truly a "learn something new everyday hobby"

[pizzaguy]

I know you hear that expression with just about everything but this is the one hobby that it really sticks. I have only been very serious about this hobby for almost 12 months now. I've always had tanks but never a true reef tank like now. This post is really about what I have learned in the last 24 hours about sps in particular.

I was always under the assumption that if you have a lot of sps that you needed a tremendous amount of turbulent flow so with that said I had 2 mp-40's running in a 36x36 tank across from each other running at 90% power. Those that have mp's probably know where this is going by now. If you don't, that is a lot of flow. Well I took it upon myself to try something different. I have approximately 40 to 50 sps frags and mini colonies plus a ton of lps and Zoas. What got me thinking is a lot of my sps had no polyp extension or very little extension but still retained all its color. Been like that for at least 5 months or more. So I turned my powerheads down to about 40% with the same settings which is I believe random so its still turbulent but not a typhoon and guess what?? Every single sps and acro now has polyps out, instead of string beans for polyps I know have huge flower petal polyps, so much that on a lot of them you can't even see the skeleton, my lps are huge and Zoas are looking incredible. So to sum up my post for newbies like myself, I personally never read anywhere when I was educating myself that there definitely is such a thing as two much flow. Don't settle for I assume its good, its not dead like I did.

[YHSublime]

Thanks for sharing. I actually sold one of my MP40s because I had two JB's and two MPs. Once I moved my fish out of the DT, I saw polyps come out on SPS that was growing very fast, but I didn't think showed them!

 

I've not seen polyps on my flower petal like you are describing, maybe I should move it's location!

[pizzaguy]

Honestly, its quit stunning. I never would have thought about it if I wasn't getting very aggravated with no polyp extension, lots of Zoas not fully opening. Ive really been busting my butt to keep my nitrates down for the sps and it was getting depressing not seeing the stuff take off. Now I know why. Lesson learned

[Cliff Puckstable]

So you can have too much flow....

[gmerek2]

Thanks for the post. I only have one mp40 100% power in my 125. I didn't think it was near enough but now I'm second guessing. I have decent polyp extension on my acros. I have learned they suck up or deflate with me when my Mg gets low or when Alkalinity is worn out. There is no flow meter test kit so it is confusing for me also.

[howaboutme]

Honestly, its quit stunning. I never would have thought about it if I wasn't getting very aggravated with no polyp extension, lots of Zoas not fully opening. Ive really been busting my butt to keep my nitrates down for the sps and it was getting depressing not seeing the stuff take off. Now I know why. Lesson learned

 

So how are your nitrates, Eric? Any success getting them lower?

[pizzaguy]

Staying below 20 on nitrates.

[zygote2k]

I think theres some misunderstanding with flow and SPS. You need tons of flow using older style powerheads to transport the waste into the filter. Now with MP40's and the clones, people just assumed they needed lots of those to get the same waste removal. It's one of the effects of bigger, faster, more.

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

If your Lps was happy with the "high flow" and your sps was not, that seems a little backwards. I will be adding two more powerheads to my 50 gallon with the two mp40's and I am thinking I will still keep good polyp extension.

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

I think this topic should be continued and not let float to the bottom.

[pizzaguy]

I agree. Most of the lps was in the lowest flow areas that I have. They are just a lot happier now.