melev

My blog a few days ago detailed how some corals and anemones were distressed, while other livestock seemed fine. I learned a few things that day when I tried to restore the lack of alkalinity in the system, which is great.

I think more personal reefs suffer from alkalinity swings than most realize. Sure, accidents happen and excess solutions pump into the tank non-stop to the point that the livestock has little chance of survival. Some tanks overheat, others literally catch fire, pollutants get into the water, phosphate rises to excessive levels, and algae naturally takes over. But when people talk about their SPS corals STN-ing, I always think it's alkalinity-related.

My unknown coral definitely suffered this week, and a chunk of it is history. The exposed skeleton that I can now see is green, not white. I've been told that this is called boring algae, a type of algae that bores its way into the skeletal structure of the coral. Commonly occurring in systems with high phosphate levels, I'm surprised to see it in tank. I'll be sure to get a picture of it tomorrow.

Today's test measured 8.5 dKH again, and things are looking pretty close to normal once more. Some traces of the original damage is still visible, but I'm hoping to watch that heal over in the coming weeks.

The calcium reactor was looking rather hideous today, so I decided to dump out the media and low pH solution within. This was poured into an empty bucket, and the inner walls of the reactor were wiped down with a sponge. Reaching into the sludge and milky water in the bucket, I recovered handful after handful of calcium reactor media that was still in good shape. All of that was added back into the calcium reactor, and a little more was poured in that I had on hand in another container -- this allowed me to throw out yet one more thing in my ongoing effort to declutter my home... bit by bit. The calcium reactor looks cleaner within, and my concerns that the media might have transitioned to mush were quelled to my satisfaction.

About a week ago, I changed my ATO mechanism from the Deluxe Top It Off kit I've used for years to the newer SmartATO's magnetic mini-computer sensor system. I've been product reviewing this device for some time, and liked it enough that I'm switching over to this product permanently and will be selling it from my site soon. I may move the previous components to the new frag system I'm setting up next month since they are still fully functional.