LPS Problems

0.5 is high for phosphates. I would run some gfo. I try to keep my phosphates at 0.1 or less

 

Kylie what stands out to me is yor po4 0.5 is actualy preaty high you need to get it down to 0.05 the level in natural sea water is 0.005 so your problem may be your po4.
-Bill

 

Your phosphates are too high was my first impression. But you say it is 0-.5. That is a huge range. How can you have such a range?

There is a reef calculator at BRS. For 80 gal (40 breeder + sump) you need 1.25 cups of regular strength GFO. That is 10 oz. I wonder if your GFO container is too full and your GFO is caking up? You need to have it about half full, and have the grains tumbling very very lightly. I know it is hard to detect this in a BRS duel reactor. If 1.25 cups of regular strength GFO (10oz) fills up your reactor, consider using the High Capacity GFO. It takes up half the space, and you need half as much. In your case around .63 cups or 5 oz.

You also say your Ca is 500 but way too high to calculate. So how do you know it is 500? You need to get your Ca and Alk in balance. So work on getting your Ca down to about 420 and the Alk will follow hopefully.

Finally, the skimmer. Not sure why there is a protein layer but that ain't good. Maybe throw a maxi jet near the top of the the tank to break up the surface tension. See if that helps at all.

 

Just take a cup and slowly press it into the surface of the water and skimm the build up off my hand. What is the calcium of your freshly mixed salt water? Are you adding anything for ca and alk?

 

Also I have a hanna phos checker I'm going to sell at fall fest as my po4 is always rock bottum. So if you want it so you can accuratly check your phosphates let me know.

 

Maybe spot feed them some PE mysis. Thats when mine really perked up, remember my blue trumpet wasn't looking too hot til then. Also, do you maybe a have a nipper in there? I caught my coral beauty the other day.......

 

may i ask how you are feeding the green water?

 

my understanding about green water is your supposed to strain it through a coffee filter and not put it directly into your tank.  i dont know  if that would be a contributing factor or not.  with my lps. I never feed them, i feed the tank with rods food original once  or twice a day and thats it. after a yr  all of them are splitting and growing to the point i can almost start to  frag some.

 

If your calcium is 500+ then there's the problem. Try to get your alk up to 8-9 and your calcium should come down. Slowly. Shoot for 400-450ppm calcium. That's plenty. If it gets to high (500) your always going to have alk problems (drifting low)

 

While you're trying to get your phosphate under control I wouldn't feed your coral, and feed your fish sparingly.

 

I ^ agree, plus the phosphates aren't helping, but I would say this is what's bothering them the most (from personal experience). How often do you change the water? A few water changes of correctly mixed new SW should bring things (calcium and alk) into better ranges. What's your salinity at? What are you using for top-off water? Things to check as well. Sometimes when you assume those basic things are fine, they are actually off........

 

Well, the super high calcium is coming from somewhere.......maybe borrow a different brand kit to test with. It sounds like your calcium levels should be ok, unless you're adding something like Purple Up or something like Kallwasser to your top-off water. The only time I had calcium off the charts was when I used Purple Up. I'm assuming you're using Reef Crystals or some other common brand of salt? I think someone else suggested this too, but what is the SW you make testing at for calcium?

 

Coralife has a calcium reading of 560ppm according to this salt thread.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1714505