Reef Discussion

[Mr.Reeefer]

qustion? Continuum aquatics coral exponential, states this product provides solubilised proteins as amino acids and lipids including important omega fatty acids, so, if I dose this will my skimmer take these proteins out of my water before the corals get too?

I need to do a big supplement order and like to try new things that benefit my reef however, I don't really feel like paying for some fancy sounding shit that doesn't do much besides cost money, so, what are you dosing? How is it working for you? What would you recommend? Are you a powder or liquid person? What's your brand? Why?

I have tried the Red Sea reef foundation A&B, but I personally don't think this A&B calcium and carbonate combination program is value for money, I prefer to dose either straight Calcium or carbonate buffer, thoughts on this?

I also noticed continuum also have a dosing suppliment for fish, some Hufa thing that works well with another vitamin M suppliment, once again this additive is meant to give our fish essential vitamins etc that are not in high enough amounts is our frozen, dry or even live foods, any thoughts or practical experience using this stuff?

TIA

 

[daveH]

I've been down the Red Sea path and found poor to none results.
I highly recommend Seachem Reef Trace and Reef Plus for noticeable coral growth and colour.
I dose small amounts of each on alternate days and have actually had excellent results. A number of others on this forum have also used these products with the same results.
For my Calc, Alk and Mag you really can't go past Randy's Recipe - simple, cheap and effective.

 

[Mr.Reeefer]

I've been down the Red Sea path and found poor to none results.
I highly recommend Seachem Reef Trace and Reef Plus for noticeable coral growth and colour.
I dose small amounts of each on alternate days and have actually had excellent results. A number of others on this forum have also used these products with the same results.
For my Calc, Alk and Mag you really can't go past Randy's Recipe - simple, cheap and effective.

Thanks for the input Dave.

I assumed as much, I thought allot of these A,B,C,D dosing programs are more focussed on sales rather than our reefs.

I have only used seachem twice, once was there liquid calcium, At the time I was still completely fresh into the hobby and had only used one other calcium previously, and on my first dose with it, i dosed as much as I would with the previous brand and seachem was allot stronger than my previous brand, only needed to dose a quarter of the amount with seachem.

I have been slowly working my way through all the decent to good brands to see what is the best, but it's a slow process, i thought maybe through all the experience on here i could speed things up and save some $$$

I have heard of Randy's, and never researched it or thought to give it a go, something about the name i just assumed it wasn't good, but it will be in the next order.

thanks again:)

 

[gtrxu1]

I have used Randy's for years with the ingredients from 100percentreefsafe. Keeping it simple now apart from a few Zeo supps, only dosing phyto a little and weekly target feeds of mysis etc for the meat eating corals.

Small amounts of Phyto daily has been amazing for my tank.

 

[Andrew B]

I am currently dosing.... NOTHING..... i will but i just set up the tank so..... :)

 

[ajkdark]

I've been down the Red Sea path and found poor to none results.
I highly recommend Seachem Reef Trace and Reef Plus for noticeable coral growth and colour.
I dose small amounts of each on alternate days and have actually had excellent results. A number of others on this forum have also used these products with the same results.
For my Calc, Alk and Mag you really can't go past Randy's Recipe - simple, cheap and effective.

I use Red Sea products and I do not regret using them. I find the results to my satisfaction.

Seachem's products are also excellent.

Cheers

 

[ezza]

What Dave said. Seachem plus and trace. I started trying their iodide recently and reef buffer. I am a bit lost currently. I have a Sen eye but haven't had it working for a few months now because of cost so I lost track of the few parameters that it monitors. Aside from constant PH awareness, I don't feel I'm at much of a loss. I had run out of supps too prior to my surgery. Quite frankly, I didn't notice any real difference in not dosing anything.... I have had a flush of coralline growth which is positive though. Randy's Recipe is good, it saves money big time. I found that my magnesium supplements that I was meant to be taking personally were excellent for my aquarium. It was mag chloride instead of sulfate which you get in Epsom salts. It's not that big a deal though.

I wish there was an easy way to know what you really need. Sometimes this all seems too hard.

 

[ezza]

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/

http://thereefuge.com/threads/randys-recipe-maintaining-calcium-alkalinity-and-magnesium.376/

 

[Mr.Reeefer]

I have used Randy's for years with the ingredients from 100percentreefsafe. Keeping it simple now apart from a few Zeo supps, only dosing phyto a little and weekly target feeds of mysis etc for the meat eating corals.

Small amounts of Phyto daily has been amazing for my tank.

live phyto?

 

[Mr.Reeefer]

What Dave said. Seachem plus and trace. I started trying their iodide recently and reef buffer. I am a bit lost currently. I have a Sen eye but haven't had it working for a few months now because of cost so I lost track of the few parameters that it monitors. Aside from constant PH awareness, I don't feel I'm at much of a loss. I had run out of supps too prior to my surgery. Quite frankly, I didn't notice any real difference in not dosing anything.... I have had a flush of coralline growth which is positive though. Randy's Recipe is good, it saves money big time. I found that my magnesium supplements that I was meant to be taking personally were excellent for my aquarium. It was mag chloride instead of sulfate which you get in Epsom salts. It's not that big a deal though.

I wish there was an easy way to know what you really need. Sometimes this all seems too hard.

Hi ez,

yes the seneye does not monitor the things we need most however, after the random ammonia spike i had a few months back, i think i feel safer having it running than not, also, i find that the ph reading helps indicate where my alkalinity and calcium is at without testing, also, if by any chance a heater fails, the temp alarm is also a great safety feature, so all in all, the seneye helps keep me calm when i'm not at home.

I think dosing is irrelevant if water changes are frequent and substantial, also depending on stock levels, the more living things we have sucking our water dry of nutrients the more we would need to add and more frequently.
A spike in coralline is a great sign, whether or not is solely because of dosing or not is not proven, i have noticed previously that when i haven't had time to dose my coralline has receded, once i started dosing again (calcium & Carb buffer) and stuck with it, it replenished and started to grow again.

Interesting that you were game enough to give your personal medication a go in the aquarium, are you still continuing with this?

all we really need is the main ones, Calc, Alk, Mag, Stront, Iod.

I like to try the ones that claim to give colour and growth to see if they really work, but it's a slow process and wanted to hear others opinions, also i wanted a go to brand or brands for the main 5 that we need all the time, apparently Randy's recipe is going to get me the same results for my Cal, Alk & mag and save me some money. Cal & Alk i go through quite fast, so this is good news for me.

What made me raise the topic was, as i was browsing for my supplements, i was so overwhelmed by all the products that claim to do all these amazing things and was slowing adding them one by one to my cart, then after seeing all this shit in my cart, i thought i would ask the question, as i didn't want to buy a bunch of shit diluted into a bottle with a fancy sticker on it, so i understand what you mean.

 

[Mr.Reeefer]

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/

http://thereefuge.com/threads/randys-recipe-maintaining-calcium-alkalinity-and-magnesium.376/

thanks for the links, some interesting reading

 

[gtrxu1]

live phyto?

At the moment yes, just Nanno but I had good results with some branded ones as well.
I may go back to the highly concentrated feed from a place called Reef Culture its really good stuff as it contains more than one type of phyto. When I was using it I was dosing 5 drops morning and night.

 

[ezza]

Interesting that you were game enough to give your personal medication a go in the aquarium, are you still continuing with this?

It was only a magnesium supplement. Really no different from any other source of mag. An element is an element. I eventually ran out of capsules- I probably should have taken the things myself instead of dosing them to the tank- but I am a bit hopeless with taking non-essential medications. If you want to obtain high quality minerals, the chemist is one of the primary sources you will find them. You can ask the chemist for bulk powder- it's just cost effective.

 

[dino]

If your params are good, and you're doing regular water changes but not seeing good growths and good colour, then the thing you probably need to be dosing is.......






more LIGHT.

 

[Mr.Reeefer]

At the moment yes, just Nanno but I had good results with some branded ones as well.
I may go back to the highly concentrated feed from a place called Reef Culture its really good stuff as it contains more than one type of phyto. When I was using it I was dosing 5 drops morning and night.

i'm in the process of setting up for live phyto, rotifers etc, can't wait to see some good results once doing this

 

[gtrxu1]

i'm in the process of setting up for live phyto, rotifers etc, can't wait to see some good results once doing this

I kept crashing my Rotifers :( I got lazy when I was culturing and the daily maintenance got annoying. I really should get up and running again they are an awesome feed.

 

[ReeferRob]

I dose:
Calcium
Magnesium
Alkalinity buffer
Strontium
Iodide
Reef Trace and Reef Plus
Some sort of green water, the name escapes me right now.
I also dose Iron as needed for my algae scrubbers, yes, I use Caulerpa.

 

[Uglyman]

I dose :
Calcium
Mag
Bicarb
Strontium
Iodide
Potassium
Iron
Silicate
Also trying Brightwells Koral Colour and Korallen Zeovit Biomate

I have not seen much improvement in coral colour since using Brightwells Koral Colour.
Biomate dosing started 3 weeks ago as I had a bottle given to me so thought why not, no noticeable changes in tank so far.

I do not currently do any water changes and have not done so for 5 months now.

 

[ezza]

I dose :
Calcium
Mag
Bicarb
Strontium
Iodide
Potassium
Iron
Silicate
Also trying Brightwells Koral Colour and Korallen Zeovit Biomate

I have not seen much improvement in coral colour since using Brightwells Koral Colour.
Biomate dosing started 3 weeks ago as I had a bottle given to me so thought why not, no noticeable changes in tank so far.

I do not currently do any water changes and have not done so for 5 months now.

5 months?! Wooooow! Do you test nitrates etc?

 

[Uglyman]

5 months?! Wooooow! Do you test nitrates etc?

I don't bother testing nitrate or phosphate at the moment, I used to religiously but nitrate never always showed 0 on two test kits and phosphate I don't bother. Phosphate in my tank has always sat between .1ppm and .03 so I have decided I don't care where it sits, instead I will keep an eye on polyp extension and colour.