PRReefNoob
New Member
Hey guys and gals!
My name is Phil and I'm 37, married with two kids in northern Illinois. I own two Wild Birds Unlimited stores and have a separate side business doing field ecology work/restoring native ecosystems outside! Both my kids play two travel sports each so I'm pretty busy (and pretty broke a lot of the time LOL), but I've decided to dive back into the hobby. I own a 125 G freshwater paludarium (with almost exclusively stuff from the creek behind my house), a couple leopard geckos, an eastern indigo snake and a sinaloan milksnake, as well as a 75 G reef with a ~25 gallon refugium and a ~15 gallon sump. I've had saltwater fish/mixed reef in there for the majority of the last 10 years. I also used to (~10 years ago) work in the saltwater department at the local Petland, so I do have a grasp on SOME things, but I still largely consider myself a noob! Three years ago I moved, first in with my parents for 6 months while we looked for a house, then to our dream house. My tank was up for 3 years roughly at our old house, but the "double move" made it pretty rough. I tried, but after the second move, from my rents to the new pad, it crashed within a year (algae issues I think). So for two years straight it sat with a few corals (blasto, psamma, scoly, cynastrea, some zoanthids although some were struggling) that were hardy and two clownfish, until recently! I decided to hop fully back in, so I started to do bi-weekly water changes of about 15% for a couple months with my Tropic Marin Classic salt, then I decided I better check some other parameters. I'm blessed to have a couple good friends who both are saltwater/fish gurus, one in the Rockford area and another that owned a saltwater store until recently in Madison, Wi. I sometimes feel like I'm asking them too much stuff so I decided to come here as a supplemental resource. They always told me not to chase numbers also, so I'll largely do anything like that here! I have a nice Reef Octopus skimmer, Maxspect 200 W LED light, and a refugium crawling with the larger ant-looking pods.
So I took a water sample about an hour away to two saltwater stores to have it tested, and found different results. The first found my calcium (~320) and Mg (~1200) to be low, pH ~7.8, Alkalinity roughly 180, and nitrates and phosphates unreadable, which makes sense considering I was hardly feeding at all. The second store concurred that I have unreadable phosphates or nitrates but read my calcium (twice) at ~490 and my magnesium higher as well. They found my pH to be around 10.5 and said "you can absolutely buy stuff today". So I did; mandarin fish, carpenter wrasse, an BTA, and some coral that I thought was reasonably priced and hardy (all are doing well). I also bought some calcium to add if needed and a calcium test.
When I got home I tested the calcium and Mg myself and found that the first store was right, Ca was reading ~320 and Mg ~1200. I've since slowly raised my Ca to 420 and my Mg is still around ~1200. I admitted to myself I don't understand alkalinity and pH and dove into this forum (thanks all!) and BRS videos and think I have a reasonable handle on it now! I know back in the day my Ca and Mg were fine, so I'm thinking the reason my coral growth was always subpar was that either my alkalinity wasn't high enough to effectively buffer against pH swings/drops or that there wasn't enough carbonate or bicarbonate in the water to facilitate noticeable coral growth. I decided the other day to buy Salifert's alkalinity test, as well as Tropic Marin's AFR and some reef chili.
All fish are alive and all my coral frags are also still alive and looking great. My plan is to feed more (at least a couple times a day for the wrasse, largely with rods food) and basically get back to consistent water changes every 2 weeks like I've been doing for about 3 months now. Test my alkalinity once the tests come in, and keep an eye on Ca and Mg also. Is it safe to assume my pH is alright (remember one store said 7.8 other store said 10.5) because of the water changes/salt I use? I saw on BRS that they shoot for about a 9 dkh pH so if it turns out my alkalinity is indeed low my plan is to get some sodium bicarbonate liquid and use it accordingly. Or, again assuming alkalinity tests low, should I use the soda ash which will raise pH and alkalinity with the thought process being that since I've only done water changes my pH is likely somewhere between 7-8 dkh and that a 1-2 dkh increase (temporary) would be best to allow for more free carbonate and bicarbonate in the water for the corals structural growth. I guess another way of asking it is what is the risk of using soda ash if my pH is already on the high side? Orrrrrr am I just thoroughly confused still?
Then I plan to raise my Mg which i assume will be more straightforward, but I would happily take any advice here. Once I have everything where I want it I will start using the Tropic Marin AFR to maintain it (I also have leftover Aquaforest components 1 2 and 3 which I haven't used in years, my understanding is they are analogous).
I'm not sure if maybe I should've split this into two posts in two different forum categories. My apologies if that's the case. Anyways thanks again for being a great resource and thanks in advance for any help or advice. Phil the Reef Noob
My name is Phil and I'm 37, married with two kids in northern Illinois. I own two Wild Birds Unlimited stores and have a separate side business doing field ecology work/restoring native ecosystems outside! Both my kids play two travel sports each so I'm pretty busy (and pretty broke a lot of the time LOL), but I've decided to dive back into the hobby. I own a 125 G freshwater paludarium (with almost exclusively stuff from the creek behind my house), a couple leopard geckos, an eastern indigo snake and a sinaloan milksnake, as well as a 75 G reef with a ~25 gallon refugium and a ~15 gallon sump. I've had saltwater fish/mixed reef in there for the majority of the last 10 years. I also used to (~10 years ago) work in the saltwater department at the local Petland, so I do have a grasp on SOME things, but I still largely consider myself a noob! Three years ago I moved, first in with my parents for 6 months while we looked for a house, then to our dream house. My tank was up for 3 years roughly at our old house, but the "double move" made it pretty rough. I tried, but after the second move, from my rents to the new pad, it crashed within a year (algae issues I think). So for two years straight it sat with a few corals (blasto, psamma, scoly, cynastrea, some zoanthids although some were struggling) that were hardy and two clownfish, until recently! I decided to hop fully back in, so I started to do bi-weekly water changes of about 15% for a couple months with my Tropic Marin Classic salt, then I decided I better check some other parameters. I'm blessed to have a couple good friends who both are saltwater/fish gurus, one in the Rockford area and another that owned a saltwater store until recently in Madison, Wi. I sometimes feel like I'm asking them too much stuff so I decided to come here as a supplemental resource. They always told me not to chase numbers also, so I'll largely do anything like that here! I have a nice Reef Octopus skimmer, Maxspect 200 W LED light, and a refugium crawling with the larger ant-looking pods.
So I took a water sample about an hour away to two saltwater stores to have it tested, and found different results. The first found my calcium (~320) and Mg (~1200) to be low, pH ~7.8, Alkalinity roughly 180, and nitrates and phosphates unreadable, which makes sense considering I was hardly feeding at all. The second store concurred that I have unreadable phosphates or nitrates but read my calcium (twice) at ~490 and my magnesium higher as well. They found my pH to be around 10.5 and said "you can absolutely buy stuff today". So I did; mandarin fish, carpenter wrasse, an BTA, and some coral that I thought was reasonably priced and hardy (all are doing well). I also bought some calcium to add if needed and a calcium test.
When I got home I tested the calcium and Mg myself and found that the first store was right, Ca was reading ~320 and Mg ~1200. I've since slowly raised my Ca to 420 and my Mg is still around ~1200. I admitted to myself I don't understand alkalinity and pH and dove into this forum (thanks all!) and BRS videos and think I have a reasonable handle on it now! I know back in the day my Ca and Mg were fine, so I'm thinking the reason my coral growth was always subpar was that either my alkalinity wasn't high enough to effectively buffer against pH swings/drops or that there wasn't enough carbonate or bicarbonate in the water to facilitate noticeable coral growth. I decided the other day to buy Salifert's alkalinity test, as well as Tropic Marin's AFR and some reef chili.
All fish are alive and all my coral frags are also still alive and looking great. My plan is to feed more (at least a couple times a day for the wrasse, largely with rods food) and basically get back to consistent water changes every 2 weeks like I've been doing for about 3 months now. Test my alkalinity once the tests come in, and keep an eye on Ca and Mg also. Is it safe to assume my pH is alright (remember one store said 7.8 other store said 10.5) because of the water changes/salt I use? I saw on BRS that they shoot for about a 9 dkh pH so if it turns out my alkalinity is indeed low my plan is to get some sodium bicarbonate liquid and use it accordingly. Or, again assuming alkalinity tests low, should I use the soda ash which will raise pH and alkalinity with the thought process being that since I've only done water changes my pH is likely somewhere between 7-8 dkh and that a 1-2 dkh increase (temporary) would be best to allow for more free carbonate and bicarbonate in the water for the corals structural growth. I guess another way of asking it is what is the risk of using soda ash if my pH is already on the high side? Orrrrrr am I just thoroughly confused still?
Then I plan to raise my Mg which i assume will be more straightforward, but I would happily take any advice here. Once I have everything where I want it I will start using the Tropic Marin AFR to maintain it (I also have leftover Aquaforest components 1 2 and 3 which I haven't used in years, my understanding is they are analogous).
I'm not sure if maybe I should've split this into two posts in two different forum categories. My apologies if that's the case. Anyways thanks again for being a great resource and thanks in advance for any help or advice. Phil the Reef Noob
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