Coral Question

[Glennrf38]

Looking for some suggestions/answers. I've had my tank now for about 2 years and don't seem to have much luck with a couple of things.

1) Can't seem to get any coral besides zenia and "gsp types" to grow. For example, I bought a three head frogspawn 2 months ago and it is already down to two heads. The two that are left seem to be very "wilted".

2) Can't get chaeto to grow either. I've had the same ball in my sump for a year and it doesn't grow. I'm thinking it might be a fake plant .

Water parameters all seem to be good. Lighting is a corallife 150W MH/PC. Good flow....... umm any suggestions?

[parkinsn]

How deep is your tank? Have you thought about upgrading your lamp/ballasts? How old are your lamps? Can you list your water parameters?
Not that I want to bash coralife but i upgraded my lamps to Ushio and saw a huge diffrence. I then upgraded my ballasts to PFO and again there was a huge diffrence in light quality.

[mseepman]

I have to agree with parkinsn...I upgraded my MH lamp to other non-coralife bulbs (even cheap chinese ones seemed better) and I modded my light to have 4 x T5HO from the PC's and suddenly growth started for me much better.

[Myka]

Even if his lights are sub-par he should still be able to keep Frogspawn. Please list all the parameters you test for, and what they are sitting at. Including temp and salinity. List what you have for filtration and what medias you use.

[Glennrf38]

The halide is an XM 10,000K that is a couple of months old. The PC are about 1 year old and are the standard Corallife 50/50s.

Salinity is 1.022
Temp approx. 81

I don't really keep the params for the standard tests. I just do the tests and make sure they are within the kits "normal". Which tests in particular should I be looking at? I will redo the tests and post them as soon as I can. I am a little lax on testing, ussually once a month.

Tank is approx 60G
24 X 27 X 18 high
Sump
16 X 34 X 16 high
Light in the sump is a T5HO

Its weird. Everything else seems to be happy and healthy including my clam and my anmone.

Thanks for the suggestions so far. Keep em coming.

[Black Phantom]

I've been using the XM bulbs for a few years now. When I tried the 10000k bulb my tank started a huge algae bloom. Nothing else had changed. The corals were ok but really didn't grow that much. Switching to the 15000k bulb produced much better results and I'm about to test the 20000k bulbs to see how that works.

[Glennrf38]

Thanks Delphinus and Kevin at Red Coral for their help and advise.
The problem is still there so I will put this out for more help.

Water Parameters:
Nitrate:0
Amm:0

CA 460
MG 1120
ALK 10

I think that covers it. From what I have read, CA is a bit high and MG is a bit low. Anybody have any suggestions on what to try next?

Thanks
Glenn

[Glennrf38]

Anyone have any ideas? I just lost another head today............

[Myka]

Sorry I asked you those questions, which you answered, and then I never replied again! My bad.

I use a cheap plastic hydrometer. I just check it once every six months with a refractometer (I would do it more often, but I have yet to buy a refractometer), although it has never changed in the 8 years I've had it. Did you have yours calibrated yet? Have you started to raise your specific gravity up?

Take a quick read through the Guides in my signature; particularly the Getting Started one, and the Parameters one. See if you can pinpoint anything on your own from there. Your calcium and magnesium are both a bit "off", but I can't see either being a real cause for concern.

I'm wondering more on your placement of the corals and what water flow you're placing them into??

On a side note...I used to lose Euphyllias all the time. I couldn't keep them alive. some would live for 12-24 hours, some would live a couple weeks. I never changed anything in my tank, but one day I added a Euphyllia that survived, and never looked back. Now I have a Euphyllia forest.

[Glennrf38]

I have the refractometer now so my salinity is right on. I have put individual heads in different areas, same thing. My anemone is doing well, my clam is doing well. Fish are all fine. GSP,clove polyps all fine. I am stumped and frustrated.