Water Parameters

KeishaKornbread

KeishaKornbread

Banned
My tank has been setup since Dec 21 and running smoothly. Once I added my first fish, I began doing water changes ever Friday night. I have a pretty well stocked tank with LPS, SPS, a bunch Crabs, 8 small Fish, Snails...the works. I thought it was a pretty stocked tank and if anything, overstocked. I feed the fish everyday and most of the coral get target feed 3 times a week. I tested my water last night and Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and Phosphate are at zero. I thought something was wrong so I tested again with my new testing kit that was still wrapped and new. Everything was at zero.

Is this normal.....and should I still do a water change.
 
Seems normal; tests usually show "0" before I do my PWC. I still do the PWC but then again I'm running skimmerless right now.
 
Water changes are also for replacing elements used up by your corals that can be found in the salt mix. Do you check calcium, alk & mag, too?
 
Yeah, I just checked Calcium, Alk, Mag and the PH and it's all stable and where they should be. Even Salinity is spot on at 1.026. I just thought it was odd since I thought my tank was jam packed. Everyone in there is doing fine. I spotted Coraline this week starting to grow on the rocks.

Im not lazy, but I wasn't sure if forgoing this weeks PWC would be ok since nothing is broken.....so why try to fix it.
 
Nothing wrong with WC! On reef tanks we don't need to do them as often as FW, because we have LR/LS in there. I go about ever 3 weeks or so on mine but I do supplement Ca, alk & mag.
 
I'm also not channing water everyweek I'm about everytwo at the moment I also am dosing daily tho seems your taking good care of that tank found a happy.place good job
 
lunacris said:
I'm also not channing water everyweek I'm about everytwo at the moment I also am dosing daily tho seems your taking good care of that tank found a happy.place good job
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As a noob, this makes me VERY happy.

I think I will do a small WC on Monday, just to siphon out the junk in the intake chamber.

Thanks ya'll!!
 
I was feeding the tank and dropping in my new coral while listening to some Billy Idol tonight and remembered that tonight is my usual PWC day again. I didn't do a PWC last week because everything was fine, so I decided to test the water again and see.

This is what I found...

Phos 0
Amm .25
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Calc 500
Alk 10dkm/179pph kh
PH 8.2

Comments and advice, please?
 
I would recheck it again Saturday morning. The ammonia shouldn't rise with a little feeding. If it were me I'd do a PWC.
 
chgoblknazn said:
I'm assuming the ammonia was up a bit because I had just fed a bit and stirred up a little gravel while moving some coral around.
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Hi,
I would not think that a tank as new as yours would have significant nutrients trapped in the sandbed yet. My guess is that your nitrates are up because you skipped last week's wc.

How are they today?
 
Yea I would do a wc also. Not only does it replace trace elements but it removes waste. I do 5 g wc's every 10 days on my system.
 
Something caused a spike and then your tank rectified itself overnight. Did you feed more than usual?
 
EricTheRed said:
Something caused a spike and then your tank rectified itself overnight. Did you feed more than usual?
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No, but I had just fed the tank 10 minutes prior after putting in my new blue turaki and gold scroll corals.

I'm just curious as to why ammonia, nitrite and nitrates are all zero. I mean i'm not complaining about it, but I want to make sure my chaeto has enough nutrients to stay alive. I've heard of them starving and just up and dieing. I have a HUGE chunk in my fuge so I think they are doing a good job scrubbing my water. There's so much in there that you can't see the sand bed under it.
 
Between your chaeto and your good bacteria, they absorbed/ate the nitrates. 0.25ppm is a low enough # to be cleared up on it's own without a wc. You do need to keep an eye on your chaeto. When I had chaeto, i would harvest it and thin it out to keep it healthy. If you have a huge compact chunk then you might want to look at the bottom of the chunk. If it's too compact there won't be enough light reaching the underside and it will be the first area to die off. For the most part it will adapt to your nutrient levels whether they be high or low. Unless you have an ulns then you shouldn't need to worry about it starving. If anything, it just won't grow much.
 
EricTheRed said:
Between your chaeto and your good bacteria, they absorbed/ate the nitrates. 0.25ppm is a low enough # to be cleared up on it's own without a wc. You do need to keep an eye on your chaeto. When I had chaeto, i would harvest it and thin it out to keep it healthy. If you have a huge compact chunk then you might want to look at the bottom of the chunk. If it's too compact there won't be enough light reaching the underside and it will be the first area to die off. For the most part it will adapt to your nutrient levels whether they be high or low. Unless you have an ulns then you shouldn't need to worry about it starving. If anything, it just won't grow much.
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I flip and tease the chaeto once a week when I go into my sump to make sure the bottom gets light for a week. It send a cloud into the DT but I figure that release of organics and pods will feed my corals. The cloudiness clears up by the next morning.
 
It's also good to break them up, beause chaeto grows end to end, the more you break up the chaeto, the more growth you get and more nutrients absorbed.
 
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