[paddyob]

Originally Posted by TheNewGuy

Hello All,

Lately ive been kind of perplexed by whats happening with my 75g reef. I have a few soft coral, not too much tho. a branching hammer, candy cane, lots of kenya trees, some palys, xenia, a fuzzy mushroom, and some others most of which hitch hiked on the live rock i bought. after i set up my tank, a couple months after i had growth everywhere. the palys were going crazy, the xenia were like wildfire, then all of a sudden, everything kind of stopped. I lost a couple small colonies of zoas (grr), and nothing else has really grown much since.

during the summer, i had a lot going on and admittedly let tank maintenance slip more than i should have. the water changes were quite sparse, but ive been running biopellets, and nitrates and phosphates remained unreadable.

im wondering if maybe i depleated some trace elements by not doing enough water changes. maybe iodine or stront or something. i finally got my DHK back to 10 from 5, calc never got very low. is there a LFS in edmonton that tests water? i dont really want to spend 80$ on 2 test kits to satisfy my curiosity.

Aquarium illusions will test your water. Take a jar in. Dont let it sit too long before your trip as it can become stagnant.

I cannot confirm... But I am sure any of the "good" shops will test for you as well.