Corals dying

[asylumdown]

That's likely causing your coral issues. Having tests that far out scares me.

And I'm with Kien on the pellet front. I've had them running in my tank since day one, and I wouldn't ever think of removing them. I also run GFO as my phosphates can get as high as 0.09 while nitrates will stay undetectable.

Different strokes for different folks though. They caused a cyano bloom the likes of which I had never seen in my last tank, but that was adding them to a high nutrient, year old, tap water tank.

[lastlight]

Scary my Elos kits have always been consistent even across old to new. It was t expired or more than a year since first use?

[daniella3d]

How can your nitrates be so high if you are using pellets?

not enough pellets? not enough skimming?

[reefwars]

Originally Posted by daniella3d

How can your nitrates be so high if you are using pellets?

not enough pellets? not enough skimming?

Quite simple really, we don't know how high his nitrates were before today, also starting very low in ml will take longer to have a positive effect.

I don't think the high nitrates are the cause but the very high alk is a big concern for me, on the Hanna it came out to 11 .7 twice and his calcium was under 350ppm we don't know if it fluctuates either.

This can cause problems when running pellets or any carbon dosing really.

[Seriak]

Originally Posted by lastlight

Scary my Elos kits have always been consistent even across old to new. It was t expired or more than a year since first use?

It expires June of 2013

[Seriak]

I ran my Hanna kit and my alk is reading 9.8 now. Going in the right direction at least

[Seriak]

Okay,

Let me know if this sounds right.

SPS Analysis

1) High nitrates led to a small algae bloom.
2) High Alk combined with the introduction of Bio Pellets led to burnt tips on my SPS.
3) The algae then formed on the dead tips and slowly stressed the SPS; hence some RTN and some STN

LPS Analysis

1) Introduced Bio Pellet Reactor which increase CO2
2) Winter has an affect of increasing CO2 as our houses are all sealed up during this time
3) These both lead to a decrease in my tanks pH
4) LPS typically are stressed from decreases in pH which resulted in a lot of them deciding to drop their heads.

Does this pretty much sum up what happened to me?
Does any of my logic not flow properly? Also, would the heads dropping off also lead to my increased nitrates if they were not removed from the tank?

[Seriak]

Oh and I guess my most recent LPS die off was a result of me stopping my Alk dosing which also lead to a further dip in my pH. I love how everything ties together.

[Delphinus]

Sounds totally plausible to me..

Might not be an issue in this case but something to think about as well as that a zero PO4 reading isn't always "really zero."

Early on it was claimed with biopellets that they reduce PO4 as well as NO3. However, this has not been my experience (I do use and have used pellets on tanks and have seen good NO3 reduction or elimination with them. But not PO4.) It's been claimed more recently that they can only reduce PO4 as long as they have NO3 to reduce. Unfortunately I can't claim any anecdotal evidence to support or dispute that, so that may well be the case for all I know, but ultimately, regardless if that is true or not, pellets do have a limited ability to remove PO4. So even with pellet use, having GFO on the tank is a good idea.

It's been a while since I've done my reading on this, but if you go back over the years of reef chemistry postings by Randy Holmes-Farley and others, I think you can find more info, but from what I recall: basically you have organic phosphate and inorganic phosphate. We can only test for inorganic phosphate, we can't test for organic phosphate, but it's only organic phosphate we need concern ourselves. So we test the inorganics and hope for the best that there is a proportional relationship between the two. This might not always be the case. So basically unless you have something proven in place for PO4 removal (GFO or lanthanum or whatever), you might have PO4 even if you test it out and get a zero (or nominal) reading. So even if you think PO4 isn't a problem, having GFO (or similar product) on the tank regardless, is a good idea.

(I just wish GFO was cheaper...)