evik

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I read it's important to use some water stabilizer when doing water change. I would like to hear your opinion and what you use? Thanx
 

KathyC

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What product were you reading this about, and what is it supposed to be stabilizing in the water?

No, there is no 'stablizer' needed when doing water changes in a SW tank. You just need pure water & salt :)
Some folks dose their tanks with Ca, Alk & Mg if their salt brand isn't providing the proper amounts, or if their tanks use up a lot of Ca, but as a rule there isn't anything else that needs to be added to the water.
 

evik

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Thank you Kathy, that's what I was doing until now. Guess I'm reading too much :splitspin . This article was from a reefer with 17 years salt water experience and with other tips he mentioned "don't forget to use good water stabilizer with every water change". So I assumed I'm missing a step.
Recently I messed up. I started to have a cyano algae problem and couldn't get rid of it, another research and I bought "chemiclean" what was the sure thing to get rid of. I hate to use any chemicals, but I was desperate, it was spreading and covering my zoas. So I used proper amount and supposed to do water change in 48 hours. Well it was a disaster. I didn't event wait 48 hours, because everything was dying. I did quick 20% water change, next day another, but my SPS were getting white, zoas were closed, whole aquarium looked like a desert seen. Not pretty site and it was Christmas. I felt like my aquarium babies were screaming :iamwithst .
I was afraid I did the water changes to fast and made the matter even worst, then I read about the stabilizer and finally decided to turn for help. I know, should do that before the mess. Now I'm just waiting, SPS's are gone, zoas are slowly opening, only thing not affected by this are fish and acans (thank god) I thought they will go first.
Well this is my story, hope somebody will learn from it, I know I did. No more chemical even when you are desperate!!!

Today some polyps on SPS are starting to open. Is there any chance they can come back?
 
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KathyC

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Sure, there is always a chance :)
Expensive lesson... :(

The simplest way I can put this is that your water conditions should never be allowed to deteriorate to the point that a water change harms the tank in any way.
If water changes are done on a ongoing scheduled basis that takes things like your bio-load (the amount of fish in your system), whether you are heavy handed with the feedings and what you are feeding (pellets and flake and food packaged in those little 'gel' blocks have phosphates in them, where fresh food does not) into consideration, you would know that you need to change your water more frequently and in larger percentages than a tank that is lightly stocked and fed only fresh food.
Emptying the skimmer cup daily and using a product like Phosban (necessary of you have high phosphates) also help greatly in reducing the impact to your water.
If you perform your water changes BEFORE the water starts to deteriorate, then you are way ahead of the game and your tank will remain stable without the parameters fluctuating much, if at all...and stable is what you are aiming for :)

I've heard so many ways to treat for cyano, but the best advice I've heard is pretty much what is outlined above, but increase the frequency and % of the water changes a little more and be sure to suck the cyano out of the tank daily.
 

evik

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Thank you for your respond and help. One more question, what do you mean by fresh food?
I used to feed my fish a cube of frozen mysis shrimps and little bit of flakes. Then I read flake food is bad, so they get now just one cube of the mysis shrimps daily (should I flash the food).
I have 90 gallon, 5 fish - par of clowns, yellow tang, blue hippo, and comic blenny. I'm changing 20gallon every two weeks and have just skimmer. I don't know what I'm doing wrong, the water isn't good. For how long you have to leave the salt dissolve before you can do water change?
I'm sorry for all the questions; I'm puzzled how I can improve the "home" for my fish and corals.
 

KathyC

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I order my food in bulk frozen blocks. A block of mysis is around 2 or 3 pounds and lasts a LONG time, same with the cyclopeeze. You can also go to the supermarket fresh fish dept and get a variety of fresh fish (small amounts) and either cut them into tiny pieces (a blender works well too, but you don't want to puree them!!) and then freeze them in plastic bags (best to load some in the bag and flatten it to about 1/4" think..and then break of little chunks when you want to feed)
Many folks add some Kent Garlic Extreme and or Selcon to the mix before they freeze it.
Since you have tangs you will also want to add a piece of nori on a veggie clip daily so they get all of the nutrients they need :)

As far as the salt, I like to let my water sit overnight before I use it. I keep a heater & a power head in there and aim the powerhead towards the surface to keep the salt suspended until it dissolves fully and in this way it also adds oxygen to the water.
It is also my understanding that if you use newly made SW just after adding it, all of the salt cyrstals aren't really fully dissolved and they can burn your corals, not sure how true that is, but I'm not willing to chance it either! lol That same situation will also cause your SG to be higher than you think since it is not all dissolved and therefore it won't necessarily read the true SG on your hydrometer.
If your water not in such good shape, you may want to do a 15 or 20% water change weekly.
What kind of skimmer do you have? Any specific issues with your water that you are aware of?
 

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