SPS polyp withdrawl

[percula]

A few days ago all of my SPS (well, all four of them) all pulled their polyps in without any event that I know of. Softies and LPS all seem happy. The SPS don't seem to be degenerating but I'm anxious to try and remedy the problem. I'm still a bit new at this so I'm looking for any suggestions of what else I should look for (or test for normally).

 

As of last night:

Salinity - 1.022 (surprised how much this had slowly dropped with creep)

NO3 - 0

PH - 8.0

PO4 - 0

Ca - 440 mg/L

KH - 6 dKH

 

Thanks, Matt

[vaironman]

First thought is your alkalinity is a little bit low. A good range is 9dkh - 12 dkh.

 

Try to bring it up slowly and your PH will drop as increasing dkh, slowly add buffer to keep PH up and in balance. This is an art I am trying to perfect it myself. Everybody has to find out what the refill/resupply of their own tanks on their own, with careful daily or every other day measurements for a couple weeks.

 

Good luck Matt. Other veterans will chime in for much better tips and I can also learn from here for sure. Good thread. Thanks.

[lancer99]

First thought is your alkalinity is a little bit low. A good range is 9dkh - 12 dkh.

 

Try to bring it up slowly and your PH will drop as increasing dkh, slowly add buffer to keep PH up and in balance.

I agree about the alk, and you should get your salinity back up too.

 

Just one minor point...I use the supplements from bulkreefsupply, and adding alk *raises* the pH. I would expect other alk supplements to do the same, but I may be wrong.

 

-R

[lletellier]

salinity is low i'm surprised other stuff isn't showing signs of anything, raise it slowly I forget what rate is safe but i'm sure someone will chime in. Can't hurt to do a water change either that seems to fix everything for me.