dark blue staghorn

[Kwater]

hey, i was just hoping to get some reasurance here. i have latley had good sps success so i thought i would try my hand at another staghorn, he is dark blue with light blue tips, i have a 175 watt metal halide and 2 t5 lights both 54 watts, my calcium ushaly chills around 175 ppm but does get higher, i just notice that is where it is most of the time. does all this sound good, i just think i can keep them now, when i restarted my tank a while ago some new teqnekies kicked in that really work. thanx for all feed back :)

 

[Jmck]

the lights sound fine, but at 175 ppm you shouldnt even have soft corals, you need to keep calcium up to 400 for them and invertibrates to be happy. So before you get any more corals you need to dose up your tank. otherwise your causing maaajor damage.

I've read on here as well, if your using a certain type of salt in your tank calcium can be hard to raise?

 

[Kwater]

ight thanx, i will contune to raise calcium ;).
right now im using tropic marin pro reef, i hopfully shouldent get problems from that, do u think i would with them???

 

[Jmck]

I have read mixed results, a few people have had low calcium with this salt, others were steady. Just monitor it over a few months and see how it goes, if after water changes your having to dose with calcium it might not be the right salt for you. My tank sits at a comfortable 420 after water changes and never drops below 400, but i use salt water from my LFS.

are you doing water changes often? this puts a number of needed elements back in your tank including calcium.

 

[Kwater]

just wondering because i just want to learn a little more, how would low calcium HURT coral, wouldent it just slow the growth of the sps corals but the lps corals would be ok because they use up more of other elements in the water to grow more than directly taking calcium out of the water.

 

[Jmck]

Calcium helps invertibrates and corals stay strong, so without calcium, they are slowly getting weaker. Its the same as people, our bones get weaker if we dont get the necessary amount of calcium and can cause serious problems for us.

and especially with SPS because they are hard corals you need the calcium or they get week, brittle and will easily break and cause damage.

 

[Kwater]

that makes sense, but wouldent that halft to be a verry verry low amount of calcium and not just like 20 ppm off????/ not challenging ya or anything just wondering. i am still gona try and raise my calcium, but i have had a 11 month constant battle with calcium and alk, i wont get into it but it was not fun. :p

 

[Jmck]

haha, if your having calcium and alk problems and have been using this salt, i say change from it.

and no, the reccommended amount is 400-450, but if your tank drops to 350 your ok but you should still try and keep it above 400.

its something you should just attempt to maintain as best as possible but dont need to stress overly about. but 175 is waaaay off recommended levels,

 

[Kwater]

shit hahaha im a freking idiot. haha sorry i ment to type 375ppm not 175 haha, wow no wonder u were saying my calcium is doing damage, calcium of 175 would hurt anything hahaha. sorry for the screw up.
im aware this is still a little low, i like and try to keep it betwenn 400 to 450 like most people :)
yah my salt used to be just plain instant ocean salt, i have just recently started using tropic marin :)

 

[Jmck]

hahaha, well if its 375, then you are fine :) supplement a little bit more because your sps will be whats bringing it below 400, your fine to get another coral, but will need to watch your levels. just see how often you need to supplement with water changes and keep it up :)

 

[Kwater]

sounds good to me, hopfully the new salt will help out too. thanx for the help ;)

 

[motorcyclereefer]

Which tank are you putting him in? If its the 80 then you probably should bump up the light some more. And you need the calcium around 400 and keep the salinity around 1.026

 

[PRC]

Maybe change the salt that you use to a salt that has calcium in it. Make sur eyou do regular water changes and you should be fine.

 

[Kwater]

yah he is im my 80 gallon. u dont think the lights are good enoughf,????
i got my salinity around 1.026 but calcium is allways a battle, i do my best to keep it above 400 though.

 

[Jmck]

do you have individual reflectors on your T5? if so dont worry, your t5 is said to be putting out 3 times more with reflectors so your totalling about 500 watts in total with your 175 watt MHalide which is 6.25 watts per gallon. So I wouldnt worry about lights.

 

[Jmck]

and PRC is right, if you can get salt with calcium do it :) will make your job easier

 

[Kwater]

yah, i have a reflecter for each one of my 2 t5 lights :)
yah that is exacatialy y im using tropic marin, it it suppost to be the best ( sadly most expensive ) of all the salts. but i have only been using it for a short time so i cant see the true resolts yet :p

 

[daugherty]

i like oceanic and seachem reef salt they heve verygood levels with a fresh mix

 

[dcantucson]

Red Sea Pro Coral mix is also a good one.

 

[Kwater]

cool thanx, since i cant afford to keep buying tropic marin i will look into these :)

and just wondering, what do u mean by a fresh mix????? what is an old mix, does stuff fall out of solution as it sits for the 24 hours whall it does the whole carbon dioxide oxygen equlibrium. im deffnetly not an expetr when it comes to mixing salt, i would like to become one though, i just know how to mix it :p