What are you dosing?

[nyc reefer]

I am curious: What is better the (2)part dosing, or a single product like Purple Up or Kent Purple Tech? Anyone w/ personal experience and/or observations please advise me. Tank is mostly softies, with a few hammers, and frogspawns.
Thanks everyone in advance.

 

[dacaptain78]

I dose ESV Alk., Cal., and Mag. I do not add any supplements to my tanks that I can not test for. I do not use Purple Up or any similar product for that reason. IMO, those products are a waste of money. They may buffer your calcium, but there has to be proper balance between Alk., Cal., and Mag. to keep your parameters stable. If one of those three chemicals fall out of the acceptable range it can have adverse effects on the other two, therefore making your water parameters unstable.

What are the levels of your Cal. Alk. and Mag. right now? Your tank may not have a high demand for calcium and alkalinity due to the types of corals that you keep. Frequent water changes may be all it takes to keep your parameters in the acceptable ranges.

 

[nyc reefer]

Thanks captain, I will check them tonite and advise you.

 

[brick-brothers]

( I do not add any supplements to my tanks that I can not test for ) thats good advice. I never thought about that. I started dosing with brightwell products.

I dose ESV Alk., Cal., and Mag. I do not add any supplements to my tanks that I can not test for. I do not use Purple Up or any similar product for that reason. IMO, those products are a waste of money. They may buffer your calcium, but there has to be proper balance between Alk., Cal., and Mag. to keep your parameters stable. If one of those three chemicals fall out of the acceptable range it can have adverse effects on the other two, therefore making your water parameters unstable.

What are the levels of your Cal. Alk. and Mag. right now? Your tank may not have a high demand for calcium and alkalinity due to the types of corals that you keep. Frequent water changes may be all it takes to keep your parameters in the acceptable ranges.

 

[adamt]

I would stick with esv products for calcium alk and magnesium. The single bottle type stuff (liquid reef, purple up) is snake oil imo, maybe a chemist can back me up on this but i do not believe alk and calcium can be combined in concentrated doses w/o the calcium percipitating out and settling on the bottom of the bottle.

If your relatively new to the hobby and your keeping mostly softies and lps just stick with b ionic, magnesium, and maybe some phyto or marine snow every once and a while. Use a quality salt (i like oceanic) and keep up with water changes using ro/di and you shouldnt have to worry about adding additional trace elements. But w/e you do I would advise you to avoid calc and alk supps that come in 1 bottle.

 

[pauliwalnuts]

I would stick with esv products for calcium alk and magnesium. The single bottle type stuff (liquid reef, purple up) is snake oil imo, maybe a chemist can back me up on this but i do not believe alk and calcium can be combined in concentrated doses w/o the calcium percipitating out and settling on the bottom of the bottle.

If your relatively new to the hobby and your keeping mostly softies and lps just stick with b ionic, magnesium, and maybe some phyto or marine snow every once and a while. Use a quality salt (i like oceanic) and keep up with water changes using ro/di and you shouldnt have to worry about adding additional trace elements. But w/e you do I would advise you to avoid calc and alk supps that come in 1 bottle.

+3 on the Esv products.

 

[KathyC]

Lots of good advice on this thread!! Cool

 

[nyc reefer]

Tank Dosing

Thanks for the great advise. I guess if it ain't broke dont mess with it. I'll continue with the two part dosing and forget about the other products I was considering.