Lol ask Andy, Al, Craig, or Ken. Currently 13 in the fish room. That doesn't include the three in the living room, one in the closet, one in the bathroom, and the seven or so I have stored at my parents. Still don't have a display tank yet and that is why I don't usually share pictures.Jon
So where are the pictures of tanks? I think you only have a goldfish in a 1 gallon fishbowl you have only read about salt lOl
Just take a maxi jet power head once a month or more often and blow the rock and sand clean you will be surprised how much crud comes up. and filter it out with either your trickle filter floss or a 100 micron sock, or a HOT micron filter, like i do. It wil plug up many times till the tank comes clean.
I keep my calcium high, my alkalinity has been staying high, and although my magnesium isn’t uber high, I’m going to get it up into the 1450 range over the week. Are there any downsides? I did some searching around and all I could find was that calcium may buildup quicker in high calcium systems. Although I didn’t find much that said uber high (550+) calcium was bad, I didn’t seem to find much that said it helped much (my green coraline is going crazy).
Anyone have any experience with keeping all of these very high? Will I just cause a snowstorm (precipitation) bringing the magnesium up?
Hopefully these SPS frags I’m getting/got are going to suck up some of it all up!
Calcium Mag alk and also ph need to be balanced if one is too high or low it will effect the rest
http://reef.diesyst.com/flashcalc/flashcalc.html
http://www.3reef.com/forums/water-chemistry/mag-high-need-get-back-balance-39131.html
http://www.onlinewatertreatment.com/literature/Nalco/docs/Tf-084.pdf
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-12/rhf/index.php
Thanks Al, I knew most of that stuff and it doesn’t much answer my question of the downsides of high ca, alk, and mag.
But I def. learned some things on the relationships between the 4, especially the roles ph and mag play.
That last article is very good, I’d suggest everyone read it.
The benefits of magnesium!!
Wow, I brought my magnesium up maybe 50 ppm and my feather was able to utilize the calcium and alkalinity from the water and grew at least another 3/4" over night! The coraline has seemed to thicken up on many of the rocks as well. It doesn’t necessarily mean thats what caused the feather to grow so much, but nothing else (to my knowledge) changed in the tank.
Ok, this feather duster is at least 2" longer than it was 2 nights ago…what gives???
Feather is up to a good 3"s longer than it was 3 nights ago.
Trying to raise magnesium by adding equivalent weight of about 30-50ppm raise each night, but I tested it tonight and it is down 40 ppm! WTF. I started off adding a bit of the mag chloride (mag flakes, ice melt) and then went to the mag sulfate (epsom salt) to balance the chloride/sulfate ions. Ca and Alk are still up where they have been. I’m wondering if the 620 calcium levels are effecting the mag test.
Side note I found a good article on magnesium. http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/oct2003/chem.htm
Now a favor. I’m going to bring a few samples of my water to the meeting. Anyone care to take some home and run some tests on it? Ca, Alk, and Mag. Phosphate too if you have the kit, cause I don’t. I’d like to verify my tests and correlate results.
Off to add another 50 grams of magnesium.
I’ll try to remember to bring my test kits. I do have a phos kit, but I’m convinced it’s next to useless.
Re-read those articles. It explains why calcium mag alk are intertwined and if they are out of balance you cant be easily fixed. check your numbers. I had another link with a graph but for some reason I can’t find it. I will look again
BUT… it never says, aside from percipitation, any negative effects of super high levels… may affect ph. only thing i could see maycause an issue. my question is, how much magnesium is TOO much?
I doubt it will get to the point of having too much mag as as the mag gets high, calcium and alk will get out of balance and usually their levels will drop which will also effect pH. Usually if on is too high you can’t get the others high enough to keep them stable and at correct levels.
[quote=“a1amap, post:32, topic:642”]
I doubt it will get to the point of having too much mag as as the mag gets high, calcium and alk will get out of balance and usually their levels will drop which will also effect pH. Usually if on is too high you can’t get the others high enough to keep them stable and at correct levels.[/quote]
Actually Al, from what I’ve read its quite the opposite. Low mag doesn’t allow for higher levels of Ca and Alk and higher mag allows them to stay into solution not fall out.
The one article I just linked mentions high magnesium. It was talking on the lines of 8000 ppm for magnesium poisoning, so I don’t think there is really any risk there. It also works as an anesthetic for some animals!
I’ll re-review those articles, Al, but I don’t think it explains why if the mag is low adding more didn’t raise it’s level. The only thing I can think is the raised mag allowed the organisms to use the high ca and alk and have drop the mag back to a level they can’t use it.
Well I must have been retarded last night, I re ran the test twice this evening and got 1420 repeatedly (mag). The other #s match what I got last night so I probably fudged the mag test. I should have known if your test shows an unexpected result (and you have an idea what it should be) test again, never go off of one data point especially when it conflicts with what you think it SHOULD be.
Feather has slowed its growth but is still growing, one point of its tube seems like it might be branching off.
The shrimp seem to be liking the elevated magnesium levels as well as all three of them have molted in the past 3 days (two last night, one two nights ago).
One of my zoas frags seems to have spread and grown a bit but the others haven’t seemed to care.
The new SPS and LPS don’t seem to have shown a difference.
The umbrella mushroom looks MUCH bigger, but that thing shape shifts so much I can’t tell how big it is, it might just now be getting comfortable in its new environment.
The shrimp will probably molt soon. Have read a lot of articles that at log mag levels they molt less often. Since its been raised I would tend to believe they would molt rather soon
[quote=“a1amap, post:35, topic:642”]
The shrimp will probably molt soon. Have read a lot of articles that at log mag levels they molt less often. Since its been raised I would tend to believe they would molt rather soon[/quote]
Yessir, you are quite correct, but you would already know that had you read my post 
[quote=“IanH, post:34, topic:642”]
…The shrimp seem to be liking the elevated magnesium levels as well as all three of them have molted in the past 3 days (two last night, one two nights ago)…[/quote]
Wow I missed that verdict_in
well I think the biggest downside would be calcium deposits on your pumps, heater, and glass. I don’t think having elevated levels will increase growth as long as you are keeping them within normal levels.
Why are you wanting to keep them so high?
Without a clear downside to keeping them high, I see no reason not to. Keeping them high ensures they will always be at or above levels that provide growth. The high magnesium has already shown me benefits.
[quote=“IanH, post:39, topic:642”]
Without a clear downside to keeping them high, I see no reason not to. Keeping them high ensures they will always be at or above levels that provide growth. The high magnesium has already shown me benefits.[/quote]
Well that is reason enough. I shudder to think how much coralline I would have if I kept my levels much higher than they are right now.
I have read that high mag levels will kill hair algae and bryopsis so there may be another added benefit.