How to make corals grow?

Hi, I have a reef and fish tank with only 9 fishes and for corals i have, bubble coral, toadstools, coco worm, mushrooms. I have 150gallons tank with 2x 250 metal hallides, 14k. 4x 80 T5 bulbs and was wondering i've had it for 2 years now but my corals have not grown at all. People tell me i need to keep my water stable but i don't know what that means. Can anyone give me a few pointers on what to do to make them grow? Also is it ok to use tap water for water changes and i have a lot of red algae how would i be able to get rid of those?

 

Keeping your water stable means exactly what it says...keeping it stable. When Corals are not in a stable tank, it does not let them grow, because corals need the water to be the same and let them settle and be good to grow..Just keep doing water changes and testing your water and changing out your bulbs and they should grow.

AND I would NOT recommend to anyone to use tap water, its not filtered enough for it to be used for our reefs. Some people have used it and been fine. But you will need to de-chlorinize it first and test it and make sure its clean enough..But still has the chance of letting algae grow in your tank. I would HIGHLY recommend using RO/DI water for water changes.


Another thing for the coral growth is you should post your params up here and maybe there is something wrong with your water.

 

Water params would definitely help everyone help you more.

If you are using tap water, that could be the root of your algae problem. As said above, it is not filtered enough, and you don't really know what is in it. You could have phosphates, silicates, etc... in the tap water that are feeding the algae.

Post your water params and some pics of the algae if you can, it will help.

 

Not to mention chlorine and lead

 

I'm not big into the whole stability thing. Some parameters need to be stable for some corals. For hard corals, for example alk needs to be somewhat stable for example, but ca really dosn't need to be. If you don't know what your doing though, it's not a bad idea to keep things stable.

What are you keeping though and what sized tank. Too much light can be a problem. If you have a 55g, with the 2x250s and are trying to grow soft corals, they probably won't grow well. if you have SPS they should if other things are in check. Flow and light are the two of the most important parameters IME. Also, for Hard corals keeping nitrate low and phosphate very low (<.03ish ppm) is critical for skeletal growth. Corals without skeletons, such as soft corals, probably don't care so much though, tissue growth in either case can increase with slightly elevated nitrate and phosphate. That's an important difference that really isn't considered enough iMO, are you looking for skeletal or tissue growth?

If you want fast skeletal and tissue growth, then you need low nutrients and a source of nutrients for the corals i.e. food. However, feeding will increase inorganic dissolved nutrients, which again can be bad, so, you need good filtration. Protein skimming, GFO, GAC. And then again, which foods are useful depends on the type of coral, so again, we are back to the question of what are you trying to keep in what type of system? What size? what filtration? What do you feed? How many fish? What are your parameters? Do you do water changes? What salt? What specific gravity? Is that s.g. tested with a calibrated refractometer? Do you dose anything? Test for anything? What are your expectations?

 

experiment moving some around

 

Agree, no tap water! Flow can be too much for LPS so if polyps aren't expanding it could be too much flow or too much light. I disagree with Ca not needing to be stable!
It may not need to stay rock steady (say constant 450), but I would want to may sure it is at least always over 400 and alk always over 7dKH (preferably 8-11). Stability is always better than instability with all parameters. Moving corals is only a good idea when you know you can provide them with what they need where they are. It can become a bad habit always moving corals around. I suggest moving them only when they are being injured or if you realize they are in a bad spot ( say your bubble is 6 inches below the MH).
Your lighting is pretty strong for LPS. If I had that system, most LPS would be on the lower portions of the tank and at the edges of the light margins.
As others suggest, giving us your parameters and flow would help us help you more.
Chris

 

When was the last time you changed the bulbs? Metal halides are good for corals for about 8-12 months, and the T5s for 6-8months. After that amount of time their spectrum shifts and their PAR specific spectrum suffers the most. Otherwise, that sounds like ample lighting for what you have, but not excessive.

Extremely unusual for no growth in 2 years without also having some major crashing events also.... my 60gal tank went from bare to completely over grown in various corals in 2 years from a dozen or so small frags of yumas, mushrooms, zoas, xenia, gsp... and even my non-plague species have seen considerable growth. See bottom for pics of 2 years growth....

thinking more on this, I am wondering what you have in your tank for flow? A good flow pattern is essential for a good reef tank, with multiple power heads and returns from a sump... a mild to moderate chaotic/random flow is MUCH preferable to a strong predictable/constant flow that never changes. If you don't have a wave maker then try to cross flow paths from various points, and keep flow on multiple planes in the tank. don't point power heads / returns directly towards a coral, but tangential to them.

There are a lot of good articles in the water chem section here: Water Chemistry - 3reef Forums

In particular read this: Reef Aquarium Water Parameters by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

Basically, chemistry. Make sure you're maintaining the correct levels of the essential elements needed for coral growth, water temperature in the 78-80 range (the higher end will result in faster metabolism and growth at the expense of faster depletion of essential and trace elements and vitamins) pH is very important also.

In a word: No. People can hate on me all they want.

If you're not following the discussion about water stability just yet then worrying about being able to read municipal water reports for your location is just one more hassle to deal with for now. Often tap water will have copper in it, and even at barely detectable traces it can kill some orals, and at the very least retard their growth.

See if the LFS sells RO/DI water or pre-mixed salt water, which would be cheaper in the short term. With a 150g tank tho you shoudl really invest in a small (80-90 gallon per day_ RODI unit, and make your own.

By red algae I am guessing it's cyano? it's actually a bacteria, and I used one of the powdered anti-cyano products and followed the water changes closely and that got rid of it... but you need to get other things under control or it will eventually come back so once it's gone you need to make sure you have a good Clean up crew, get tank chem under control, and you should be able to stay ahead of it.

Anyways... that's my 2¢.

-Doug





And this is a few days ago:

 

nice pic montage greysoul, i have a piece of hammer that looks just like that.

 

Sorry for the late reply. i've been very busy with work and all. So i measured my

Nitrate: 0ppm
Phosphate: 0.0ppm
calcium: 460-480mg/L about 23-24drops

I have a refugium 45 for up to 225gallons with a ASM-G2 200gallon protein skimmer and my water at home i have a RO/DI system for the water filtration but it still has algae. My work place i bring mixed saltwater from home to water change there and i have a floating valve at my work place connecting to the refugium to refill it when it is low which is tap water. is that ok or do you guys think its bad? thanks in advance