help! low dKH and high Ca

[gig]

Hi all, hoping I can get some solid advice, I've had a couple corals wither away on me over the last couple weeks, but couldn't figure out why.

Decided to test my water today and my Ca was at 540 and my dKH at 6.

What's the best way to fix (slowly of course).

I have some Kent Super Buffer dKH I can use, but if I use it will likely dose have of what they perscribe.

However, I could also increase my Kalk drip, which I think is the issue.

A couple months back I switched from doing a drip, to simply topping off with Kalk, this seems to coincide with the problems, but also hard to tell.

Any ideas? I just want to be careful I dont cause any big swings quickly

 

[FishBeard]

Have you tested mag? This is usually the culprit for swinging your cal/alk apart from normal. My thoughts are magnesium is low. I battled this same issue early on when i started sw. The super buffer dkh just kept making the problem worse.

 

[gig]

No, I can test, but my tank is Pretty mature, I do wc every 2 weeks, it odd its out of whack

 

[ColaAddict]

The problem with mature tanks is you usually have alot of coraline algae and they suck up alot of magnesium. I would check the magnesium before dosing more kalk.

 

[FishBeard]

I don't think ago of the tank would make a difference when your magnesium levels get too low. It's a parameter thing, not a tank maturity issue. Let's see where that tests out at, would be a lot easier to just dose magnesium for a few days and let your parameters sort themselves out with a water change or two.

 

[gig]

OK, I only said "mature" as you mentioned "early on when I started sw", you may be right though, it's worth checkingf before I do anything.

The only other thing is the switch to KALK as my top off mught be a culprit, maybe it's dumping more in that before raising Ca? I would think that KH would go up too though, doesn't KALK raise both Ca and KH? I started using the brightwell Kalk+ which contains mg, but it's pricey, dont think I'll continue using it.

 

[ColaAddict]

It sucks switching products. I recently switched products myself, with my 2 part. The concentration is different, so my alk was doing some swings until I finally got the hang of the new product. I was testing everyday, sometimes 2x a day. I told myself, I'm sticking with this new product from now and not change.

 

[gig]

ok, so using salifert, I'm testing between 1300-1350 mg, so acceptable levels, I went ahead and dosed (probably75%) of the kent super buffer dkh, see how it goes tomorrow...thanks guys