SPS/LPS Corals, Calcium Reactors, Carbon Reactors. Phosphate etc etc

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begginersluck

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Apr 3, 2012
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Jersey Channel islands
These are all the things a reef enthusiast will be talking about plus more.

I'd like to start a discussion on Corals and how they are best kept. This could help a lot of us out there that are probably too scared to ask. I used to be but if you dont ask you wont know.

I'm in process of setting up my 90G and hoping to do a full blown reef. I want to make sure my water is stable so talking about Phosphate and Calcium will help me understand more about the topic. Could someone explain a little more in detail how Phosphate and Calcium are imporant to watch and also how we should be doing it.

I think another great subject is different types of corals. I dont know much myself about them however i'm very interested in introducing numerous species both hard and soft. Could someone jump in and go in to more detail on what SPS and LPS corals are and other types of corals. Also explaining how to tell them apart.

Obviously this is a wide spread topic but i'm hoping this thread will provide us with a little more knowledge on keep corals.

Thanks in advance and look forward to hearing everyones comments.
 
I'm sure a lot of us could lean from this. ill subscribe.

Let me talk about what I know.

LPS= long polyp stony coral
SPS=short polyp stony coral.

Now, I found that one that is new to a reef tank almost graduates to sps corals. The best thing for coral is stable water. I put in my soft corals after 2 months an by 5 months put in LPS. But that was just me based on my comfort level.
 
I'll be adding all my livestock including sand and rock from my old tank straight over to my new tank so effectively i wont have a cycle and its almost an established tank.

I'd like to add the equipment first so il be adding a top up system, Deltec MCE600 skimmer and not sure about a reactor of somesort.

How can you tell the difference between SPS and LPS? Maybe someone can upload a picture of an ovbious difference?
 
I personally don't have sps yet. Hopefully within two or three weeks ill have a birds nest coral.

Here are two heads of my hammer coral. This is an example of an LPS .
 

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Cool this is my hammerhead.


I've been reading up and I thinki
Going to get a calcium reactor rather than dosing.
 

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Lighting

Soft coral - almost any lighting will do
LPS - At least T5 lighting
SPS - Metal Halide or strong LEDs. Recomended 5 watts of light per gallon


Minimum recomended requirements for coral growth
Calcium - 400
Magnesium - 1350
Alk - 7.5

Just some basic guidlines that I'm sure someone will say are wrong...:lol:
 
Actually, It's Scleractinian, as in Small Polyp Scleractinian-
Scleractinia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Unless you have a tank that's loaded with these, (and when I say loaded, I don't mean twenty 1" frags, I mean mature colonies) you will be able to replace all elements with a simple water change regimen with a reef grade salt mix.

Examples-
This 60" x 30" x 25" tall tank that used to be in my basement was not dosed ever, and no calcium reactor in sight. Weekly water changes kept all of these football and basketball sized colonies growing and healthy-
img_2307511_0_a0f20a0fb937c5514f2857ffb3582c4d.jpg


As was this 8' x 24" x 17" tall coral tank-
img_2307511_1_53758572e71e15dc083e7e4494db57f9.jpg

I don't know if you can make it out, but there is a 14" clam in there as well.

Also, in terms of lighting, watts per gallon isn't a very good rule to go by due to individual efficiency per watt.
T5's are every bit as capable for SPS as metal halide is. LEDs however, are much more potent than both, providing you choose the right unit.
 
X, those tanks are gorgeous. Someday when I'm not in an apartment I swear I will have a basement full of tanks :)


For now a 75 gallon will have to do
 
Lots of good information on here -
if people with expereince want to keep letting us newbies know:
a good progression coral from a softie --> LPS and then
a good progression coral from LPS --> SPS

Also where do Non-photosynthetic corals fit in?

Thanks!
 
Depending on your bio load and coral load, it would differ. As much as you can reasonably, is what I would recommend. 15-20% or so I guess. A 10 or 15 gallon water change on a 90 shouldn't be too difficult, and it's a great way to export nutrients also.
Any reef grade salt mix should work fine. RC is ok.
 
You aren't going to use a lot of calcium unless you have giant colonies.
This tank is a 195. It's 5 feet long. The colonies in it are softball sized and larger. The Millepora dead center was 15" across.
I maintained this tank with zero dosing. Just weekly water changes. The total water volume was about 300 gallons, and i did 50 gallons a week.
img_2339083_0_ed17491a7eeafaa5c801e4f5e2845ff4.jpg
 
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