Reccommendation for Supplements

[jrgilles]

Hey guys, I was thinking about adding something to my tank to boost up trace elements. A huge zoanthid colony is not looking too hot, and I suspect it may be a trace element issue.

Tested chemistry, and my calcium and alk were a bit low, but not bad, and everything else seems fine. Tank has been set up for 2 years. Corals are starting to grow much denser, and I suspect it may need some trace elements added in. The zoanthid colony in question (100+ heads) has always been super healthy. I am thinking the problem is from one of 2 issues:

1) need new lights. Which have been ordered
2) over the last year, and with increased coral growth, I need to supplement some trace elements. I have finally started to deplete what is in the water. Water changes have been the same as always (20% every 2-3 weeks.) But maybe something is lacking with the increase in coral growth.

I plan on attacking on both of these fronts to observe what happens, but am curious what people recommend for boosting trace elements. I see lots of options online.

Kent offers a trace element supplement, but what are you guys using? Are there other things I should be thinking about, such as amino acids, etc.?

Anyway, any info would be appreciated, as I would like to get this zoa colony healthy. (I have been observing at night, and haven't noticed anything annoying them, and haven't added anything to the tank since the Marine Expo)

Thanks!
rob

Oh, and:
Phos: 0
Nitrates: 0
Ca: 390 (refilled the kalk reactor)
Alk: 7 dKh (added alk sup)
Mg: 1300
pH 8.35
Spec. Grav.: 1.026
Temp: 76

 

[mojoreef]

A huge zoanthid colony is not looking too hot, and I suspect it may be a trace element issue.

Why??

Corals are starting to grow much denser, and I suspect it may need some trace elements added in.

Why??


So what level of trace elements are lower then normal?? :bounce:


Mike

 

[jrgilles]

Well, my thought process is this:
Nothing has changed in the system, besides the bioload of corals increasing. The number of growing tips and softies as increased a lot over the last year, as things grow out. I have had to dial my calcium reactor way up to keep up with the increase in coral growth (as shown by monitoring dKH.)

The tank started with a lot of trace elements 2 years ago (ie. 120 gallons of water, not a lot of corals.) Water changes replenish some of this, but with increased growth, it makes sense that some of the 'pool' of original elements from tank setup have been slowly used up over time. It seems, based on the tanks course, that there is a chance I have depleted some of this pool. Timing seems about right to me.

I have not tested for any trace elements, but it seems fairly easy to test this hypothesis by adding in a small amount of supplement and observing the results. If wrong, I am out $20 and a small supplement shouldn't hurt the system. If it corrects things, then bonus.

Could possibly be the lights, as I am at about 8 months on my halides. They are also getting replaced.

Anyway, seems like a simply hypothesis, and an easy thing to test (by doing a conservative supplementation and observing.)

Do you think this shouldn't be an issues? Maybe it is just lights, but kind of made sense to me that I may have used something up, and it seemed very easy to test...

rob

 

[jrgilles]

I have not tested for trace elements, and am not sure I want to shell out a ton of money for a bunch of kits that I will hardly use. Seemed to make more sense (economically anyway) to supplement very conservatively and observe to see if the condition changes, as this would be significantly cheaper, and would varify the same thing

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[jrgilles]

and using io salt.

If you guys think that trace elements are not getting depleted, I can just change the halides and see what happens. Seeemed like an easy and inexpensive test to boost trace ele a bit and see if it has an effect. But if not necessary I won't do it.

If it seems reasonable thoough, I would love a product rec. Thanks!
Rob

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[mojoreef]

Trace elements take up a very small percentage of SW, very small. On top of this their is no evidence of corals being dependant on any of them. When you add a product it is going to have a direct impact on other elements in the SW, as in if you add ions from one element and do not increase your salinity you are taking out an element that the corals may actually use? Then their is the question of what kind of a carrier the additive using?? most use glucose? is that something you want to be adding??

So lets look a t Amino Acids as you mentioned. SO we know that most corals get about 20% of their Nitrogen budget from them and manufacturers use this concept for a barrage of advertizing their products. BUT lets dig a little deeper. If one looks at the curve on uptake from water in regards to AA's it insignificant?!?! So where do corals get the AA's from then? They get it from all the things in the water they take up, so detritus, left over food, bacterial flock and similar products, and in the case of reef tanks we got a ton of extra stuff their right?? SO what happens when we add an additive of AA's, well its a dissolved source of nitrogen so everything in the tank that uptakes N is going to be all over it, so what?? ALgal and bacteria mostly as they are not static (as in the corals are stationary on the bottom and bacteria and algal cells are free floating) so who are we really feeding??

Anyway I am not trying to discourage you from trying stuff if you want, I just have a hard time understanding the concept behind what has become a billion brightly colored additive bottles that we now see everywhere. that and you couple in the fact that the mass majority of these things we cant even test for, so what kind of a pool are we are we building in our tanks?? and what is the impact of that?? For me I look at your tank and see you have grown this colony for a couple of years and have done so with great success, carry on my friend!!


Mike

 

[jrgilles]

Yea, I hear ya. All the additives being sold are a bit crazy. Maybe I will change lights and hold off on sup.

There are two zoa colonies in question, in different parts of the tank. Both everlasting gobstoppers and maybe a hundred polyps on each. Love high light and are usually very big. All the polyps on both colonies have shrunk to at least half size and are not always open.

I see no pests or anything. So a bit confused. I will just change the lights first and see if this helps.

Other zoas in the tank are fine. If you have any other ideas on what the problem might be, please let me know

Rob

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[Chichas01]

have you considered allelopathy?

 

[rayjay]

I'm now over 18 years without adding trace elements. At least, adding in the form of store bought items. Trace elements are added every time I feed my tank anything. The food has pretty well anything that gets used up in the trace element category IMO.
I do water changes to LOWER the levels of trace elements more than to replace any.
However, the trace elements ARE good for ONE thing. They transfer a lot of money from hobbyists pockets to store owner pockets.

 

[jrgilles]

Yea, you guys sold me. Trying to find other causes that this one type of zoanthid is not happy. It is all of them in my tank, separate areas/colonies, all effected.

I have tweaked a few things, so I will see how they respond. I noticed the protein skimmer had a clog in the airline that was causing it to not function at 100%. Could be the cause. Gave the whole thing a good cleaning yesterday. Also tweaked my light cycle and temp a bit. It was following seasonal charts, but I have now set it to stay at a fixed value (76.2-76.7*F, actenics on 7:30 AM to 9:20 pm, halides on 10:45 to 6:30pm.)

Hopefully this combination of tweaks will bring the everlasting gobstoppers back to life. Other zoas are fine, and I have seen no pests. Gotta be something with the water.... Light bulbs are new (replaced after the colonies closed up.)

rob

 

[mojoreef]

See Rob the problem is that we dont know? and their is such a huge variation from coral to coral and species to species so how can anyone make a call. So an example, you could put 10 acros in a tank and then put them under the same light, some will respond very good some good and some not so good, same applies to food types, water flow and possible trace elements. If you dose some kind of trace element it might have a good effect on some and not so good on others.

Ok so lets look at it from a different angle. Their are 70 trace elements in Saltwater but their are about 14 that are concidered the top ones. so for scale lets keep in mind that SW has lets say 19000 ppm are chlorine, mag is 1325 and lets say cal is 410. So now lets look at some of the top Trace Elements.
Fluoride/fluorine =1.3 ppm so really very tiny and I have seen this as being toxic
Iron = .01 ppm good for corals?? good for algae for sure.
Phosphate = .07ppm well we all know about this one
copper = .003 ppm ??
cobalt = .0005 ppm nasty stuff
maganese = .002 nasty
molybdenum = .01ppm nasty
tin = .003 nasty
vanadium .002 nasty
zinc =.01 nasty
Selenium .0002 nasty

Anyway you get the idea, Seawater is a collection of all the things it basically comes it contact with. If we look at the top trace elements its a mix of things that might help but also a mix of things that will kill everything. So to give you my train of thought how does someone or some manufacturer make the call on what is good and will help things and what will kill, and what logic are they using to make that call?? Then even if their right how is it going to effect different coral species and so on. If its just an arguement that "Well its in Natural SW and thus it should be good for corals that grow in it" thennnnnn.........their dumb??? LOL


take care

Mike