Calcium, Strontium, Ph Buffer, Phytoplankton and Iodine

[Tony]

ive been adding these to bring things back to normal and give my corals and Polyps some help. Im not sure though how to know whne they have enough. it says to add according to tank size...ok....and then tank load. How do you know how much to add when every tank is different and corals are different sizes? i noticed right away that the Polyps really like the Phytoplankton. they have almost all opened within a day of me adding it. the corals have been doing really well. the one Candy cane coral which was almost done for, is recovering.
So my questions is, how much? When? and is there anythign else to look into adding other than what i listed?
Tony

 

[reefman23]

If you are dosing Ca, Strontium, and pH, you should be testing for them. That is the best way to make sure you arent overdoing it. As far as Iodine goes, it isnt A must to dose especially because good-sized, regular waterchanges will maintain proper levels and it is very easy to overdose Iodine which can have negative effects.

What Phyto are you using? Unless it is a refrigerated LIVE brand like DT's then it is no good. The stuff like Kent's Phyto is nowhere as good as the live stuff. With the live Phyto, one teaspoon per 15 gallons like every other day.. i think that is a little too much. I personally add one teaspoon of DT's every 3 or 4 days to my tank and I have about 35 gallons total.

FWIW, I feed my LPS a mix of mysis and cyclopeeze using a syringe every few days. SInce I started this routine, my candy canes as gone from 2 heads to 12 in about 8 months.

HTH,

Jesse

 

[drty811]

TONY are you doing regular water chnages? if so you really shouldnt need to dose any of those. i do weekly water changes and test before and after the change. i have never needed to supplimnet anything. the water change replenishs all elements. HTH.

 

[Tony]

Ok. that is really helpful. i use distilled water for the water changes. that should be the same as any other water in terms of nutrients or are there differences? i hope yo understand my confusion. i go to one place and then i go to another place and i hear different info. ive had alot of run around lately. ill start laying off the dosing. do more water changes. so how that goes. is temperature a major factor as to why that my polyps arent all opening? ive been having so much difficulty getting a steady temp. my last thermometer was a defect and my heater was too screwy to keep the temp at the right place.
ill look for the phytoplankton you mentioned.
thanks
tony

 

[drty811]

the salt is what carries the elements. as for your temp in the tank, alittle temp fluxuation is ok but if it gets to drastic thats when youll have problems. whats your temp at with lights on, and wehn lights off?

 

[Tony]

my temp today is at 83 degrees farenheit. about 26 celcius. the lowest it has been is at 23 celcius. day and night it is pretty steady unless i do a water change and or the power goes out like it did last week.
T

 

[drty811]

temps alittle high, 78-80 is where it should be.

 

[Tony]

What types of effets does high temp cause? would it cause fish to die?
i have a Gobe who has been through pretty much anything that has gone on in the tank and then when ever i add someone else, they die. all the crabs and snails are ok. I got a yellow tang and had him for 2 days and then ...... :x . I try and introduce new fish very slowly and over the span of two hours. sometime longer. bag in the tank to warm it up and then slowly transfer water to another container with the fish and then tkae the fish and put him/her in the tank. am i doing it wrong?
tony

 

[islandcreation]

First Tony how big is your tank? Yeah, 83 degrees is pretty hot. Is that with the lights on after 5 hours and whats the temp during the day. Obviously all that wouldn't matter if you had a chiller, do you have one? There are so many factors with temp fluntuations, water pumps in the sump was the most problematic for me along with heat transfer from the lights. I generally have my lights come on 7pm when it gets dark and turn off at 3am, this is all cause of heat. Like Erik said 78-80 highest I got which I got scared was 84....

So with acclimating your fish. So you put the bag in the tank and let it sit in there for 30 minutes. Then do you open the bag and but tank water in there a cup every 30 minutes.... and slowly go from there. Thats what I do but I sometimes test the LFS water first and see how much their on top of their tanks. It shows alot about them! :mrgreen: Then I compare it with mine. The bigger the differnce the more cups I put in until i feel comfortable. If their close I'll wait atleat 1 hour and a half, longest was 3 hours. Hope this helps, if not sorry :mrgreen:

 

[Sea_Dawg]

Another very usefull method of acclimating your fish with minimal stress is called the drip method...

#1.To do this pour the bags contents into a small bucket, and icecream bucket would work well.

#2.Then place a large glass full of tank water onto a higher surface.

#3.Then get some airline tubing and tie a knot, make it loose at first.

#4.Create a siphon using the airling tubing from the glass to the bucket.

#5.Udjust the knot to make the water drip a couple times per second.

#6.When bucket is filled empty it about half way and repeat desired amount of times.

Just make sure that when the contents of the glass are emptied into the bucket it will not overflow! :shock:

I used this method when accilimating my YCG and it worked very well, its color remained fairly strong throughout the driping and being released. After only about an hour it was acting as it was at the LFS.

HTH,
Ben

 

[Tony]

the drip method sounds like a better way to move the fish. but i do use the cup by cup method and i test the water for salt and sorts. i have to admit, it was this morning when i found my tang dead. very very upsetting. i thought i had finally gotten things under control. very upset. :censor . usually takes about 1.5 hours.
by the way the tank is 12 g. i dont know if you read a few of my other posts but ive had a lot of frustration by misinformation from people ive bought from up here. pain in the :moonin .
im lowering temps as we speak. no chiller though. what is a chiller? how does it work?
do you need one for a 12 g nano?
by the way, i really appreciate the help from everyone. its nice to get honest advice.
Thank you.
Tony

 

[TimSchmidt]

A chiller is a heat sink for your fish tank. It acts like a refrigerator for your water. With a chiller and a heater you will have very steady temperatures. A lot of people get away with just using a fan though.