Help with additives.

[Beverly]

Originally Posted by Ruth

Your best bet is to use Bev's chemistry links and determine what your ideal levels should be at for what you are keeping. IMO if you are doing weekly water changes of 15-25% you probably don't have to be dosing anything. The key is to test your tank water as well as your make up water to determine where your levels are at. The general rule of thumb is don't dose anything that you are not testing for.

Reef Chemistry links can be found here...

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=19425

Weekly water changes do not ensure maintenance of alk, Ca or Mg levels. I do 15% weekly water changes in three various sized tanks as well as drip kalk nightly in all three. Had all levels where I wanted them at the end of November. When I tested after Christmas, only Ca had been maintained. Alk was a bit low in all three, but Mg had fallen off the charts!

Each tank has different corals and fish stocking levels, and therefore different usages of alk, Ca and Mg. Testing and adjusting these three will help your corals, fish and other living things in your tank thrive, not merely survive.

Also, when testing and adjusting levels, keep a log of what your results are. That way you can look over your logs and see usage trends that will eventually reduce your need to test so often but still dose correctly. However, always have test kits on hand and DO test regularly.

[danny zubot]

Bev's right, water changes can't maintain your levels. Considering that if your calcium is at 320 ppm, and your new salt water measures 380ppm. If you are only changing 15% it won't raise your tank levels back up to 380. (just and example) I drip with Kalk weekly between water changes, Kalk is the most cost efficient calium additive for low to medium tech reefs. I also dose iodine, magnsium and strontium weekly as recommended in the instructions because I don't have tests kits for those elements. I consider that the instructions are pretty accurate for my bio load.