sen5241b December 8, 2009 Share December 8, 2009 My coralline has had a significant die back especially where the MH light is strongest and my alkalinity has been chronically low. I have been dosing with unbaked baking soda to keep alkalinity high. According to reefkeeping mag, coralline will suck a lot of alk out of the water. Alk can consists of different things. Will keeping alk high with baking soda help my coralline grow? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
schulzjp December 8, 2009 Share December 8, 2009 Im wondering if the baking soda is affecting your calcium. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Origami December 8, 2009 Share December 8, 2009 Keeping reasonable alk levels is important for coraline growth as is calcium. Coraline, I believe, also consumes a lot of magnesium (4% by weight or thereabouts, I believe). Baking soda is an imbalanced additive that will raise your alkalinity. It will do nothing for the other two. Without proper magnesium levels (1280+ ppm), adding baking soda or other alkalinity additives can actually cause a decrease in calcium as calcium carbonate is precipitated out. What are your pH, calcium, magnesium and alkalinity numbers? Coraline does not grow well under intense light, so your MH lighting is most likely slowing growth down. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sen5241b December 8, 2009 Author Share December 8, 2009 Keeping reasonable alk levels is important for coraline growth as is calcium. Coraline, I believe, also consumes a lot of magnesium (4% by weight or thereabouts, I believe). Baking soda is an imbalanced additive that will raise your alkalinity. It will do nothing for the other two. Without proper magnesium levels (1280+ ppm), adding baking soda or other alkalinity additives can actually cause a decrease in calcium as calcium carbonate is precipitated out. What are your pH, calcium, magnesium and alkalinity numbers? Coraline does not grow well under intense light, so your MH lighting is most likely slowing growth down. My calcium is always a little high. Mag is always well above recommended levels. My alk, without dosing, goes down to 6 or 7. Ph will occasionally drop to 7.8. As long as I dose about 1.5 teaspoons a week with UNbaked baking soda, the alk stays between 8 and 10 and the Ph stays right at 8.3. I have tons of coralline but just a few corals. (it seems with tank chemistry -no two tanks are alike!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Origami December 8, 2009 Share December 8, 2009 Alk can drop faster than calcium if you have strong growth of stuff like coraline and other skeleton-forming livestock that incorporate a high percentage of magnesium in their skeletons. Nitrates? An incomplete nitrogen cycle can also rob you of alkalinity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sen5241b December 8, 2009 Author Share December 8, 2009 Alk can drop faster than calcium if you have strong growth of stuff like coraline and other skeleton-forming livestock that incorporate a high percentage of magnesium in their skeletons. Nitrates? An incomplete nitrogen cycle can also rob you of alkalinity. My 'trates are all below measurable levels. What is an "incomplete nitrogen cycle"? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Origami December 8, 2009 Share December 8, 2009 My 'trates are all below measurable levels. What is an "incomplete nitrogen cycle"? When organic stuff is broken down by bacteria, the process releases ammonia which is converted to nitrite, which is converted to nitrate, and the nitrate, ultimately, to nitrogen gas. That nitrogen gas is ultimately finds its way back into living tissues (into amino acids that make up protein), which makes up the organic stuff that bacteria break down. That's the nitrogen cycle and it goes 'round and 'round. The "incomplete" part comes between the nitrate and nitrogen gas steps. You see, the process up to that point actually consumes a unit of alkalinity. This unit is returned in the next step during the conversion of nitrate to nitrogen gas. The net effect is to be alkalinity-neutral. However, if an aquarist manages their nitrates largely by water changes, they're removing the nitrate before the nitrogen cycle can complete. Consequently, that unit of alkalinity that was consumed in the first steps is never returned, and alkalinity drops. In essence, when you throw nitrate down the drain, you're effectively throwing alkalinity down with it. Reefkeeping magazine had a good article on this a while back. It's here if you want to read it: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-12/rhf/index.php Look about halfway down to the section that is titled, "Alkalinity Decline in the Nitrogen Cycle." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dschflier December 9, 2009 Share December 9, 2009 Wow excellent explanation. I will read the article. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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