Yes will 1500 ppm of mag is not a problem with any thing I keep I keep mag at 1500 as a minimum and Ca runs up wards of 650 to 700 and dkh at 14 to 15 . Oh a new term blue coral is that it ? When you run higher Dk and Ca you need the added magnesium to keep them both playing well and happy together..
Bryopsis only thread
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Returnofsid accidentally boosted his mg by 500 over night. I thought that this would have an effect on his alk, and consequently his PH, but aparantly it didnt.
Returnofsid accidentally boosted his mg by 500 over night. I thought that this would have an effect on his alk, and consequently his PH, but aparantly it didnt.
"The precip would be Mg precip but not a big deal, it will redesolve."
From donW, and then returnofsid followed up with his measurments:
"Nope, SG is sitting steady at 1.025. Ca is at 420, pH is 8.0 and my Alk is a little low at 7.2 dKH. My Alk has a habit of dropping to 7.0 dKH though, if I don't dose it regularly.
From what I understand, Mg being too high will not cause a precipitation of Ca or Alk. "
Seems to me like if magnesium dosing has the potential to swing someones ph and alk, then 500ppm boost should have done it I would think? Please, I look forward to your explanation. Magnesium confuses me
From donW, and then returnofsid followed up with his measurments:
"Nope, SG is sitting steady at 1.025. Ca is at 420, pH is 8.0 and my Alk is a little low at 7.2 dKH. My Alk has a habit of dropping to 7.0 dKH though, if I don't dose it regularly.
From what I understand, Mg being too high will not cause a precipitation of Ca or Alk. "
Seems to me like if magnesium dosing has the potential to swing someones ph and alk, then 500ppm boost should have done it I would think? Please, I look forward to your explanation. Magnesium confuses me
Jeeps you had asked if calcium or alk would percipatate because of the large addition of mag. Dons reply was that he figured only the mag would percipatate, which is correct, But in what form. Here is a quick and dirty.
Most of the mag in our tanks are free ions (only bound to water moles), a small percentage is bound to sulfate, bicarbonate, floride, borate and hydroxide. Now only about 10% of mag in SW is bound up by these other elements and it has a very small effect on the total mag, BUT it does have a large effect on those elements.
Mag likes to pair up (ionically bind) with a number of other elements (as listed above). In the case of carbonate (alk) Mag stabilizes it to such a degree that it becomes far more present in SW then it could ever be if mag was not present. So with out this pairing our tanks PH would be much higher and would be more susceptable to large swings. We refer to this as a ph buffer. So in reality its level plays a large role in what it does to the carbonate system (and thus the PH) also it plays a large role with borate which can also effect the buffer system. Then you have to concider the type of salt mix you use, some salts are heavy in sulfates, or borate and so on and so on, so issues could happen their also.
Now pairing and percipatate are two different animals, your question was that you were worried that the over dose would percipatate the calcium and alk. If you can picture adding boith part of lets say bionic to your sump at the same time in the same location, you would be so super saturating it that it would cause both parts to percipatate (ionincally bond) and come out of solution (form a solid) this looks like a cloud in your tank and its very rare as Boomer said as it would take an event such as that to make it occur, it also the reason they sell the products in two seperate containers.
Now if you look at the chemistry and know that 10% of the total mag content in your water gets bound to these other elements and you increase the total content of the mag you are going to also bind up more of these total elements. Even though its not enough to cause percipatate its going to change the over all chemical equation. Now could it be a sharp ph spike that goes up or down for a few hours and then levels itself out?? could be. We had that happen when all these phosphate removers first came out. Folks would add a bunch of it to their system to quickly, they would come back the next day and see no ph spike but their critters were dieing. After someone did an experiment it should that the iron was binding to the carbonate ions and cause a huge PH spike over night but would then level off by the next days.
So the bottom line is that its to tough to factor in all the different things that could happen, thats why we just say take it slow and easy and that way what ever might happen will happen slow enough not to pertain or in time enough to catch it and fix it??
Anyway I dont know if I made it clearer or muddied it up even more lol. But I hope it helps a bit
Mike
Most of the mag in our tanks are free ions (only bound to water moles), a small percentage is bound to sulfate, bicarbonate, floride, borate and hydroxide. Now only about 10% of mag in SW is bound up by these other elements and it has a very small effect on the total mag, BUT it does have a large effect on those elements.
Mag likes to pair up (ionically bind) with a number of other elements (as listed above). In the case of carbonate (alk) Mag stabilizes it to such a degree that it becomes far more present in SW then it could ever be if mag was not present. So with out this pairing our tanks PH would be much higher and would be more susceptable to large swings. We refer to this as a ph buffer. So in reality its level plays a large role in what it does to the carbonate system (and thus the PH) also it plays a large role with borate which can also effect the buffer system. Then you have to concider the type of salt mix you use, some salts are heavy in sulfates, or borate and so on and so on, so issues could happen their also.
Now pairing and percipatate are two different animals, your question was that you were worried that the over dose would percipatate the calcium and alk. If you can picture adding boith part of lets say bionic to your sump at the same time in the same location, you would be so super saturating it that it would cause both parts to percipatate (ionincally bond) and come out of solution (form a solid) this looks like a cloud in your tank and its very rare as Boomer said as it would take an event such as that to make it occur, it also the reason they sell the products in two seperate containers.
Now if you look at the chemistry and know that 10% of the total mag content in your water gets bound to these other elements and you increase the total content of the mag you are going to also bind up more of these total elements. Even though its not enough to cause percipatate its going to change the over all chemical equation. Now could it be a sharp ph spike that goes up or down for a few hours and then levels itself out?? could be. We had that happen when all these phosphate removers first came out. Folks would add a bunch of it to their system to quickly, they would come back the next day and see no ph spike but their critters were dieing. After someone did an experiment it should that the iron was binding to the carbonate ions and cause a huge PH spike over night but would then level off by the next days.
So the bottom line is that its to tough to factor in all the different things that could happen, thats why we just say take it slow and easy and that way what ever might happen will happen slow enough not to pertain or in time enough to catch it and fix it??
Anyway I dont know if I made it clearer or muddied it up even more lol. But I hope it helps a bit
Mike
Thank that helps. I thought it was more likely that there would be a change in alk, and no change in calcium, but I figured Id recomend testing it just in case. What still confuses me though, is if the magnesium binds up your extra carbonate, and causes your ph to drop, then how do the carbonates make it back in to the system later? I.e. If there is a big ph swing and your alk crashes overnight, how does it return to equilbrium by the day so you dont notice it?
IndyMatt
Well-known member
Any regrowth from the original die-off? Got an update?
Mine died off some but seems to be coming back a little now.
Mine died off some but seems to be coming back a little now.
TWallace
Well-known member
I noticed a single stalk of it growing on that zoanthid covered rock. I'm gonna raise the mag up a bit, but I'm low on Tech M now.
Your Carbonates are your buffering system. In a normal tank you will see swings in your PH due to a number of reasons. CO2/oxygen production from light to dark reactions (difference between night and day), External co2 production (cold night and you close the windows and turn the heat on). Biological reactions with in the tank (spawn/death/feedings and so on). Anyway their are many reasons. The carbonates in your tank create a buffering system for the ph, as in the PH can take the above mentioned hits amongst many other and will not drop or raise (or will do so very minimally). If the carbonate buffer is depleted you loose that buffering system and thus are susceptible to larger more aggressive swings.
So theoretical, You add a boat load of Magnesium , it binds to your carbonates forming Magnesium carbonate, some of it percipatates, some just stays bound up. The lights go off, oxygen production slows, co2 production raises, naturally occurring reduction (bacteria) begins, bryopsis begins to die off ( or its Photo system shuts down which stops its Oxygen production down and increases the reducers begin to reduce it) along with all the other scenarios that effect PH and cause it to lower. This continues through the night until the lights go back on, once that happens reduction goes down, internal co2 production shuts down, external production slows, oxygen production begins again, some of the bound up Carbonate frees up, precipitated carbonate dissolves and oxygen production once again begins and causes your ph to naturally raise to its normal operating level.
Kind of a rough look, but hopefully you can see the concept??
Mike
LiquidFunk
Member
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anyone have any idea if this mag process will work on red algaes? I have some nasty red carpet algae that is busten my balls.
TWallace
Well-known member
I haven't tried it, but I doubt it. From what I've seen most other algae are unaffected. Sometimes it doesn't even affect bryopsis. There are several people reporting that the magnesium trick isn't working on their bryopsis. I have chaetomorpha and red graciliara in my fuge and both were unaffected by the magnesium.
twilliard
What next?
That is correct. This method so far does not touch any other algaes (in my tanks). But I have noticed that I think it slows it a little.
burning2nd
Well-known member
my tank has straiten it self out ageain... from the mag spike.... all is well the corals have mostly regained there color... the GTA is dark green ageain... and in a diffrent spot...
TWallace
Well-known member
Yeah, my toadstools and sinularia regained their color, too. I'm not sure if the elevated magnesium was the cause, or just that I raised it too fast. Either way, nothing died, so no big deal.
barrierreefcf
Sponsor
We used Kents Tech M and raised the Mg in a 135g that had become overwhelmed with Bryopsis from 1100 to 1400 over a weeks time. At that point we ran out of Tech M but within 7 days 90% of the Bryopsis had died. More Mag coming today and we will resume dosing and try to bump it a little higher. Great thread and advice. GBTA, Snails, Zoas, SPS, Clams, Shrimp, LPS are all present in this tank and we suffered no losses. No softies here so further info there.
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TWallace
Well-known member
There may be something else in Tech M that helps kill the bryopsis. I had success with Tech M in my main system, but used all of the Tech M I had. My QT was having a massive outbreak of bryopsis and I decided to go the cheap route and used Mag Flake to boost magnesium. I got it up to over 1950ppm with no effect on the bryopsis. I ordered more Tech M and just got it today. However, the QT was still at 1950 magnesium, so I lowered it by doing a 90% water change. I got it back down to 1530, then added some Tech M. I'll test again tomorrow and take some pics to document this.
burning2nd
Well-known member
nice....
i dont know if it was my bottle of kent M but there was like white particals that came off the bottle.....
I got my Bryopsis on the run ageain... theres a little patch that i dont mind on the back side but its in check.... so i dont mind.
Ive tried geting it to my Qt tank for experimentation, but ive bin unsucessful
i dont know if it was my bottle of kent M but there was like white particals that came off the bottle.....
I got my Bryopsis on the run ageain... theres a little patch that i dont mind on the back side but its in check.... so i dont mind.
Ive tried geting it to my Qt tank for experimentation, but ive bin unsucessful
bettonijp
New member
Hi Mojoreef,
I m newby, Frenchman living in Chile South America.
I have a nano reef, 60 lt. I began on september 2012. I have problem too with Bryopsis. Reading some posts, it says that one should use Kent Marine Tech M, and no other Magnesium additive. Is that it? Or can I use any Magnesium add?
Thanks for your post.
Jean-Pierre
I m newby, Frenchman living in Chile South America.
I have a nano reef, 60 lt. I began on september 2012. I have problem too with Bryopsis. Reading some posts, it says that one should use Kent Marine Tech M, and no other Magnesium additive. Is that it? Or can I use any Magnesium add?
Thanks for your post.
Jean-Pierre
