into a Dino outbreak and you don’t have that, I just upped my feeding with dry foods and also started feeding oyster feast by reef nutrition bc that stuff makes your water dirty, and lowered my lighting (that was more for the Dino) and kept re testing nitrates and phosphates everyday, I don’t know if this was the right thing but it did help, try talking to your lfs, Good luck!
That Brightwell Nitro ...you can dump the whole bottle in because you're going to need about 50 more bottles. I used one bottle in 2weeks to bring a 40 gallon breeder full of SPS colonies from 3 to 10 nitrates. It's nutrients by the way. I wouldn't run a refugium in you situation. No bioload
Growth of SPS slowly takes off, then goes exponential and this leads to changes in dKH, calcium, magnesium at a quicker pace. You don’t know unless you track that.
I have a very similar tank. Red Sea Reefer 900 3XL. Ive got more bling on mine but basically the same. I run way more bioload in my system. I think you got caught by mistaking what the actual problem was. The Kessil is a strong enough lamp it had probably been that way for a long time. The nutrition collapse of your Chaeto destabilized the system and you made it worse by large water changes. A large dose of live phyto would have bought you a little time to get new macro. The problem of low nutrients created weak corals and the could not handle the destabilization. More fish and feed them. Once you get back to macros in the fuge as the dominant nutrient uptake lose the filter socks. Feed plenty and monitor nitrate more than calcium. FYI I started keeping reefs in ancient times lol. Circa 2002. My current system is only 4 months old. Nice tank though. Just keep those animals healthy enough to survive some instability.
Heavy import is needed if you are doing heavy export and not sure of your alk..if alk is above 9 SPS need more nutrients and light too otherwise they will starve..if alk is between 7-8 then low nutrients is the way to go
Double check your Salinity tester. Feed your fish with dry food add some amino acid. Only conclusion providing what you said the water par was stable. When you introduced new frags you could of introduced a bacteria or virus or parasite. I'm I big believer in quarantine frags as much as fish.
If your tank is low in nutrients then don’t do anymore water changes till they rebound. Otherwise your just taking even more nutrients out with every water change and dropping the nutrients further down. Do a couple big feedings to bring your nutrients up again and remember to always do everything slowly. Good luck
That’s why I feel like it’s maybe not a nutrient problem..? I mean I have a nutrient problem, but that wasn’t the cause of the death bc after I did the water change all of the corals looked so much better. And even the goni bounced back. Do you think it could be a bacteria bloom or something?
@@QueenofReef I don’t think it’s a bacterial bloom seeing that your water was nice and clear. But maybe the Chaeto dying could of had an effect on the corals. Are you running any carbon to get the toxins out that the chaeto put in your system?
My .02, if low nitrates or phosphates caused your issue, then doing water changes would further your issue not help. I suspect you are having a couple issues. I would think Iodide would be one potential thing to check. The Zooxanthellae in your corals are battling for resources against your macro Algea and your glass Algea. Iron, Iodine, nitrates, phosphates and other trace elements are needed for all competing. Even with your Kessil being set in the wrong spectrum (halfway), it shouldn’t have had an issue growing as long as it was on. 5-10ppm of Nitrates is gonna be the sweet spot but Chaeto Gro will help with balancing the others. I would also recommend to start a small culture of Nano phytoplankton (good episode), it’s easy (take a clear apple juice jug, drill a hole in the cap for the airline, a couple tiny holes for air exhaust, run air pump with soft airline into a rod of hard air line that goes to the bottom of the jug, fertilize with F2, stick in a foil lined box and hang a grow light above it. Harvest half one a week just refill with fresh salt water and couple ml of F2) Phyto turns the nutrients in the water column and any left over F2 fertilizer directly into coral and pod boosting food packaged up in the phyto cells.
Unfortunately this happens I loss a couple of acros when my nutrients bottomed out ever since I raised the nitrates everything started getting better, try not to run your skimmer 24/7 turn it off for 4hrs daily.
@@QueenofReef Unfortunately the temp only has to get too high for a couple of hours, then the corals will die/melt over the next 2-3 weeks. The bacterial bloom (you called algae) is a classic sign this has happened and so is the way the corals are dying and the fact you managed to kill chaeto. Nothing you can do about it if this has happened. Also make sure you are monitoring tank temp near the surface and not the sump of chiller temps.
You loaded a lot of sps fast (yes the tank aclimated first over a good time), when there wasn't a big diverse tank. Sps are quite often the little brats of the fish tank. Maybe triton test to see if some of the lesser nutrients aren't missing. Ps love the tank.
Agreed. My patience got the best of me, and when I saw them happy I thought it was all ok. Tank isn’t mature enough, but so close to it I can feel it!! Definitely doing ICP test and maybe dosing bacteria?
keep testing your water and sending icp tests. im surprised you werent ready for this. nitrate and phosphates are something you need to test constantly.my chaeto was in a black bucket with no light for 6 months and never died either. always hold a bottle of nitrate and phosphates to dose if you have to in an emergency. you should heavy feed your fish and broadcast feed your coral and spot feed. when you feed your coral daily you will be good. i feed my fish and coral 2-3 times daily and still have low nutrients in the water.
Just ordered an ICP. I’m a newbie and I’ve never even thought about this being an issue, at least not to this extent because I’ve always had the opposite problem-definitely unprepared (hence the guilt). But learned my lesson BIG TIME. I’ve been heavy feeding my fish, but starting to feed corals as well.
![KSI - Dirty [Official Visualiser]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/VoDh1h1dPUE/mqdefault.jpg)
I'm sorry about your corals. Thank you for taking us in your journey. I felt your pain and wish you the best. Keep us updated.
Kích thước cái hồ này bao nhiêu?
Over filtration is without a doubt one of the most common issues in reefing these days. So much cool tech that is super efficient at removing nutrients before corals can. I can’t run a fuge without dosing. Dirty class is a good sign, I chose to add a UV to limit how often I need to clean it but am worried if it doesn’t get a little hazy.
I highly recommend you invest in the the Hanna ultra low phosphate checker and add it to your daily regimen of checks. I aim for .03-.09 for my mixed sps/lps system and since bringing it up to this level I haven't had any more sps die off events. I use the same neonitro and neophos to keep them in the sweet spot.
Interesting that you say that. My phosphate levels are confusing. I’ve been as scientific as I can but I find the Hanna Phosphorus tester very unreliable. I’ve tested the same sample and had results from 0 to 16ppb using the same water, two different Hanna test kits and the different vials. I found the Salifert phosphate kit hard to read, but now I’m used to it I actually find it more reliable.
I now do ICP tests with Triton almost every month now as it’s the only reliable way.
Exact same thing happened to me about 6months ago and I made the mistake of overcorrecting the low Nitrates and dosing too much Nitrogen - with the exact product you showed. End result was that it shocked all my corals and i lost nearly every SPS in the tank and some of my prized LPS....absolutely devastating. Corals continued to die for 2-3 months so be prepared for that. I then had months of cyano and algae issues as I screwed the bacterial balance....You learn some painful and costly lessons in this hobby! My advice is just go really++ slow. As they say, nothing good happens quickly in reefing...
I removed all cheato as it was sucking out everything I was chucking in the tank. Have now replaced with caulerpa prolifera which seems to grow slower. I'm not trying to ride them ultra low levels anymore as its caused me many of headaches with dino. I try to stay somewhere near 0.1 p04 and 10ish no3.
Wondering why I even set it up in the first place and now I’m just embarrassed 😩 I think i’ve been getting too excited with this build and I need to slow things down. I hate low levels…absolute nightmare. Hopefully no dino’s here to come myself!
I would keep skimmer running and I would remove the Chateo. It is probably removing more stuff that you are adding to the tank. You also could feed more frozen food. It will increase NO3 and Po4
These fish are going to get so fat in the next few weeks lol.
@@QueenofReef Let them.....
Wouldn't pellet or flake food raise no3 po4 as its more nutrient dense?
I second this notion. I don't have a big tank, but the chaeto I had running on my tank completely decimated any nutrients I had. Completely bottomed to the point it threw off all the elements in my tank to. Needless to say I threw the Chaeto out and keep the skimmer running. I pour the skimmate back in the tank and shut it off for a day.
Sorry to see your bump in the road but thankful you’re sharing your journey. I’m sure a lot of us will learn something from this. At least this hobby is never boring!
Very true! Thank you 🙏
Had a very similar issue when i set up my new tank after about 4-6mo. Couldn't get chaeto to grow and tank glass was filthy all the time. I ended up buying chaeto one more time. I ended up using Neo Nitro (like you) and also Neo Phos as well as Chaeto grow all from brightwell and dosed slowly to the parameters i wanted. Turned my lights off on the tank and skimmer off for a few days and let the fuge light run itself for 12-14hrs to try to out compete the algae funk in the display. After about three days I started with a 6hr schedule on the display (still running the 12-14hr fuge light) i noticed the chaeto growing and the glass was only being cleaned 1-2 times a week. To me, this meant the fuge was out competing the display and I kept testing and kept the parameters at 10-12ppm for Nitrate, 0.06-0.08 for phosphates.
Once this happened, I slowly ramped on the display from 6,8,10, and finally the 12hr. schedule previously.
Since then, the chaeto is full blown and have had no issues with film algae and nutrients are stable. I do still dose slight ChaetoGro here and there though.
It may not work but just figured I'd put my 2cents in. GL and Keep up the fight! :-)
I dose NeoNitro and NeoPhos. The product literally changed everything about reefing for me. I have always run low nutrient systems, as I don't keep many fish because I'm gone 2 weeks a month, and the Neo products have been a game changer.
Hey, I’m going through the same issue. Did the NeoNitro work for you?
Could you tell me what kind of tang that is the one with the white tale?
Icp tests will give you a wider window of view for water chemistry. Also are you running an opposite lighting schedule for the chaeto or same time as main display?
Also one other thing did you make sure the foxface isn't getting to friendly by nipping on the acro polyps?
Found your channel a few days ago and binged the last few months of your content. The new aquarium has definitely been a challenge for you, but you're not giving up - you'll get there! Thanks for taking us along for the journey.
Love watching your progress. Your enthusiasm for the hobby is infectious and that energy will reward you. Everyone has bumps in the road.
🥺❤️
I would have also left the acros in the tank as they could jump back, you'd be surprised by some of them, just because they lose color doesn't always mean they are dead. Cannot hurt to have them in there for a couple months to see if there is any progress.
They were dead dead unfortunately 😥 Don’t have the heart to stare at them either ahhh
Had this issue also. I have just started with Microbacter 7 and plus NP until I can get readings. starting to see color again on the test kits now and I will switch to Balance np for carbon dosing.
But very difficult so far.
Brightwell solved My ULN issue. After 2 weeks my PO4 and NO3 Back to normal. I recomend to start with small dosage, especialy NeoPhos, its a fosfate bomb Inf you read the instructions. Good luck, keep reefing.
Did you test for ammonia ?
The understanding I have for the loss you're experiencing is off the charts. Loss in the hobby is seriously mentally exhausting.
Make sure your parameters from your mixing station match up with your parameters from your tank. You might have a bad bucket with low alk, cal, mag. Im currently dealing with this issue. This would definitely mess with your SPS.
The same thing just happened to my tank! Chaeto turned to mush, nutrients bottomed out 0. Picked up the Hanna ultra checkers. Neo nitro and phos are my life savers right now but I’m struggling to get nutrient levels back up. Ugh!! So frustrating!!
Might run some carbon a few days in case the dead SPS released something in the water. Also if you start dosing nitrate and phosphate start out with have the recommended dose. You need to slowly get to the levels needed. A quick jump will just cause more headache. Also might try running the skimmer on a 18 on 6 off to see if that helps.
I stop running my skimmer. Had no issues since
sorry for your coral loss, really feel for you as my tank does this every now and then that's why I always have a bottle of Nyos nitrate on hand and as soon as my no3 drops to 2.5 I bump it back up to 5
Definitely learned my lesson that I need to keep some on hand too!
I would say dirty up that tank and consider doing an ICP test to rule anything else out.
I’m definitely following you sista! Hope you find a solution quickly.
I have been fighting this for the past year. If you were to see in some of my videos, Any SPS I put inside my tank are STN within a couple weeks. Hopefully you get a quick turn around. I have thought about turning off my skimmer however it is constantly pulling out nasty skim mate so not thinking that would be wise.
I recently started following you. Noticed in 1 of your videos you say you're from TX. As am I. I live in San Antonio. If you're in the surrounding area 1 of our lfs got a batch of acro black bugs. The warehouse distributor is out of Dallas. Hope this helps. How I caught it was waited till lights out and did a zoom on camera. I was gutted. All my other sps are gtg
Since the corals bounce back after a water change which would at worst be LOWERING your nutrients as the cause, I would rule that out although too low isn't good. Perhaps adding some other "chemical filter" might help such as some ROX Carbon, Chemi Pure or perhaps Polyfilter. I would start with the ROX Carbon first and see if the corals seem to respond well to that and go from there.
Yep pretty much what I thought! Everything’s seemed to have stopped/bouncing back now. Have managed to bring my nutrients up, but this whole thing is still really odd. Watching and waiting atm (don’t want to make too many changes at once you know?)
More fish, more feeding. I'm a firm believer that heavy fish/feeding loads with heavy export is the best way to go with SPS.
Also, nice rock work; great minimalist style.
Agreed! New fish coming in two weeks, have increased feeding and feeding corals now (not too much, don’t want to shock though). Things are looking so much better already 😅 And thank you!!
Hello there, how is your reef doing?
Did it bounce back?
Did you find out the cause of the dying acros?
Yes to both! Currently working on a video! I’ve been in a funk so it’s been hard to upload, but explaining everything this week 😬
@@QueenofReef great to hear, can’t wait to see the video?
Definitely send an ICP test and see where the depletion in elements are. You may need to dose some trace elements either weekly or daily in your case. The algae film on the glass also helps feed your corals as you clean it off. I wouldn’t jump the gun and start changing things quickly as you will create more problems. Your going to create a swing affect. Great one week. Not so the other. I would just continue your water changes and replenish the elements being consumed by your animals once you get your ICP. You probably need more sulfate and potassium and boron. But who knows until you get a more idea on your ICP test. Know your parameters before you start continuing dosing more of what’s not needed. You will crash your tank.
Take it slow and you will have a flourishing reef system. Dosing more elements seem to be in your near future.
Happy New Year
Oh yah. Your answers could be at Hydrospace LLC. Check it out. Since you have a nutrient issue.
Why dose everyone run to the icp test the trace elements are so minimal that the water changes will already have replenish them. The only reason to get icp test is if you are experimenting with potassium for better color on your acro so you don't dose too much which is so easy because there levels are so low. The real problem is acidity in our tanks from low PH and or high PO4. Mostly the low ph everyone thinks is ok. The biggest hidden secret ever successful reefer has is they keep there ph between 8.3 and 8.4 and no one ever asks about this they only ask what are you dosing and check your icp. Just get your ph up.
@@erikreagan2339
It’s all about water volume. If your system has depleted elements. Water changes aren’t the only answer these days. Our equipment operates so well that with the life in your system with the mechanics involved. Water changes just aren’t the answer anymore. Also to chase ph requires elements like boron and others. So ICP test isn’t the grand all answer. But as a hobbyists it helps get you closer to a solution to a persistent problem. Test helps. Regardless. Also not all salts are the same. They aren’t regardless what people say. I wouldn’t knock down anything that helps a hobbyists succeed. Testing is all we got. So use it..
Hi, what is your PH at? I hope it's not below 8 by any chance?
My phosphates have been rising they are at .12 now, I have a bunch of algae but I now have a phosphate reactor so phosphates should be going down. My nitrates are at 0 for a while, should I get more fish to raise nitrates or dose that nitrate in a bottle?
I would definitely go the fish route if you’re able to! That way you can balance the bio load out and won’t have to dose all of the time
@@QueenofReef awesome thanks for the tip I will try that out! :)
i wonder at what level you keep your Alk level. in my experience, if Alk goes anywhere above 8 while having low nutrients (~
Yep, a lot of truth in this. This kept happening to me until I realized I needed to keep my ALK between 6.5 - 8.0 ...this kept happening to me and the odd thing was everytime my ALK was above 8.
Could something else be leaching into the tank? Some other contaminant? Seems like you had a decent amount of nitrates if the algae was going crazy immediately after you removed the chaeto, you’d think the Acros would have been able to use some of that too.
That’s exactly what i’m thinking…the tank is getting pretty cloudy also. Still not sure what’s going on exactly.
From some googling, I saw some others have their acros die due to stray voltage. Essentially some piece of faulty equipment leaking a weak electric current into the water. Just another potential culprit to maybe check out.
@@ManiacalMangoes Have to eliminate everything! Will be checking out today to see 🙏
@@QueenofReef you could have a salt problem with a trace element. could also have a pump or magnet leeching into the tank. definitely get an icp test. also buy nitrate and phosphate kits from red sea. then make an algae control kit that has both tests for cheaper. also you shouldn't need to test alk and Cal frequently because with your water volume changes will happen slower.
Thank you for sharing this ❤️ keep your head up
Hi First of all, sorry for bad englisch im Form Germany. ;-) I don't think it's a phosphate or nitrate problem otherwise the LPS would be much earlier. If necessary, I would filter activated carbon and do an ICP test where you also get the other values that you don't get with the drop tests. I'm guessing here on an iron or copper problem, something like that. I have a redox measuring device permanently installed, if something dies or goes bad the value drops and I see it immediately, in addition I add ozone until the value is back to approx. 350mv
I’m wondering if her dkh has been swinging??
Just coincidentally stumbled across your channel. I love seeing more womem involved with the hobby. ✌
I'm sorry for your loss I have a 94 gallon aquarium with a 40 gallon sump it's been setup going on a year now had major trouble with ammonia in the beginning I use dr. Tim one and only my ammonia stayed majorly High for about a month-and-a-half after that got straight I did a couple of water changes and I can say since August 21st ammonia, phosphate,no2,no3 have been at 0PPM and everyone that I've talked to about this cannot explain why I feed my fish a lot I have had a few people tell me they think it's from the dry Rock that I used three bags of live sand but I don't know
Have you considered getting an icp test? I always worry about things like heavy metals and stuff like that when i have a few loses. Only takes a bit of equipment breaking down and leaching something bad. Probably is the low nutrients but always good to test
Ordered one to come! Definitely need one to make sure, especially considering the water change made everything stop/look better (which makes me think more than one problem here…😥)
Yeah so frustrating isn’t it! Sometimes you can do everything right and it can still go south 😔
A couple thoughts..
1: The cheato was removing/keeping something in check. When the cheato died...that component irritated your acros. I found that it is absolutely necessary to dose iron to keep my cheato flourishing.
2: When nutrients are too low, acros can't handle too much light. Their metabolic process gets out of whack. I'm not sure what your PAR is at...but once nutrients bottom out.. .acros can get pretty fickle.
I make homemade KNO3, Na3PO4, and Iron solutions...it's very easy and cheap. Once I dosed these, my acros exploded with growth.
Where did you find the info to make your own dosing
I'd suggest keeping your skimmer on even if you take the collection cup off or turn it down so you're not skimming. You could drop your ph a lot not having a skimmer running and exacerbate your problem. I feed hpd with reef chili and nori to keep my phosphate up, and am dosing sodium nitrate when my nitrate gets low.
Reduce the time your refugium light is on. Cheato is very efficient as you’ve witnessed. I run my fuge light for 4 hours that’s it. Even then I still find myself dosing nitrogen. A fellow reefer I know has their fuge light on every other night instead of nightly for 6 hours. Works for them.
Will have to do that when I reintroduce! Holding off until my water is more dirty. It definitely is efficient that’s for sure 😅
I’m looking forward to seeing this tank when the corals grow out.
Me too! Hopefully no more issues 🙏
When ever I added my ATS I was having problems with low nutrients and what i did first was add more fish like anthias which help but was not enough, so I just started feeding the fish more(5x a day with reef roids mixed within the auto feeder). Which solved my problems. I also don’t think the change in light spectrum on the refugium caused the chaeto to die, because I have used the kessil in the all blue and all white spectrum to grow chaeto and didn’t see any difference in growth. I also did have a lot of acros die of non existing nutrients when I first started using the ATS. I forgot to ask but are you using any type of supplements like cheatoGro to replenish the elements the chaeto is using?
Keeping your skimmer off isn't going to help your PH level at all, turn it back on and just leave the top off so your not removing nutrients. Your going to need Neo Phos as well. Are you testing Phosphorous (PPB)? You might want to get the ULN test kits at this point (Red Sea Pro nitrates and Hanna phosphorus). Salifert isn't going to help you anymore. Dose Phos and Nitrates. Dose and then test your water in 1 hr. then test the next day. You can then gauge the consumption rate. If the rates are going down compared to that 1hr test then the system is still using the nitrates and phosphates. Don't over compensate on this cause typically the system will consume consume consume and look like it needs it, but eventually it's going to stop like it hit a brick wall and you don't want to overshoot it. It's like a freight train once it gets moving and very slow to stop moving in a direction.
I'm not sure why you started Chaeto. Where your nitrates and phosphates high? If they weren't then it's worthless cause the Chaeto will just die unless your dosing fertilizer. I also highly doubt your nutrients were totally zero. Your LFS probably didn't use test kits made to detect ULNS, but I'm sure your probably pretty low since the acros are dyeing and keeping them under ULNS conditions is very risky. You get awesome colorization with ULNS, but it makes the corals very susceptible to changes. You even said in your video you could see the corals colors getting deeper and more vibrant each and every day (#Signs of trouble).
Also it's just my guess here, but you recently added Chaeto to your tank, cause the last video I really didn't see anything in your refuge under that Kesil light and you were already struggling with low nutrients. You are also doing massive water changes and also cleaning your sand. THIS IS NOT HELPING lol. Stop doing water changes, stop vacuuming your sand.. Let your system get dirty and your bacteria develop and monitor your Nitrates and Phosphates/Phosphorous. I would immediately start getting as much diverse bacteria as you can. Get a piece of live rock (from a trust worthy source), get some BioDigest Prodibio bacteria dosed, get some AF Life Source, Dr. Tims Refresh. You need to add these things, because your cleaning routine although fun to watch; ok painful to watch by means that you go through a ton of manual work to accomplish it, is depleting your good bacteria.
*On a side note - If you are seriously having algae issues where you need to clean the glass and back wall all the time, Neo Nitro and Neo Phos is going to make you pull your hair out in a minute. Cause guess what happens when Algae gets nutrients and light? You will just be feeding this issue and making it worse. This brings me back to your bacteria diversity Biome. See previous paragraph on getting some bacteria and dose microbacter 7 and clean right away, but remember that microbacter 7 and clean is not going to resolve your problem long term. The bacteria in those bottles does not live long within the system. You need to develop the long lasting diverse biome. If you're scratching your head as to why your having problems now, well it's because all that cleaning was actually helping while bacteria was developing, but now slowly over time you have been hurting it and algae is starting to gain an upper hand and depleting the system because the cleaning is removing what you worked so hard to develop.
I also don't understand why so many people are suggesting getting an ICP test for you; i guess if you think you have candles in your tank it would be a good test lol. I get them every month, but really they are just for my trace elements and corrections I need to dose. Your water changes are already replenishing your trace elements (ps to get your biome setup dose trace elements while your not doing water changes). there are a ton of manufactures that make trace elements that are easy to dose (tropic marine makes a great one). I use the ICP test because I dose each element individually, which I doubt you want to do right now with a system so young anyways. Now what will benefit you as in a water test would be a AquaBiome DNA water test. Once you achieve a good result from that test, then you are ready for SPS.
Ok one more rant and then I'm done for the night lol. I don't think there is any pro-reefer that utilizes chaeto. Chaeto is a unbalanced system just like carbon, gfo or anything else within a system that depletes or gets removed from a system. I get it tho cause it's kinda cool cause Chaeto grows fast and it's fun. Kinda like the Chia pet; ok I seriously aged myself there. Cha Cha Chia. So if you want stability ... Chaeto isn't it , because say you're nitrate and phosphates are 5ppm and .03ppm with chaeto running and now you need to remove some cause it's overgrown; well now your nitrates and phosphates are on the rise cause because you removed it. Then you start seeing your sps start to STN or RTN due to nutrient imbalance. GFO and carbon are the same; slowly depleted and cause system instability. One would say well carbon depletion doesn't hurt anything; Well Wrongo it does, cause it effects your lights ability to penetrate the water and SPS don't like changes in lighting all of the sudden. You may start off with 350 PAR at the start of carbon and end up with a slow depletion to 250 PAR. You won't notice anything until you replace the carbon and within 8 hrs your right back to 350 PAR. So most of us just run Ozone and never have to worry about it. Ok time for bed and keep fighting the good fight. Nutrients are the biggest pain in the !@#!@#. I have one tank that is bare bottom and i've been fighting that tank everyday for 2 years. Never will I do a bare bottom again :)
On a positive note. NO WATER CHANGES AND STOP VACUUMING YOUR SAND! if you want clean sand get a clean up crew and a couple sand sifting gobies lol.
Yes someone who knows what there talking about. I assumed after a year she would have a very diverse bio load by now. But i have heard with these dead rock people use it can take 2 years for good bio diversity to accumulate.
Whats is up with the ozone i have always used carbon but a reefer that i really respect and think he knows what he is doing uses ozone az well. Does it affect ph at all?
@@erikreagan2339 carbon isn’t bad, it’s just a media that doesn’t contribute to stability. Your light penetration of the water as it depletes vis water clarity. Ozone never depletes and is static. It doesn’t effect Ph, but it will cause plastic to deteriorate, so may sure your skimmer is compatible and your using ozone safe fittings.
Those acros you have on your palm, doesn't look like dead. I know acros will bleached out if they're dying or maybe your light settings is not for sps. I can tell you lps/torches are happy on that level and your sps were looks like almost the same level. Sometimes acros opens up when they're new then start dying because of lighting. It's kinda hard to keep mix reef tank because of lighting compatibility.
What was your phosphate and nitrates. If your cleaning your glass you have phosphate in your tank. If your nitrates bottom out. The only thing they would loss color. Did your alkalinity drop or go up. If Alk ok did you check your salinity?
Alk 8.3 salinity 1.025 stable. I’m starting to think it’s an issue unrelated to my nonexistent phos/nit because the wc helped and my tank seems a tad cloudy
I didn’t hear what your levels actually were. Were they undetectable? I wouldn’t use salifert for phosphate testing. It’s not sensitive enough for low nutrient systems. I would be using Hanna Phosphorus ULR. It measures in parts per billion and then you can convert to ppm.
I have the hanna checker so I will try it out! Undetectable nitrate and phos.
I would check your potassium. I have heard salifert makes a decent test kit. The seachem nitrogen and phosphate work fine in my experience as well if you ever feel you need something right away.
Damn that sucks! Did u ever figure out what was wrong?
I think adding the nitrate may help, but do you have a way to test the trace elements? The ICP is great, but takes several weeks to get your results. When you did your water change you were most likely adding back many trace elements that the corals and algae strip out of the water. I had the idea of not adding anything that I cannot test for. Your up near Dallas, right?? Have you checked with Dallas North Aquarium??
when i see this happen i think about 1) ph swing in the day if your spending more time inside more c02 entering the tank 2) increase alk demand causing larger drops in the day due to coral growth 3) larger alk demand with ph fluctuating due to being inside more in winter. 4)swings in alk or other parameters in weeks past (genetic processes take time to adapt). 4) to much calcium or potassium etc added 5) added an alk bolus to fast 6) I look at Macro algae's when they die do release a lot fo endogenous chemicals this need water change and carbon. 6) other coral losses release chemicals that have now triggered RTN 7) Bacterial blooms . the fact that water changes helped the coral suggests it is chemical/bacterial/biological as apposed to nitrate and phosphate alone. The nitrate and phosphate issue would be addressing the corals nutrition and ability to immunologically adapt or heal damage (as with humans when we get sick and malnourished). You may want to do some micro element dosing to increase coral immunity. These are things that I have had to address over the past 25 years in maintaining my own and other peoples tanks for similar reasons. I hope you figure it all out!! happy new years!
Hello, how is your KH? Low nutriments=low kh. Near 6.
Hope you got the tank nutrients figured out. Follow video??
And if you try PO4+ from aquaforest? 🤔
Haven’t used it!
i dose my tank with all for reef everyday for my 250. i use to dose calcuim and alk but switched. my acros are doing fine and growing. maybe use all for reef.
Calc and dkh intake would not just kill her coral. You only add that stuff when you have so many coral growing so fast that they are depleting all the Calcium. And you can add so much calc without hurting your coral.
Sehr schade das du diese schönen Acropen verloren hast, Kopf hoch.
Einige wichtige Parameter für Acroporen:
Wenn der PO4 sehr tief steht, also bei 0,01-0,02, darf die KH niemals über 7,5 steigen, sonst sterben sie. Allgemein würde ich die KH immer bei 7,0 halten wenn man Acropora hält. Habe immer Stickstoff zuhause falls du Nährstoffe nachdosieren musst. Das Kalium/Calcium Verhältnis ist sehr wichtig für Acroporas. Mach einmal im Monat eine ICP... Und lass die Algen weg - sie sind absolut unnötig in deinem System. Greets from Germany :)
Send an ICP now. Being that you don’t have a lot of fish…and you have a fuge…might be low nutrients. What are your numbers? Nyos for Nitrate. Hanna phosphorus ULR. Those are very accurate for me.
I ordered one today. Phos and nitrate are bottomed out completely - 0 😭 I’m so screwed
@@QueenofReef only raise by 2 ppm max with NO3 or it will brown out your Acro’s. Also dose some aminos if you have some. James planted tank has a calculator and you can pick either sodium or potassium nitrate to figure the dose for your system. Doesn’t matter which one. Spoke to Randy Farley about it.
Chemi clean or ciprofloxacin can resolve rtn issues if the problem is pathogenic bacteria running amuck.
Try amino acids in low nutrient. Helps strengthen the acros to handle more shifts. Go slow raising nitrate. There are a lot of questions not answered. How do you know you didn't get an alk shift? I've noticed alk will dip or rise depending on nitrates and phosphate adding or removal. Possibly something in the water. Icp might show something . Could be numerous things that went wrong. I know from personal experience that bottoming out phosphate will cause rtn and raising them too fast will do the same. I'd concentrate on raising the phosphate over the nitrate slowly .Welcome to sps
If you're ever in a pinch and can't find neo-nitro or neo-phos, get sodium nitrate or tri-sodium phosphate use the jamesplantedtank calculator to mix it up to the same concentration if you ever need to raise nitrate and phosphate. Also, I had lost a fair number of acros a while back and ran an ICP test and found that my iodine had bottom out. So if in doubt run an ICP test.
Sorry to hear about your issue. Maybe get an ICP test and see what is really far off. This can tell you what may be wrong with your water.
Ordered one today! Getting to the bottom of this… can’t lose any more 😔
Sorry for your coral loss good luck
Thank you 🙏
I would add some Polyplab rocks and add up some Genesis. I think you should maybe add more fish slowly. Are you dosing amino acids? Poly booster does wonder. What is your PH? Did you had PH swings?
I’m no expert but you could easily try adding maybe 2-3 more fish something small to medium size that’ll bump up your nutrients for sure ! Or just keep up with the reef roofs lol
shutting off your protein skimmer might lower your ph, maybe you could leave it on but not skim anything or leave the cup off.
I have turned it back on after I recorded 😅
I would hazard a guess that doing big water changes made the situation a lot worse and is the potential cause of the acros dying. The quickest way to reduce nutrients is water changes after all. If I see a couple of corals not doing great but all the rest seem fine I try not to freak out and change anything, and if there is an issue with chemistry I will change it slowly over weeks, regardless if the current chemistry is upsetting a couple of corals. It's not worth upsetting all the rest. Of course, that method doesn't always apply but it's served me well
The water change did help considerably, I think I have more than one problem here 😵
Don’t normally comment just a viewer but 1-Water change allowed you to completely remove any nutrients available. 2- running high par you must keep available nutrients this is key especially witht he stock of corals you have . I run multiple radions and yes it’s over kill but am a light and flow guy and you must keep nutrients at those par levels.
Definitely feel for you , by the way great tank and new subscriber 👍, I found with mine and a few friends that obviously when nutrients completely bottom out RTN is inevitable, totally agree that the algae on your back of the tank and glass was definitely sucking the life out the corals. Definitely the brightwell stuff will work but I would dose half of the recommended dose, as you don't want any other issues, I used to run a ULNS, but since I raised it up to nitrates 5-10 and phosphate 0.07 - 0.11 the tank looks great, take it slowly and you will get it right ,👍👍🙏🙏
Have you considered turning off that refugium, switching to frozen large particulate foods, and keeping the skimmer on at a lower rate? (take these suggestions with a grain of salt, I'm incredibly new to the hobby and don't even have a tank). I would think that refugium, especially with fresh healthy chaeto, is sucking a lot from your tank
Icp test on both your tank and fresh saltwater you are doing changes with. Marc on Melevs reef had a similar issue and turned out his salt had no potassium and the more water changes he did the worse it got. Positive thing though is your sand looks perfect
I had this issue were my nutrients bottomed out too like a month ago, I don’t want to lead you the wrong way but I don’t stopped my water changes completely to not remove any more nutrients, however my issue evolved into a Dino outbreak and you don’t have that, I just upped my feeding with dry foods and also started feeding oyster feast by reef nutrition bc that stuff makes your water dirty, and lowered my lighting (that was more for the Dino) and kept re testing nitrates and phosphates everyday, I don’t know if this was the right thing but it did help, try talking to your lfs, Good luck!
Greatings from Germany 🌊💙
I feel you pain… same thing happened to me long time ago and I when crazy trying everything but I make it…
Definitely going crazy 😩
That Brightwell Nitro ...you can dump the whole bottle in because you're going to need about 50 more bottles. I used one bottle in 2weeks to bring a 40 gallon breeder full of SPS colonies from 3 to 10 nitrates. It's nutrients by the way. I wouldn't run a refugium in you situation. No bioload
Growth of SPS slowly takes off, then goes exponential and this leads to changes in dKH, calcium, magnesium at a quicker pace. You don’t know unless you track that.
I do track it 😬 Has been stable
Test you potassium, should be between 380-420 mg/l. Marc Levinson had similar problems with corals loosing coulor and dying.
I have a very similar tank. Red Sea Reefer 900 3XL. Ive got more bling on mine but basically the same. I run way more bioload in my system. I think you got caught by mistaking what the actual problem was. The Kessil is a strong enough lamp it had probably been that way for a long time. The nutrition collapse of your Chaeto destabilized the system and you made it worse by large water changes. A large dose of live phyto would have bought you a little time to get new macro. The problem of low nutrients created weak corals and the could not handle the destabilization. More fish and feed them. Once you get back to macros in the fuge as the dominant nutrient uptake lose the filter socks. Feed plenty and monitor nitrate more than calcium. FYI I started keeping reefs in ancient times lol. Circa 2002. My current system is only 4 months old. Nice tank though. Just keep those animals healthy enough to survive some instability.
Heavy import is needed if you are doing heavy export and not sure of your alk..if alk is above 9 SPS need more nutrients and light too otherwise they will starve..if alk is between 7-8 then low nutrients is the way to go
Double check your Salinity tester. Feed your fish with dry food add some amino acid. Only conclusion providing what you said the water par was stable. When you introduced new frags you could of introduced a bacteria or virus or parasite. I'm I big believer in quarantine frags as much as fish.
Update?
working on getting one out this weekend !
If your tank is low in nutrients then don’t do anymore water changes till they rebound. Otherwise your just taking even more nutrients out with every water change and dropping the nutrients further down. Do a couple big feedings to bring your nutrients up again and remember to always do everything slowly. Good luck
That’s why I feel like it’s maybe not a nutrient problem..? I mean I have a nutrient problem, but that wasn’t the cause of the death bc after I did the water change all of the corals looked so much better. And even the goni bounced back. Do you think it could be a bacteria bloom or something?
@@QueenofReef I don’t think it’s a bacterial bloom seeing that your water was nice and clear. But maybe the Chaeto dying could of had an effect on the corals. Are you running any carbon to get the toxins out that the chaeto put in your system?
Send out an icp for sure and get those nutrients up in the mean time
That’s the plan…hopefully no more losses (seems to have calmed down though?)
My .02, if low nitrates or phosphates caused your issue, then doing water changes would further your issue not help. I suspect you are having a couple issues. I would think Iodide would be one potential thing to check. The Zooxanthellae in your corals are battling for resources against your macro Algea and your glass Algea. Iron, Iodine, nitrates, phosphates and other trace elements are needed for all competing. Even with your Kessil being set in the wrong spectrum (halfway), it shouldn’t have had an issue growing as long as it was on. 5-10ppm of Nitrates is gonna be the sweet spot but Chaeto Gro will help with balancing the others. I would also recommend to start a small culture of Nano phytoplankton (good episode), it’s easy (take a clear apple juice jug, drill a hole in the cap for the airline, a couple tiny holes for air exhaust, run air pump with soft airline into a rod of hard air line that goes to the bottom of the jug, fertilize with F2, stick in a foil lined box and hang a grow light above it. Harvest half one a week just refill with fresh salt water and couple ml of F2) Phyto turns the nutrients in the water column and any left over F2 fertilizer directly into coral and pod boosting food packaged up in the phyto cells.
Sorry for the issues :(
🙏
You're not alone I lost two mini acro colonies for no damn reason... i get more and more tempted to do brain dead easy corals every day.
Low nutrients lower light , higher nutrients higher light par
Yep! Just happened so quickly I didn’t adjust 🥺
Unfortunately this happens I loss a couple of acros when my nutrients bottomed out ever since I raised the nitrates everything started getting better, try not to run your skimmer 24/7 turn it off for 4hrs daily.
Have a close look at your temps as the tank shows signs of getting a little too hot.
Corals don't die like that from low nutes...
Right, I think low nutrients isn’t the cause (still a problem but)…esp because the water change helped. My temp has been stable. I’m so worried
@@QueenofReef Unfortunately the temp only has to get too high for a couple of hours, then the corals will die/melt over the next 2-3 weeks. The bacterial bloom (you called algae) is a classic sign this has happened and so is the way the corals are dying and the fact you managed to kill chaeto. Nothing you can do about it if this has happened. Also make sure you are monitoring tank temp near the surface and not the sump of chiller temps.
I wish I could give some advice , dont give up your will figure it out 👍🏽✌🏽
Thank you 🙏🙏
@@QueenofReef Happy New Year
You loaded a lot of sps fast (yes the tank aclimated first over a good time), when there wasn't a big diverse tank. Sps are quite often the little brats of the fish tank. Maybe triton test to see if some of the lesser nutrients aren't missing. Ps love the tank.
Agreed. My patience got the best of me, and when I saw them happy I thought it was all ok. Tank isn’t mature enough, but so close to it I can feel it!! Definitely doing ICP test and maybe dosing bacteria?
Considering a water change as a "band aid" might be at least part of the overall problem.
How
keep testing your water and sending icp tests. im surprised you werent ready for this. nitrate and phosphates are something you need to test constantly.my chaeto was in a black bucket with no light for 6 months and never died either. always hold a bottle of nitrate and phosphates to dose if you have to in an emergency. you should heavy feed your fish and broadcast feed your coral and spot feed. when you feed your coral daily you will be good. i feed my fish and coral 2-3 times daily and still have low nutrients in the water.
Just ordered an ICP. I’m a newbie and I’ve never even thought about this being an issue, at least not to this extent because I’ve always had the opposite problem-definitely unprepared (hence the guilt). But learned my lesson BIG TIME. I’ve been heavy feeding my fish, but starting to feed corals as well.
can feel u on that one even tho i still love th ehoby there do be times were i be like should i just sell it all bcz its honestly a lil to much. LOL
Low nutrients why are you doing water changes.
Have you been reaching to the bottom of the tank for snails
😔 I hope you figure it out
What were your nitrates and phosphate?