mvit
Member
For a few weeks now I noticed my some of my zoas not opening all the way or at all and my frogspawn not extending like it used to. Some days the frogspawn would slime a bit. Up until now everything was doing well,especially the zoas. They had very good extension and very long "edges". The frogspawn open only about halfway. The zoas that stay closed are very fat and I do not see any pests attacking them except a small bristleworm or 2 crawling around on them at night.
After I first saw the odd behavior (about 2 weeks ago)I tested water and everything was O.K. but alk was a bit low at 125ppm or 7dKh. So I very slowly raised it over 3 days with baking soda/RO and at last test it was 161ppm or 9dKh.
I did also notice the calcium stays pretty stable around 500ppm. The tank isn't using up calcium but thats probably due to the low bioload. I've got lots of corraline starting everywhere but it is not really pink.
The way the zoas looked before and how they look now is like night and day.
They had super extension and color.
I was running 2 65w power compacts but the bulbs were getting old and I am pretty sure the spectrum was degrading although I did not have any algae or cyano blooms.(but I do have chato in the sump).
I wanted to upgrade to T-5 HO anyhow so I got a 2 tube T5 HO fixture and what a difference! I also thought a bit more flow might be helpful so I purchased a Koralia 2 powerhead. These upgrades were only in effect for 4 days and I don't see any improvment yet. My mushroom and GSP are doing fine(the GSP actually seems to like the T5s better).
Params=
29 gallon tank
Salinity-1.025
PH-8.2
ALK-161ppm
Nitrate-0
Phosphate-0
Calcium-500
Mag-1260
Temp-79 F
Heres a pic of the zoas. Sorry for the crappy pic but my camera does not do closeups.
Do you think I should wait it out?
Thanks,
Mark
After I first saw the odd behavior (about 2 weeks ago)I tested water and everything was O.K. but alk was a bit low at 125ppm or 7dKh. So I very slowly raised it over 3 days with baking soda/RO and at last test it was 161ppm or 9dKh.
I did also notice the calcium stays pretty stable around 500ppm. The tank isn't using up calcium but thats probably due to the low bioload. I've got lots of corraline starting everywhere but it is not really pink.
The way the zoas looked before and how they look now is like night and day.
They had super extension and color.
I was running 2 65w power compacts but the bulbs were getting old and I am pretty sure the spectrum was degrading although I did not have any algae or cyano blooms.(but I do have chato in the sump).
I wanted to upgrade to T-5 HO anyhow so I got a 2 tube T5 HO fixture and what a difference! I also thought a bit more flow might be helpful so I purchased a Koralia 2 powerhead. These upgrades were only in effect for 4 days and I don't see any improvment yet. My mushroom and GSP are doing fine(the GSP actually seems to like the T5s better).
Params=
29 gallon tank
Salinity-1.025
PH-8.2
ALK-161ppm
Nitrate-0
Phosphate-0
Calcium-500
Mag-1260
Temp-79 F
Heres a pic of the zoas. Sorry for the crappy pic but my camera does not do closeups.
Do you think I should wait it out?
Thanks,
Mark
