Coral feeding ?

[SavageSS]

Presently I am feeding my corals with DT's Live Phytoplankton $$ & Kents Zooplex. What is everybody else using I no there are other products but which ones are good and which ones are not good what is yor recipe for happy corals?

Also what are you using for buffering your RO/DI water when I started out 9 plus months ago the LFS told me to us Kents Superbuffer-dkh now I am questioning that choice another LFS say all you need is Kents Osmo-prep Marine . I have heard about Kents Coral Builder what is the correct product vs application. What is eveybody using with succes ?

[Mr.Reef]

I also offer my corals cycloopzees's the frozen type.

[vertical]

The only thing I feed my corals is light and CA and ALK from my CA RX and mush that I feed more for the fish. I guess there is debate weather they get anything from feeding...Keep in mind that I only have SPS in my tank. When I feed though all my corals seem to extend their polyps more. Dont know if this means anything.

If your interested I made my own fish food mush. Heres the recipe of what I dumped in.
1 large brick of Cyclopeese
1 large brick of PE mysis
1 large brick of frozen brine
1 medium brick of clams
1 medium brick of krill
2oz of selco
4oz of zoecon
2tbsp of smallest golden pearls
2tbsp of next size golden pearls
2tbsp of freezedried rotifers
2tbsp of freezedried phytoplankton
3 sheets each ground up of the different kinds of seaweeds selects
small container of minced garlic.

Next time I make it I will probable add more mysis to the mix. I mixed everything and froze it in small ziplock bags. I feed about 1/2 tsp a day.

HTH
Casey

[Loverotties]

Originally Posted by vertical

The only thing I feed my corals is light and CA and ALK from my CA RX and mush that I feed more for the fish. I guess there is debate weather they get anything from feeding...Keep in mind that I only have SPS in my tank. When I feed though all my corals seem to extend their polyps more. Dont know if this means anything.

I do the same!

[SavageSS]

Thanks on the feeding, does anybody have an opinion on the RO/DI water buffering ?

[ReefSitter]

kalkwasser via kalk reactor

[sls]

geez vertical your fish eat better than I do.lol

[redwinger]

I feed my sps light and fish poop and the lps I will target feed with cyclop-eeze. As far as buffering your rodi water some do and some don't. I used to use a product that brought the ph up to 8.3 before I started dosing kalk to help with the low ph. Since switching to the Ca reactor I buffer nothing and don't use kalk. You just have to do what works for you.

[Loralie]

I feed Liquid Life and a dozen other things mixed in...I think I am gonna make a mush and I have thos ice cube trays that make the pellets...I think I will borrow Verticals mush mix

[David Grigor]

You do not need Kent Osmo-prep for your top off water.

However, I do use the Osmo-prep for water changes ( Instant Ocean & Reef Crystals ) . Although it may not be necessary.

Here is my logic: I add a teaspoon or so of the Osmo-prep to the bucket of RO/DI water ( with powerhead running ), add my Alk, CA, and Magnesium addivites ( Seachem Reef builder, Reef CA Advantage, Magnesium powder forms ) to the fresh water BEFORE putting in the Salt. Only reason I use the Osmo-prep is because I add the addivites prior to the salt and want the fresh water to have a base so that the additives will not precipitate immediately. This just save me from having to mix my additives in a quart or so of freshwater individually to add to the salt later. When it's all said and done my CA, ALK, Magnesium is now elevated to the levels I want in my Fresh SW. If you add your addivites after the salt ( or not at all ) then there propably no need for the Osmo-prep.

[salty65gal]

WOW Lots of chemicals!!! I only add fresh ro water with salt mixed in for my water changes. Everything seems to be doing fine after almost a year of this. I have lots of chemicals and maybe I will start using a little to see if I can find a difference.

[David Grigor]

Fresh SW ( both Instant Ocean & Reef Crystals ) doesn't have high enough values for CA, and Magnesium to maintain the levels I like to keep. I add the Alk as well to the SW so that I don't have to dose it seperately to the tank.....So basically for the SW change keeps my values ( along with Kalk topoff ) without any additional addivities outside of the water change. It keeps everything simple and a easy routine for me.....takes literally seconds to dump it in the water prior to the salt. Now if the tank was bigger then 58g probably wouldn't have the luxary to be able to dose everything through small twice weekly water changes...

[vertical]

David out of curiousity what are your target levels for CA ALK and MG?

[capman]

And what are you using to raise magnesium levels?

And what test kit do you use to test magnesium levels?

And, finally, what do you find happens in your system when magnesium levels are lower than they should be?

(I've been wondering recently whether I should be thinking more about magnesium levels in my systems, hence all the questions).

[vertical]

Well here is my take on MG. The only test kit that I have found in the hobby to be accurate and repeatable is salifert (true for most tests). That said I use the powder/crystal form of Seachems reef advantage magnesium. I target my levels at about 1300.

The way I understand it if your MG level get to low it makes raising CA and alk almost impossible. For example in my old system when I didnt check it my lvls got below 1000. This made raising CA to even 400 impossible. When I went to add buffer to raise it it would just precipitate out. Ultimately the high CA content and low MG in Oceanic salt is I believe what started the demise of my last tank I kept doing WCs with an unbalance salt and just kept making matters worse.

HTH
Casey