500ppm Calcium too High?

[Lbrewer34]

When I was first starting out with my tank about 3 months ago I had a guy at a lfs tell me to add a product (Microbe -Lift Coralline Algae Accelerator) to my tank to help with coralline algae growth. He said to just add the recommended amount every day for a few weeks. I did this for about three weeks but stopped because it just didn't seem right to keep adding something if I wasn't testing for it. That week I bought a calcium testing kit and saw my calcium was at 500ppm. For the past two months my calcium hasn't come down, despite 10-15% water changes weekly and I haven't added any more of the product. I don't any coral yet, just live rock and a few fish (starry blenny, two spotted goby and a Six line Wraisse) and a cleaner crew. I want to get my tank ready for corals before I go to the Bob Moore event next month. Do I have anything to worry about with high calcium now? do I need to lower it before I add any coral? As of bow, the fish don't seem to mind the calcium, my concern was for getting the tank ready for corals. Thanks for the advice,

Lee

 

[thatguy559]

your calcium will not come down with water changes due to the simple fact that you are still adding calcium with the new salt mix.

500ppm is not bad i had my tanks at 550ppm with a dkh of 11 and mag of 1300.

 

[jrgilles]

Should be alright. Water changes are not adding in 500 ppm calcium, so it should come down, although very slowly.

If it gets too high, you will have a snowstorm and it will fall back down. I wouldn't worry about it too much though

 

[Chichas01]

would also be helpfull to knnow where your Alk and Mg levels are in relation to your calcium.

 

[Krish]

would also be helpfull to knnow where your Alk and Mg levels are in relation to your calcium.

Very good point! In adition to that, take a peek over on the link below and read the discussion that went on in that poll. It will help put things into perspective. HTH


http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/f36/what-your-calcium-level-58915/

 

[Lbrewer34]

Very good point! In adition to that, take a peek over on the link below and read the discussion that went on in that poll. It will help put things into perspective. HTH

Thanks for the poll reference, it seems that I'm not too far off the norm, but after reading the in-depth chemistry talk, I really need to test my alk, at least better than a dip test. The good thing is I'm being relatively proactive in getting the tank ready for corals, something I didn't do when I added fish.

 

[07FocusST]

I had the same problem for around 6-9 months. I just dosed Alkalinity for a month or 2 daily till it reached 14dKH and Mag was 1500ppm then it finally settled out around 460ppm calcium