back in the game with lots of mistakes

[schoch79]

Ok, so long story short, I've done reef tanks before but have been away for a while and jumped in head first only for my over confidence to bite me in the ***.

Now for my mistakes from the start and me asking for some opinions. First off I know most of this is stupid stuff and I should have known better but what's done is done and I don't need to be reminded of my stupidity. So I started my aquarium up with some live rock from a reputable source it went through its cycle and pretty much sat there for 2-3 months like that. I went and got some clean up crew, multiple snails and hermits, and they did their thing and all was good. Probably about another month or so went by.....all this time I haven't done a single water change or check any parameters except the occasional sg to make sure it was still on point.

So that's my first mistake compounded by my next mistake. Since I've done reefs before and the only thing that was added to this tank so far was the cuc I was confident the cycle was done and it was time to add the coral. So I went to the local club's frag swap and picked up about 20 or so small frags, mostly softies with a few lps. Since adding them most of the softies (zoas, Kenya tree, mushrooms, palys) are all doing well except for a few nicer zoa's which opened at first but now wont open and are slowly shrinking. All of the lps were doing good for a few days and quickly went south. Symptoms were recession of tissue and general dying.

Since then I have done multiple water changes and the softies are pretty much the same, and the lps is looking better but obviously not completely recovered yet.

My initial thought on the problems was alleopathy. Then I started thinking maybe it was a chemical imbalance of alk,calc,mag, etc. Then I thought maybe it was the lights, What do you think? Did the water changes fix the balance of alk,calc,mag or did it remove the softy toxins? Or maybe a little bit of both? My tests now read on point for everything. Of course I can always post them for you but if you read sk8ter's signature that's pretty much it. My lights are an AI sol blue and at max they are at about 50% of capacity.

Either way I learned that all the experience in the world does not make up for doing some basic water tests and simple water changes....even if you don't have anything in it yet.

[mr.maroonsalty]

There is a lot to keeping a reef tank, the challenges never end. We don't know much about your tank: it's flow, lighting, nutrient level... It's a pretty common mistake to run out and spend a lot on a pile of corals without knowing if you or the tank is even ready. Most of us have unfortunately killed our share of corals, and will probably kill a few more before we are done. If you are doing regular maintanence like water changes, crud vacumming, calcium/Alk monitoring and additions... Just the basic nutrient control and water chemisty things we do will go a very long ways.

[schoch79]

Yeah, that's pretty much the rule of thumb I go by. As stated before I have been successful in the past but got sloppy this time. Just to comment on a few things you mentioned the flow is handled by a unknown size koralia powerhead and a hob filter modded to be a fuge which between the two create what I would call medium flow, lighting was mentioned in my first post, and as for nutrient level the only thing I can vouch for is that nitrates are low. I used the api test and I just did a generalized look at the color since they are all so similar. As for what all my levels were at when I added the coral I couldn't even guess except that my sg was 1.026. For all I know nitrates could have been 200 and calc/alk could have been 1. Either way like I said things are seeming to have turned around.

[mr.maroonsalty]

Sorry about not seeing lighting mentioned, I still haven't learned to pick out led lingo
One of the mistakes I learned from is to always check the calibration to my refractometer; I do it first and last, looking at my make up and tank water at least once in between. Calibration solution is very cheap and last forever if fitted with an eye dropper type nipple.

[schoch79]

LOL funny you mention the refractometer....I now have 2 of them. They both tested the same. Ultimately my main problem came from not doing a water change until about 4-6 months in.....I was still using the water I cycled with when I added corals. My biggest debate was whether that water was so depleted of the calc/alk/mag and that ruined the lps or if it was all of the new softies added with them and the resulting alleopathy.

[Hal]

You need to post your pH, sg, alk, ca, mg and tank temp. I know you say your water changes should keep them in line, but I wouldn't assume anything.

[schoch79]

Hal I think everyone here is misunderstanding what I'm saying here. My tank now is doing better. To re-sum up what my original post said----cycled/added cuc/never did a water change for probably 4-6 months/never tested anything/added a bunch of coral soft and lps/ most soft did ok, lps suffered-dying/ did some water changes everything looks better now. Base question was mostly did the water changes fix the balance of alk,calc,mag or did it remove the softy toxins? Basically why do you think the corals were suffering prior to water changes starting?

[Reef Frog]

I once kept some stony corals I didn't need but wanted to keep alive in a 10g tank with no big 3 supplementation. They declined very quickly until I got on the ball. When I tested I was astonished at how quickly they sucked the minerals out of the water.

So I'm thinking this was the cause of your issue not chemical warfare. If your phosphate levels happened to raise a great deal during this time, the oroblem coukd have been compounded even further.

So you added 20 frags to how big of an aquarium? If it was a huge aquarium & begun with high level reef salt, you *might* have been able to go a while without dosing or WCs and the corals could have possibly hung on for several months. Doubtful in say <75g.

Best wishes going forward. What are your plans for keeping the big 3 at their proper levels and stable? Or are you going to stick with softies?

[schoch79]

The tank is a 20L. Small, I know but I've done that size before. At the moment I plan to keep up with the big 3 with water changes alone. As I test and find supplementing is necessary I will be using bulk reef supply's 2 part with dosing pumps. With a tank this small I have no plans for a calcium reactor and kalk in the past I wasn't very happy with dosing. That said I don't plan to do sps much and lps will be limited. For lack of a better way to put it I want the corals in this tank to be "flowy", lol.