new to keeping corals... now what??

[bigford84]

so i always said i would never want to keep coral, but now im hooked!!! so what should i be testing for now that i have corals in the tank??

my favorites are the pulsind xena stuf. i got the white stuf and some pink too. people say the xena is like the little canary miners use in the mine to tell if things are going bad. is that rite? and if yes then i think all is going well so far.

but what else should i be doing/testing to keep them all happy?

 

[carey]

First thing off the top of my head is calcium and phosphates.

 

[bigford84]

ok sounds like a good start... thank you


anybody else??

 

[Fishguy2727]

What types of corals do you have?

If you don't have any stony corals I wouldn't worry about calcium or magnesium yet.

If you only have soft corals so far just focus on water quality. Test your nitrate, phosphate, pH, KH, temp, and salinity (ideally with a refractometer). Get a good water change schedule going (at least 10%/week) and use high quality salt (I use Tropic Marin) and RO/DI water to make your saltwater and to top off.

Xenia is a great coral. It will actually improve water quality. It can be sensitive to changes in temp, salinity, etc. If all is well it can grow like a weed, so you may need to keep it under control. Ideally you will be able to frag it as it grows and give the frags to the LFS for store credit.

 

[william coco]

Hi! I am new, I have a 120 reef tank with soft corals they are not opening up. All my levels are good cal nitrates are 5 ph 8.3 everything what to do.