Blah coral colours... any tips?

[doch]

So it seems that I can't get good colouration out of a fair number of the sps that I put in my tank. It's a 55 gal with an Aquaticlife 6 bulb T5HO fixture... If I remember corrctly, 2 fiji purples, 2 super blues, and 2 coral lite 2's. Light cycle of 13 hours on the super blues, and 12 hours on the rest. Chemistry... phospates are next to zero, nitrates are clear as water, amonia and nitrite right around zero... haven't been testing for a while as they were steady zero for every test. Calcium is right around 420-450. Magnesium is 1325-1350. Alk is about 10dKH (fluctuates a little) and pH of about 8.2. So, as far as I can tell, all of my parameters are right around where they should be, and to me I have adequate light (maybe not the best, but should be good) and I seem to loose the nice colours. As an example, I picked up what would have been my favorite frag from the LFS, and left town for work for 4 days... it started off as a deep green with nice purple tips... when I got back in town it was a creamy light brown, with a little bit of purple on the tips. Some stuff colours up, some maintains colour, but for the most part, SPS seem to lose their pop in my tank. I also don't get nearly as much growth as others seem to... sold a couple of frags that had lost their colour in my tank to a guy on here, my similar corals have hardly grown at all, he says his have doubled in size.
I feed Mairine snow, pods, phyto, and another one that I can't remember the name of right now... concentrated coral food or something like that (lottle bottle with a dropper).
What am I doing wrong??? Did I buy a junk light?

Thanks all.

[dawen]

check your phosphate and nitrate lvl, high vaule of those cause losing color and brown out, check po4 with high sensitive kit

[doch]

Fair enough... it's worth a shot. On my (low end) hagen test kit I'm showing VERY low nitrates (essentially crystal clear) and a little bit of phosphates but nothing significant... I'll pick up a better kit for both and give it a shot. Thanks for the tip.

[lorenz0]

try cutting back your hours on your lights first. i only run my growing bulbs for 6 hours and than the 22,000k's for an hour before and 2 hours after. also how is your skimming? your system could be high in nutrients

[doch]

Cut back the light? Really? I also run LED's for a few hours after the 22k's go out... that wouldn't have a bad effect would it?

As for skimming, I run a remora C on the back, and I have a secondary skimmer on my Tom PS4 filter. I think I should be ok, but not fantastic. I don't have much more in the way of room for a sump, so I'm stuck with this set up until we move and I get to upgrade!!! I'm usually fairly on top of the water changes, so that helps with the nutrients... I do about 10%/week... when we're not doing reno's (almost done!!!)

[BlueTang<3]

Lowering alk is going to yield better colour, for ur calcium level it should be around 8 for ur tank to be balanced. I run at 400 and 7 great colours.

[High tide]

Do you get good coralline growth? Is that the 48" or 36" fixture? How much food do you feed and how often? What media do you have in your Tom filter?

I agree you need to test your PO4 and NO3 with higher sensitivity test kits. If all your test kits are Hagen I would buy a whole new round of kits. Your parameters could look quite a bit different afterwards.

Provided your bulbs are still young and it's the 48" fixture, I'd say your lighting is adequate. I would swap a fiji purple for a daylight though to raise the PAR.

Feeding your corals could be counterproductive if skimming and waterchanges are not keeping up with the input of nutrients.

[doch]

Do you get good coralline growth? Is that the 48" or 36" fixture? How much food do you feed and how often? What media do you have in your Tom filter?


Provided your bulbs are still young and it's the 48" fixture, I'd say your lighting is adequate. I would swap a fiji purple for a daylight though to raise the PAR.




Coraline is not great, it's coming along though. It's the 36" fixture (36"55gal). Bulbs are only about 2 months old... maybe 3. As for food, I give the drops almost every day, marine snow and phyto probably 2-3 times per week (about 2oz of each). The media for the filter, I just use the pre filter stuff, and carbon... I don't recall there being anything in the bottom... maybe bio balls? I'll have to check that out on the weekend.

Thanks Wes, I'll try dropping the Alk some. I had read that the higher the Alk, the better the growth, so I'd been trying to keep it on the high side.

\Thanks for all the ideas guys.

[Dyspnea]

Before you drop money on new test kits, you can ask someone else with "better" test kit too check your water. the hagen test kits could be right, you never know.

[High tide]

Coralline algae is a good indicator of water quality. Assuming all Ca, Alk, and Mg levels are as they read I strongly suspect PO4 and probably NO3.

Sounds like your lighting is a bit too dim to maintain good growth and colour for SPS. You may want to try supplementing with an extra strip or switching some of the dimmer bulbs (fiji purple or blues) with ones with higher par values.

Also, if you're feeding everyday and only doing 10% weekly w/c your skimmers cannot keep up with the nutrient export.

Bio balls are unsuitable in a reef tank because they create NO3 that cannot be converted fast enough, with a better test kit I'm sure it would yield NO3 readings.

First thing to do before you do anything is test the water with new reliable test kits.

[doch]

High Tide - Thanks for all the advice... much appreciated. What would you recommend for media in the filter if bio balls are no good? I looked it up on line and the Toms come with bio balls and scintered glass media. As said earlier, I also use the filter floss like stuff, and the carbon. Should I get rid of the bio balls and glass media? Should they be replaced with anything?

[High tide]

No problem, glad to offer some advice.
Just the filter floss, cleaned or replaced regularly, and carbon changed periodically are good enough. Bio balls and sintered glass are designed for fish only systems where NO3 is not as big a deal and much better than NH3 and NO2. They have no place in a reef tank. It would help to put a Chemi-pure Elite in there to bring down your PO4 and NO3 when needed.

[doch]

I'm actually very seriously thinking of running zeo. Found a set up in Calgary that I'm hoping I can buy. He's also got 2 little fishies reactor. If that doesn't work out, I'll likely buy new soon. I'll also make some tweaks in the filtration as soon as I have some time (finish the reno's - 1 more day should do it). Thanks again everyone! Appreciate the advice!

[saltynuts]

buy a bigger tank lol. let use know how things go.

[doch]

Ed, I can't wait until we're done these reno's, and into the new (but not yet found) house with my new (and not yet picked out) 180ish tank. CAN'T WAIT!!! My little 55 is running out of room already! Hmmm... maybe it's a good thing that things are growing slowly!! hahaha

[doch]

Little update for those interested. Here's what I did:

1. Pulled the Bio balls out of my filter
2. Double checked my water with Elos test kits... results came in comparable to the Hagen kits
3. Added a GFO reactor
4. Picked up a Hanna Phosphate tester (down to 0.02)
5. Picked up several of the Zeo supplements

Essentially this all went down within the last 2 weeks, and man have I noticed a BIG difference. Almost everything has a new splash of colour to it already. Unfortunately there are a few that still look pretty blah, but I'm confident that they will some around. Not sure if it was one of those actions, or the combination of them all, but either way... I'm very happy!! I've also noticed an increase in growht... some of the frags that have never shown any signs of growth have new (and colourful) tips!! All is well and good.... thanks for the tips boys and girls... MUCH appreciated!