SPS losing color
 

Hi,

My SPS reef has been going great until a couple of months ago. I noticed that some of my corals were slowly losing their color and growth rate. I have noticed some nuisance algae growth around the tank lately. I am not sure what is going on and I need some help from the pros!

I have a 29g tank that has almost been running for a year. I am currently using a DIY led light fixture with 25 CREE leds. I am running a skimmer, mp10, GFO, and carbon. I do weekly 3-5g water changes with RSCP salt.

Current tank Parameters:

Alk 8 (redsea)
Calcium 510 (redsea)
Mag 1440 (redsea)
Nitrate 0 (salifert)
Phosphates 0 (salifert)
PH 8.0 (salifert)
Salinity 1.026

Any advice would be great! Thanks!

what's the color combination of the leds. I did a diy a while ago and my spectrum had too much blue in it. corals looked horrible and the ha was growing faster than the coral.

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My current setup is 13 royal blue xt-e leds and 12 cool white xp-g leds. I have had this light setup since day one.

If you have algae, there must be phosphates/nitrates coming from somewhere. Do you use GFO and if so have you changed it recently?

If you have nuisance algae, you have phosphates.

Also how high above the tank are your LEDs??

I tested for both nitrates and phosphates today. Maybe I will try and test again. I changed the GFO out a week from yesterday.

My leds are in the hood of a biocube. I would guess a few inches from the water.

I am assuming you just put the LEDs in???

No, they have been in since the start of the tank.

I just tested PO4 again and is still at 0ppm

The only way to truly test your PO4 is to use a hanna meter as they are the most precise. Are you using RO/DI water? Whats your TDS?

Have the LFS check your water for po4. Do you have fish? How often do you feed them?


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I would suspect high nutrients. That would cause brown out.

Usually when SPS bleach its due to too much light. A friend of mine, as soon as he built his new tank with LEDs, all his SPS bleached within the first month.

And yes, for an accurate PO4 reading, I would recommend a hanna checker. Do you have an nuisance algae? If you do, the algae is making PO4 unreadable.

I am using RO/DI from a LFS so I am not sure.

Ill stop by today and see if they can test. I usually feed every other day.

The leds have been on the tank for almost 10 months and I have never experienced bleaching. I will try and get some before and after pics up. As far as the algae I have it on the sand and some of the rocks. I try to take out as much as I can with water changes.

From my understanding the algae use up some of the phosphates and nitrates, so readings of 0 for those two are probably due to the algae.

If this is the case what would be my next step?

what do u dose?

BRS recipe 1

Do u spot feed corals....ur phosphate and nitrates are 0 because of algea...have u added any new rocks...how often do you change gfo and carbon

Any recent changes to the tank?

If you do have nuisance algae the next thing would be removing PO4. Which normally people get a GFO reactor or also you can try a turf scrubber.

I would most definitely look at getting your PO4 checked with a hanna meter (maybe a local reefer can help you out). I would also test the TDS of the LFS water. You can buy a handheld TDS meter for like $20 to get a good idea of what your getting. Sometimes LFS's will not replace the DI cartridge as often and after the membrane it may put out at like 10ppm TDS, and since the DI is used up it doesn't remove the 10ppm of dissolved nutrients.

Here are a couple of before and after shots. I also included some algae pics.

Before
http://i753.photobucket.com/albums/x...5/DSC04029.jpg

After
http://i753.photobucket.com/albums/x...5/IMG_0244.jpg

Before
http://i753.photobucket.com/albums/x...5/tricolor.jpg

After
http://i753.photobucket.com/albums/x...5/IMG_0247.jpg


Algae pics
http://i753.photobucket.com/albums/x...5/IMG_0250.jpg
http://i753.photobucket.com/albums/x...5/IMG_0249.jpg

No i do not spot feed. I added some new rocks around the first of the year.

No recent changes. I have been using GFO for six months or so. I have not heard of turf scrubber but I will look into that.

I will have to look into this when I get some time. I do want a RO/DI unit, I just havent pulled the trigger on it yet.