Question? If I'm able to maintain my phosphates at .02 to .04 parts per million, and my nitrates between 2 parts per million and 4 parts per million with the Red Sea nopox, why do I need to do a water change? I dose aquaforest dry components to keep my magnesium and calcium and KH stable my pH is 8.2 to 8.3 consistently
Water Change ?
- Thread starter Bogartus
- Start date
Check this out.
https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/reef-chemistry-by-randy-holmes-farley.295/
The only way to do this is with something like triton with ICP testing. Even then, that's not exact.
https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/reef-chemistry-by-randy-holmes-farley.295/
The only way to do this is with something like triton with ICP testing. Even then, that's not exact.
Your going to get a lot of different answers on this. Salt mixes provide major and minor trace elements that three part does not provide. However, I've seen tanks that do minimal water changes that look just fine. There are a lot of things we don't / can't test for. Water changes are one of the easiest and most inexpensive things you can do for your reef. Supplements, GFO, etc can get expensive. Just my two cents.
There are different schools of thought. Some are into religious water changes and some are minimal to none. I do believe that #1 your tank will tell you how it's doing, but also consider not just the corals but things like mulm build up etc. I also believe that those that say a xx% water change only takes out said xx% of nutrients is not necessarily true either. Water changes can clean tons of detritus off of rocks, sand bed, etc. when done as part of maintenance vs just sticking a hose in the water column. Maybe your tank might not need as frequent of a water change but I'd still recommend it as some form of maintenance.
Since you have a lot of SPS I suggest slowly getting into the water change schedule. Such as slowly increasing time between water changes vs a sudden large change in the schedule. It's purely suggestive and not based on any facts but just the notion of nothing good happens fast and stability promotes success.
