no growth and pastel color

[daveonbass]

ok so here are some current pics of the tank. Colors are back to what I have always had before, some even a little better. I don't test nearly as much as I used to (or should) but I do feed pappone' about 3-4 times a day and dose CA and ALK every so often till I decide to test. After the test I determine how far off I am from my desired levels and dose accordingly. then its back to small doses through out the week till I level them all up again.

just a few shots.

rainbow monti


another view


small unknown frag and sunset monti also rainbow monti mother colony


FTS

[daveonbass]

time laps comparison

1/30/12

2/21/12

3/18/12


I think things are looking sooooooo much better now that the tank is healthy again. If I had to say the biggest thing that turned it around I would have to guess it was feeding the corals multiple times a day...and night. Lighting was also an issue, and water quality was a distant 3rd. BTW, my po4 is still not detectable with my API test kit...(so it's not going WAY up at least) but my no3 is still hovering around 20ppm. I only say that because on another thread someone mentioned that you can't have a very good SPS tank unless the no3 is close to zero and you have a ULNS system. I am far from it and I have what I feel are very healthy looking corals.

Thanks to everyone that has helped...and big thanks to Franklypre for going back and forth with me with both are tanks.

[franklypre]

Definately looks like it's supposed to, you get rid of the stuff you want to, get those frags on the LR and that tank will be ready to go. So was the new batch of Pappone any different? How's the Shortcake?

[daveonbass]

SS looks terrible. But it's just shy of dead...so I'm just gonna give it lots of time and slow care.

The new batch was just fresher...and it blended up a little smaller, but there were still some chunks for the fish and LPS. I'm half done with it now. I'm gonna need to invest in it with you.

As far as moving anything...I'm still waiting for a frag tank to fall in my lap. I'm gonna write Mark from dallas and see if he can build one for less than I have seen online...also I'm going to price the cut glass myself and see if I can build one myself. which ever one is cheaper is probably how I'm gonna go. once it's up and running smoothly i'm gonna start making cuttings of lots of stuff, but still only go one coral at a time so as to not disturbe the tank to drasticly at once.

always a new project.

[mos90]

so even though your nitrate is a little elevated u still needed to feed?

what did u determine about your lighting that was the issue?

[franklypre]

The food we feed has a carbon source, sugar, so when we feed we should be effectively lowering our N&P. However Dave has a shortage of phosphates so his trates still run a little high, I was practically giddy when I finally started showing some nitrates in my system. Amazingly the colors are really starting to come in now, go figure. I think the issue with the lighting was that he thought he was giving the coral too much light, which he was for the amount of nutrients in the system. As he raised the nutrients and lowered the light there was definate progress IMO. Deja said she wants a ric BTW, she has always liked them. I need to get over there to see this in person again.

[mos90]

i thought he was using biopellets? i didnt think u would dose vodka,suger while using them. or would u?

so the feeding u were doing was intended to raise phos?

the reason im asking is im having a similar issues. i was dosing redsea nopox for a while. phos was down to 0 per hanna ppb meter while nitrates were around .5ppm. i went on vacation and didnt dose noxpox or reef energy(vitamins&aminos) . when i got back in 3 days 1/2 my sps were 3/4 dead. most have not yet recovered or died. i have discontinued both to this point and have been feeding reef chile.

my phos is still low at .02 but nitrates are up to 4ppm. i may be having the same problem as dave. corals were starving.

and no im not hijacking just asking..

[franklypre]

Simply put it does not hurt to run levels of nitrates and phos that people get bashed for every day on forums so long as you have strong lighting and good flow. Right now I can't get my system to run nitrates or phosphates at the level I would like, which is arount 10-15 for nitrates and atleast a detectable amount of phos. I am steadily raising my alk and calc but that's a different thread all together. The idea of ULNS is really hurting alot of reefers IMO, zeo is not ULNS nor is pappone. Biopellets and or resins(GFO, Phosgaurd,etc) create a true ULNS and eventually starve the coral without a reliable food source. So feeding just enough is OK so long as you do it everyday, overfeeding allows for a day or two without feeding and growth of filter feeders.

[mos90]

good info.. ty. im kinda leaning towards more of a nutrient rich tank and im changing back to t5's from leds.

[mos90]

dave what is your lighting schedule now? im using almost the same bulbs as u 12" awl in a 6 bulb fixture.

btw. the corals have recovered nicely.

[Veosk]

Dave things look great. watch the api po4 kits and no3 kits mine always read 0 but i had algea. tested w/ a salifert test kit and was suprised to see my po4 and no3 were so high. have since corrected the issue.

Sure it feels good to be back on track.

[daveonbass]

hmmm...a lot being discussed without the input of the owner of the tank in question.

My Biopellets are in effect NOT working...they cant. because I do not have enough PO4, they can not reduce my NO3 any more. which is why my NO3 is still hovering around 20ppm. I do not like nor want this number to be my NO3 level, but for right now it's both stable and low enough that the tank works. I'm 100% sure that if I could get the no3 level down to 5ppm like it should be then I would most likely get the proper colors out of the corals that I want. as it stands my blues are more purple...with a teal tint, and my yellows are more green. Green is a dominant color in my tank, (read, easy to achieve) but reds also pop really bright right now so I'm happy with the contrast. But taking the lights out of this issue...I have seen and read how proper ULNS systems get those extreme colors by living on the edge of starving and healthy to achieve the colors that we desire...it's the coral adapting by throwing out certain colored algae to survive that we are striving for. I have gotten the pellets to work in the past by crashing my system by inducing a Biopellet bacterial cloud through carbon dosing of sugar. LOTS of sugar. There is not nearly enough sugar in the pappone' to induce this even if I dumpped the whole ziplock baggie full in at once. I choose not to do this right now because every time I have induced the Bloom on purpose I have suffered some kind of loss...weather it be actual fish or corals...or just simply health...I do not want to do this right now though because the tank looks so much healthier right now. I do hope to reduce the NO3 though through an upcomming vigorious WC schedule...and maybe then the Bioplellets will activate again...But if they do not I'm not going to fuss with them any more. After all I have a very small fish load right now, and I can't over feed them on accident so I am not adding enough PO4 to be used up. My algae is way low...compaired to what it was...and only my cyano is a problem...and I think that may be FROM the biopellets.

in short I used to utilize the biopellets because I had a high fishload and fed them a lot more...so the pellets had something to EAT so to speak. now I just need to keep heavy feeding my corals...and so far it's been successful.

Lighting is more tricky. I explained it best I think on the last page...I had to raise my light up (lower light to the corals) to keep from bleaching and killing them off. once the lights were about 20"AWL the corals started to compensate for having too little light...thanks I'm sure in part to the higher feeding. so they were now browning out...and in essence, getting a sun tan to help with the next step in the process of adding more light to the tank by lowering the fixture closer to the water. I slowly brought it down and watched for color changes. I eventually got it as low as 7-8" AWL...but have now moved it back up to 10" AWL. Eight inches was just too much light for the corals to handle and they started to bleach again. Si by raising the light physically, I innoculated the coral and got them prepaired for more light in the future...which they happily accepted and are not metabolizing the "brown" algae in their bodies quite well and growing noticably...while still retaining their sun tan lotion "color" of "not brown" algae for protection. (plus bulb type plays a role)

my lighting schedule is:

2:00pm 2x blue+ on (dawn)
3:00pm all bulbs on (5x Blue+, and 1x Purple+)
8:00pm day bulbs off, and 2x Blue+ on (dusk)
9:00pm all bulbs off
(2x 3w RB LEDs on 24/7 for moonlighting all night)

The moonlights do have a slight pop with just 2 bulbs on for dawn dusk, and adds a nice shimmer. But once all 6 blubs are on you can't notice them.

And lastly on the Test kits...I understand that they are likely not accurate...I mainly only use them to test for changes. Do I really have 20ppm of NO3?...maybe not, but I do know that the level that I do have is not raising or lowering. Same with the PO4...it's stable at a certain number and not growing.

[reefjunkie42]

so is the color loss from biopellets?

[daveonbass]

Short answer....no.

[franklypre]

If you dump a whole thing of pappone in there it will cloud that water up for sure. Not due to the sugar but none the less. I still think you should've done a big WC, dropped the lights a few inches at a time and started feeding from the beginning, but I look at this hobby more simply than most. I'm just glad it looks good, now we can move to your tank thread, or rename this to "got color, getting growth". I still have some frags for you whenever you have room.

[daveonbass]

Clouding up the water, and causing a bacterial bloom are two completely different things...and a whole thing of pappone' will not cause a bacterial bloom. The reason "your way" wouldn't have been a success is that the coral were too stressed. If I gave them more light and shocked them with a water change as well as dumping way more food than they could metabolize all I would have done was kill the already weak corals, pollute the tank that I just did a large WC in to clean up the water, and then aggravate myself for killing stuff off by not going slow enough.

Even the healthy frags you gave me ay first were highly shocked by the change when they first went in and are just now recovering. Like I keep saying...if it were simple then more people would be doing it.

[franklypre]

My way could be a little more stressful but wouldn't have killed much if anything, of course it wuold have been performed as soon as the bleaching started if it were me. But regardless of should've, would've, could've it's all looking good and hopefully you'll get some of that good fast growth with all the pappone you've been adding. I just wonder why some frags don't like the acclimation to your tank.

[daveonbass]

Probably a combination of no3 being to high, and the light being too much. The main problem coral frags are low light species.

[franklypre]

So what are we gonna do for some LE corals, battle corals or atlantis aquarium. I'm thinking first or second week of April, I really would like a red dragon. Is there gonna be another thread for your tank?

[daveonbass]

Dude I won't have money to split for like three months. Good grief, where do you get all this disposable income? And I am in no rush to get more frags anyways cause I have no where to put most of them.

Like I have been saying I want to set up a dedicated frag tank. And that's most of my money right there.

As far as a new thread....I don't know, its kinda my little tank thread...haha. I'll see what I can start tonight.

[daveonbass]

Dude I won't have money to split for like three months. Good grief, where do you get all this disposable income? And I am in no rush to get more frags anyways cause I have no where to put most of them.

Like I have been saying I want to set up a dedicated frag tank. And that's most of my money right there.

As far as a new thread....I don't know, its kinda my little tank thread...haha. I'll see what I can start tonight.

[franklypre]

I agree on the thread, just change the name maybe. As far as disposable income all I can say is you gotta know how to spend money right, LOL. My coral fund is starting to replenish itself lately, folks like 10-20 dollar frags aparently. The new camera has made a massive difference. Wish we had more people to trade with locally, nobody around here seems to like to frag anymore.

[daveonbass]

Cause there is nobody around here...closest good place is Dallas and they are flooded.

[honkit]

Great to see the recovery that your SPS corals have made. Your combination of pappone and reduced lighting has nailed it right on the head. How long are you running your T5s now?

[franklypre]

There are people here just no way to get in touch with each other. I found a few in Shreveport and that area, some between here and Little Rock. I need some new stuff to look at bud.