Magnesium too high?

[IPisces]

My magnesium, well not mine but the tanks magnesium has been rising over the past week. Here are my parameters at the moment.
Tested for- Nitrates- Nitrites - Ammonia-PH- Phosphates
8/23/2009- 0- 0- 0- 7.9- 0
Calcium- Alk dKh- Magnesium
405 - 10.0- 1530

On 8/10 mag was 1440
On 8/20 it was 1500
alk was lower then too.
I did a water change on 8/9, 9/17 & 8/23 a total of about 9 gals each time.
Tank is 55 w/20 gal sump so probably a total of 60 gals of water.
Is there something going on that needs to be fixed?

 

[Scooterman]

What are you supplementing? What brand test kit are you using for MG? What brand of salt are you using?

 

[IPisces]

What are you supplementing? What brand test kit are you using for MG? What brand of salt are you using?

I am not supplementing anything for magnesium. I am supplimenting calcium and akl, using calcium suppliment from Microbe-lift and Randy's recipe
I am using Salifert test kits.
The salt I am using is OceanPure Pro.

 

[IPisces]

OceanPure PRO Marine Reef Salt is a little higher in magnesium than other salts and I've been told I don't have enough coral in my tank to eat up the magnesium! Any one willing to help me out with this let me know. I am guesing I would need sps to use up some of the magnesium? There are so many types of coral I don't know where I should start.

 

[Pentagona]

check your supplements, a lot of calcium supplements now have Mg in them as well.

 

[IPisces]

check your supplements, a lot of calcium supplements now have Mg in them as well.

Yeah, I checked the bottle last night wondering about that, but I didn't see it listed. I will check it again just in case my glasses weren't working.

 

[Pentagona]

FWIW Randy's two part has a Mg supplement in it as part of the recipe, both Mg sulfate and Mg chloride, when you're dosing are you not dosing the Mg side of the recipe? Also, any stony coral be it LPS or SPS, and even clams will utilize Magnesium. Lastly, as long as you keep your CA and AlK levels up, a reading of 1530 isn't "horrible". I've run my Mg up in the 1600's to help control a bryopsis outbreak in the past. The problem is when your Calcium and Alk drops you get sleepy snails. I would also check your test ket against your LFS's. IME, Mg test kits seem to be more succeptible to being bad or inaccurate than a lot of the other chemicals we test for.

 

[IPisces]

The problem is when your Calcium and Alk drops you get sleepy snails. QUOTE]

Oh....okay. My turbos havent been very active lately. This would explain that. Will it kill them if it goes on too long?

Is there anything else I can do to lower the magnesium. Maybe smaller water changes so I am not adding so much with the new water? And no, I am not using Randy's recipe for mag.

 

[Pentagona]

sleepy snails usually involves snails laying in the sand upside down hanging out of their shells, but still obviously alive, almost like their intoxicated. If exposed to this for long periods of time, yes, it can kill them. But like I said, with your calcium above 400 and alk above 9.0 you shouldn't be experiencing this. My turbos do fine with Mg up in the 500's as long as the other two params stay up. I would make up some fresh saltwater and check the Mg levels in it. If lower than your current tank Mg, just do several small water changes over the next couple of weeks and it should bring the levels down. I wouldn't supplement anything during that time, as the water changes alone should be enough to keep your calcium and Alk up to normal params.

 

[IPisces]

Thanks for all the input.
My snails have not been "laying in the sand upside down hanging out of their shells, but still obviously alive, almost like their intoxicated" but they have not been moving around much. They are still alive however.

 

[Pentagona]

My turbos aren't always super active. They'll go through periods of real activity and then they'll just hang around a while.

 

[IPisces]

My turbos aren't always super active. They'll go through periods of real activity and then they'll just hang around a while.

Kinda like us. Eat too much and then lay around.