Coral supplementation/dosing

Hey guys and gals,

Been away from 3reef for a little a bit again but I need some opinions and I'm sorry if I am by chance beating a dead horse with this thread. I have two 20 gallon nano tanks, one has some softies, a few lps, and a few sps. The other tank has some softies and lps. Now they are not real coral heavy right now and I don't want to go super heavy but I would like to see if I can add a few more in each and boost the growth while at it. The predicament I'm in is that I work a lot and that doesn't always leave a lot of time for testing. I don't test like I should but I do keep up on water changes at 5 gallons once/week if not twice/week. Now I have never dosed before and have kept all my levels up by doing water changes and the corals seem to be doing great. They aren't multiplying like I would hope but nonetheless they are full and healthy. Is there any sort of all in one supplement I can toss in maybe like once to twice a week to give the tank a boost? Maybe trace minerals? Amino acids? I know there is no miracle supplement but i figure a little something might help. I want to give it a boost without throwing the water chemistry out of whack. I would love to dose but I have no idea where to even start with that and I'm afraid I would not keep up on it due to my schedule and would have the params swinging way too much. Any advice/help?

 

hey flyn.

if things are healthy and full i persoanlly would not change anything in your routines, twice a week water changes are probably more than enough to resuply your system with anything your corals may have sucked up. the golden rule in sumplimenting is "dont add what you dont test" so if youre telling us you already have little time for testing i would defenitely not go down that path.

maybe look into feeding, but be careful with that too...

my 2 cents

 

Ah yeah thanks! I did forget about those wise words. I personally thought maybe trace elements might not hurt at all but i could be wrong. I forgot i do feed phyto and some lps coral food about twice a week but it isn't spot feeding.

 

well im no expert on the matter so hopefully others will chim in. you got some pictures your setup?

 

I wouldn't bother with trace elements. They're the least utilized (if at all) and so are easily replenished with water changes, they're the most difficult to test because of their extremely low natural levels, and last but not least, some can become toxic if levels are elevated much above what's found in NSW.

 

what salt mix do you use? you could perhaps check if you can upgrade that?

 

I agree with everyone else. Dosing won't make your coral grow any faster, it's just done to replenish what your coral have consumed. I wouldn't start dosing until your coral grow to a point that make it difficult to maintain calcium and alk. through water changes.

 

If your goal is to achieve increased coloration and growth you can try, Reefroids, Acropora, SpongePower, Reef Chili. From my limited experience it's best to use a smaller than recommended dose, less frequently than recommended, be consistent and over a couple weeks time you'll see some improvements. If you have a skimmer you can try some of the Zeovit products.

Get an Iodine level, you can also add one drop of Lugols Iodine weekly. I do think that soft corals benefit from a little extra Iodine. Be careful and beware, Iodine can become toxic. You use 1 drop in twenty gallons, that is it.

With products listed above any improvements you see will be gradual, the most important is aspect is consistency, second most important aspect is more is not better.

I have a 20 gallon as well, I have spent some time researching and using the products I listed specifically for their use in a nano tank.

 

Awesome! Thanks for the responses! My local reef store started carrying reef roids not long ago and swears by it so I think from all the positive feed back i hear on that I will pick that up soon! And I have heard about Lugols before as well and might give that a try! If need be I can post a picture of each setup if that will give anyone a better idea of what I am working with. At the moment I have been using instant ocean reef crystals and stuff has seemed to be doing really well even though I know it is not the highest end salt mix, it has been working really well for me so far. I thought about trying Brightwell's mix next and see how that does.

 

JMO, but I would suggest sticking with RC. IO has been in the business longer than most others, and they have a darn good track record for producing stable, consistent salt mixes, a claim not many others can make. Remember, just because someone else charges more for their product does not necessarily mean it's better.