supplements??

[glowplug]

If your doing your Wc's and your salt is good stuff, do you need tehm and if so any reccomendations? I was looking in a cataloge and there are sooooooo many!!!!!!!! I would only be doing softies. Thanks!!!!!!!!!

 

[reefkprz]

supplements are only needed if you need them. let me clarify:
calcium is good to have on hand just in case, I have it on hand but with my coral load and my water change schedule I havent had to use it in over a year.
alk/buffer is good to have on hand in case of emergency but again for the most part only if you need it.
If you have a super high coral load, like a tank heavy with SPS and or LPS supplemenmtation may be required, for your average hobbyests, or beggining hobbyest it easier to mess things up trying to supplement than it is to fix things. If you decide to supplement with ANYTHING have the appropriate test kit for it. there are many things that can od on quite easily.

 

[jmick]

Most of the commercial suppliments are not needed and are a waste of money. If you do regular water changes you should be in good shape unless you have a highly stocked tank like the above poster said, then you might need to add calcium, alk buffer or magnesium. On all of these products, only add what you test for and you should be in good shape. You have to remember that most of the products you see are created by people in marketing not science and garbage that only add excess nutrients to your tank, which is the exact opposite of what you want to do.

 

[glowplug]

thanks guys, there is just so much stuff out there it makes you think that at least some of it is neccesary! I have seen a lot of products that are sold as sets, where you buy one but it works with 3 other bottles and at the end of the day you just bought 100 dollars worth of stuff. Are any of them beneficial like the kent nano bottles(the pair)? i have a 20 long, and am willing to keep up on WC's but with mostly softies and feeding cyclope eeze, rotifers, any thing else you guys might suggest?, just upgraded my lighting and want to add some wow factor in the way of softies,ive been doing FOWLR for about a year and a half

 

[reefkprz]

in a 20long heck buy a cheapo 10g tank and do 50% water changes every 3 weeks, there is almost no way you would ever need to supplement anything ever IMO. and your water would be of the highest quality.

 

[mscarpena]

I don't reccomend doing a 50% water change at one time though with a reef tank. Also waiting 3 weeks is too long. Your calcium, alkalinty, and PH will fluctuate too much. You should do like 3-5 gallons on a weekly basis. I would do 3 gallons per week and test the above parameters.

 

[glowplug]

I had planned on doing and usually have in the past a 5g weekly WC, on my 20 long im only using an aqua clear 70, a modded maxijet 600 and about 20lbs of LR. With the suggestion of getting a 10g did you mean for me to make a sump?

 

[glowplug]

bzzzump

 

[nycbob]

i just do 20% water chng every week. i think i hv a pretty heavy coral bioload too. i keep lots of sps,lps and softies. water chng seem to replenish the trace elements and calcium.

 

[reefkprz]

there isnt anything wrong with doing large water changes on a reef tank, as long as the temp, and sg are the same. thats the only size water changes I do on my 12g and my 10G. I do them every 2-3 weeks. on my 75g w/30g sump I do 50% changes once in a while but its a pain trying to match everything up, because I have to mix in a couple different containers.