My Lighting Spectrum??

[Eb0la11]

Edit*** Ok so I dont think it has anything to do with my lighting. See page two, post number 16 of the forum for info on my water parameters. That's now what I need help with. Cheers!

Hey guys,

so my corals are not doing that well lately and Im trying to figure out what has made them go south a bit.

I can attribute it to either a bit of poor water quality, which has been rectified lately, though Im still not dosing but have changed over probably 40% of my water in the last 3 weeks, but I think it might be my lighting.

For example, my candy cane coral is showing little to no colour. It opens up fine at night and I feed about once a week, but it has no colour. Nor does my pulsing xenia anymore and it has shrunk.

My light is a Coralife AquaLight Pro with 3x 250W MH and 4x 96W Actinics that run for a 12 hour period every day.

My tank is 24" deep and my light is 4" off the surface. So my candy cane is probably 16" from it right now.

What do you guys think? I need to learn what "high intensity" lighting would be, would this be like right near the surface or what? Where is my medium intensity light range?

[viperfish]

250W is tons of light for a candycane. How old are your bulbs?

[Eb0la11]

They are about 4.5 months old now.

[Bloodasp]

I think it might have more to do with your water parameters than anything.

[Eb0la11]

Yeah I would guess so too, I'll need to get some test kits and take some readings pretty soon here, might need to start dosing if I wanna keep corals.

Does anyone have success with corals without dosing in a similar setup with a good light, good skimmer and frequent water changes?

[ScubaSteve]

Alright, I'm probably going to take wrath from people here saying this but... MH bulbs DO NOT change much over their lifetime. Ok, so maybe there is a slight decrease in output but it is minimal. I use MH consistenly in my reseach and I have to calibrate the lamp every week; no change over the past year. Your flourescents will die overtime but not that much in 4.5 months.

Your problem seems like params OR you have some chemical warfare going on. When you say the candy cane has no colour, does it looked bleached? More importantly, is it receding? What else is hangin' out in that tank?

[Eb0la11]

Well, we got a few corals doing well and then some that are not really at all.

Doing ok/well:
Frogspawn
Favia
Red Montipora
Green Digitata
Green Star Polyps
Green Bubble Tip Anenome (no where near any corals)

Doing Poor:
Candy Cane
Birds Nest
Hammer Coral
Pulsing Xenia
Colt Coral
Green Montipora Cap
Red Montipora Cap

Thoughts? No corals are really that close to each other, most are still pretty small in size too.

The Candy cane does look white, but I am inexperienced and dont know if it looks like its receding. It opens up at night no problem.

Thanks for the help guys!

[Eb0la11]

Any more thoughts?

[fishytime]

Yeah I would guess so too, I'll need to get some test kits and take some readings pretty soon here, might need to start dosing if I wanna keep corals.

Does anyone have success with corals without dosing in a similar setup with a good light, good skimmer and frequent water changes?

Check out Carmen's 75g bowfront thread.......probably one of the nicest, low tech low budget, non dosed tanks you will ever see...http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=45688&page=10

[fishytime]

Well, we got a few corals doing well and then some that are not really at all.

Doing ok/well:
Frogspawn
Favia
Red Montipora
Green Digitata
Green Star Polyps
Green Bubble Tip Anenome (no where near any corals)

Doing Poor:
Candy Cane
Birds Nest
Hammer Coral
Pulsing Xenia
Colt Coral
Green Montipora Cap
Red Montipora Cap

Thoughts? No corals are really that close to each other, most are still pretty small in size too.

The Candy cane does look white, but I am inexperienced and dont know if it looks like its receding. It opens up at night no problem.

Thanks for the help guys!

How big are the colt and xenia?.....leathers are the worst for chemical warfare....that could be something to think about......are you running carbon?

[Carmen]

Check out Carmen's 75g bowfront thread.......probably one of the nicest, low tech low budget, non dosed tanks you will ever see...http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=45688&page=10

Thanks Doug!:wink:

I had great success with my low budget 72G. I attempted dosing and felt it wasn't for me...I was extremely inconsistent and just did not want to put in the time.:redface: ( My time spent on the tank is somewhat limited)
I do believe I started seeing a decline in certain corals once my leathers reached a good size. So perhaps chemical warfare may be to blame. Running carbon is a necessity with leathers.
Also I have experimented with certain salts and found different salts affected the tank. (ofcourse that alone could be explained by parameters rather than salt but I have never been real good at consistent testing).
I have the same frustrations at being able to keep certain corals with great success and others that just don't do well and slowly fade or die. Frustating as that may be I just chalk it up to some things are happy in one tank and not another.:wink:

Carmen

[ScubaSteve]

I keep a 20G with the 150W Coralife Aquapro, HOB filter with carbon, no skimmer. I do water changes every week to two weeks. I'll do it more frequenty is something looks unhappy. I find my colt and frogspawn to be like 'canaries in the coal mine' to let me know it something isn't right. I have eerything in that tank... softies, LPS and SPS. I have a HUGE toadstool in the tank which is a bit of a polluter that upsets the others from times to time but typically I find with carbon this goes away. Oh, and I keep my candy cane right on the sand and he grows like stupid.

Definitely get some test kits. You might it could be something as simple as your pH being off. Test, then dose IF you need it.

Yeah I would guess so too, I'll need to get some test kits and take some readings pretty soon here, might need to start dosing if I wanna keep corals.

Does anyone have success with corals without dosing in a similar setup with a good light, good skimmer and frequent water changes?

[Eb0la11]

Hmmmm, some interesting thoughts. I am not using carbon right now, but I might have to start I guess? haha.

The xenia and colt coral were, when at their peak size maybe the size of a couple soft balls for the xenia and a tennis ball for the colt.

They are definitely doing poor now and I dont know if theyre going to make it. Think they are the culprit?

[ScubaSteve]

Don't forget that a reef is really just a pretty looking battleground. There may be something attacking the softies who are then fighting back with chemical warfare which is ****ing off the other corals. It's vicious circle. Just work your way through the solutions: water change and parameters, carbon (lots), look for pests like Xenia-eating nudibranchs, crabs, etc., make sure nothing is touching/ relocate certain corals, pray.

[Eb0la11]

Hmmm, ok so I've got a minimal amount of carbon running now just in a HOB aquaclear 50. Its about 3 cups or so maybe 4?

How much do you guys run at a time on an aquarium with a 165G display and probably another 40G of water in my 60G sump? Also how long is it good for? A month?

Anyways, thanks for the help guys, I'll try this for now and see if it helps. Probably won't see results very fast.

[Eb0la11]

Ok so I just got a test kit to test the water, here are my readings:

Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - Very low, near 0
pH - between 8.1 and 8.3 (probably closer to 8.3)
Calcium - < 340 > 320
Phosphate - 0 - 0.25
Alkalinity - How do I test for this? There wasnt a way to test it in the kit I got.
Magnesium - See Above
gH - Should I test this? I cant find info on what a good range would be for it
kH - See above
Iron - I didnt test for this but could if needed.

So what do you guys think I should do to get my corals to start responding better to their environment? I see my calcium is below the ideal conditions and I could look at dosing that, but everything else seems adequate

[kien]

Alkalinity - How do I test for this? There wasnt a way to test it in the kit I got.
Magnesium - See Above


They sell test kits for both of these tests. Just about every test kit manufacturer has their own and your favourite LFS should have one. Might want to call to check stock first thought as these kits seem to always be out of stock or have low stocking for some reason.

[Bloodasp]

alkalinity is your kh. At least that's what I think it is. GH is more for fresh water.

[Eb0la11]

alkalinity is your kh. At least that's what I think it is. GH is more for fresh water.

Can anyone else verify this?

[Eb0la11]

So Im just doing some reading about how Alkalinity Calcium and Magnesium levels all kinda need to be balanced and therefore you cant just up say the calcium right now (or so thats how Ive interpreted this article Im reading)

So I was wondering if you guys can give me an example of how the numbers might change for all three if I dosed just calcium. Would alk and mg go down or how does it work exactly?

What do you add to the water to up or lower any of the three levels? Whats the easiest way to add, as well? Do I need some kind of dosing system? Could I use my ATO to dose once I get my levels correct? just add my dosages in proportion to a 5g bucket that would auto top off the system during evaporation?

[Eb0la11]

Bump