Corals Dying - Calcium

[Seriak]

Okay many of you know that my corals started dying on me around 4 months ago. At that time, I had started doing 3 different things.

1) Added a new MP40
2) Introduced Bio Pellets
3) Started to Dose Calcium.

I just couldn't figure out what was going on until recently my calcium ran out and I didn't bother changing it for a week. During this time my green film algae started to disappear and my LPS started to puff up again. I hadn't put 2 and 2 together yet so I filled up my empty Calcium jug and bang my algae started to come back again and my LPS started to shrivel up again. So my question is this.

What about my Calcium can cause

1) excess film algae that covers corals and rock
2) stress out LPS so they drop their heads

I have talked with the Calcium supplier and there has been no similar complaints, so the belief is that the Calcium is fine. I typically put the calcium in a jug with some RO/DI water give a few shakes and put my dosing tube in it. I dose 3 times per day for 40 seconds.

My parameters were as follows.

Ca 470
Mg 1300
Alk 7.8
PO4 .01
Nitrates 10ish
PH 8.00-8.13

[Aquattro]

Your Ca is too high. Not that it's likely causing this, but it doesn't need to be anywhere near that. How do you maintain Alk in this system?

[asylumdown]

It's very possible that this is a case of correlation and not causation. Just because these things happened to coincide with one another relatively closely in time does not mean one is the cause of the other.

A film algae that covers your corals sounds like dinoflagellates to me, I've not seen the normal garden variety film algaes cover living coral tissue before.

If it is dinos, they bloom and fade, then bloom again, and could very well just happen to do so around the time that you stopped and started calcium dosing.

[asylumdown]

I should also ask, why were you dosing calcium at the rate you were dosing, and what concentration do you mix your calcium solution to (1 cup per gallon or...)? Was it low when you started? You should be tuning the amount you dose calcium to match the rate at which it's being consumed, as determined over a couple of weeks of regular testing and adjusting. If you're not mxing your dosing solution to the same concentration each time you refill it, you'd then need to re-tune your doser when the reservoir was replenished. Was 40 seconds 3 times a day a number that you determined to the be the right number to maintain your levels where you wanted them?

[Seriak]

Originally Posted by asylumdown

I should also ask, why were you dosing calcium at the rate you were dosing, and what concentration do you mix your calcium solution to (1 cup per gallon or...)? Was it low when you started? You should be tuning the amount you dose calcium to match the rate at which it's being consumed, as determined over a couple of weeks of regular testing and adjusting. If you're not mixing your dosing solution to the same concentration each time you refill it, you'd then need to re-tune your doser when the reservoir was replenished. Was 40 seconds 3 times a day a number that you determined to the be the right number to maintain your levels where you wanted them?

I add 2 cups of calcium chloride to 1 gallon of water. My Calcium was around 350 when I really started dosing more. It then jumped to 500 so I have since turned it down and it hovers around 470 last time I checked. I am going to leave my doser off for the next month to see what happens.

When I say it covers my corals, I mean it does overgrow my zoas very slowly and if my tips of my SPS start to die it grows there as well.

[asylumdown]

ah I see, yah that's normal algae then.

Well, calcium chloride (if that's what you're using) inherently doesn't cause the issues you're talking about, otherwise it would be the most common problem experienced by hobbyists. That leaves either

a) a contaminant in your supply
b) The calcium causing other issues with your water chemistry - dying tips is often associated with alkalinity problems, any chance you've had periods where your alk has been driven too low by the addition of calcium? Each test we do is only a snapshot in time, perhaps your dosing of calcium has caused swings in alk? They're pretty good at surviving within a pretty wide range if it's stable, but they're not awesome at dealing with rapid changes. Overdosing on calcium can cause sudden drops in alk which can burn the tips of corals, and takes a very long time to recover from
c) this has nothing to do with the calcium and it's a coincidence that things seemed to briefly improve when your calcium reservoir ran out.

case a is easiest to test, toss what's left in your dosing reservoir and make a new solution with a different brand and see if that helps. Case b can only be tested by checking your water chemistry every day to make sure your alk is stable day over day for a long period of time, though if this is the aftermath of a period of instability that has passed, you might not get a conclusive answer. Case C is the hardest to test.

If you really want to find out if the calcium is the problem, I would personally start by changing brands and testing my levels every day (maybe twice a day) for a couple of weeks. Simply ceasing to dose calcium won't tell you what the issue was - even if things improve, that won't tell you anything useful. If it improves you'll still be left with it either a) being a coincidence of timing) or b) it was something to do with dosing calcium, but you still don't know what. You'll need to dose calcium again in the future eventually if you've got stony corals, so it would be better to know how to prevent this from happening again when you do.

[Seriak]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Your Ca is too high. Not that it's likely causing this, but it doesn't need to be anywhere near that. How do you maintain Alk in this system?

I am maintaining my Alk by dosing as well. (Soda Ash) Barely any gets dosed at this time as the numbers are bang on where I need them to be since I have bio pellets.

[spit.fire]

What size system
how many ml of biopellets
where is the return line going from the pellet reactor in relation to your skimmer
are ALL the pellets tumbling
what did you use to seed your pellets
how long have you been seeding
how often do you dose bacteria for the pellets
Are you using any other form of carbon dosing

[Reef Pilot]

I run bio pellets, and they have done wonders for my tank (used to be very high nitrates and phosphates), keeping my nitrates at zero, and phosphates near zero (also run GFO). Where people get into trouble with bio pellets is not dosing enough bacteria supplement. I use MB7, and keeps my tank very clean and free of cyano, and other algae. Also, you need the right reactor, so the pellets tumble properly, and the output has to go to your skimmer.

I just started SPS less than 6 months ago, and they are growing very nicely, with very good colour. Some have a couple inches growth already. LPS (which I had before) is OK, but growth seems to have slowed.

I don't feed any of my corals, other than my dendros and sun corals (directly with mysis).

[Seriak]

I really think it has something to do with my calcium as I mentioned in the first post. I haven't touched my bio pellets in months and things got better and worse. The only times something changed when things got better or worse was the dosing of the calcium.

But for those interested.

I started with 100 ml of pellets and added 100 ml every 2 weeks until I was at 500ml.
I did not seed them with anything.
I use a reef octopus reactor that tumbles them all just enough to keep them moving
The output of my reactor is right next to the input of my skimmer

But as I said before, I do not think it is related to the pellets based on my experiences so far.