Another Chemipure Dilema

[-E-]

Tank has been running for over a year and I feel like I haven't learned anything. SPS started growing but zoas never open. I was religiously doing 15% wc every week with Red Sea Coral Pro mixed at LFS, and replacing the sponge and chemipure every month. Nitrates were consistently reading at 1 or less but still had algae. I've been trying to reduce light exposure to combat the algae and it seems to be working. I was running filter sponge, chemipure blue, poly pad, and phosguard in hob. Ran out of phosguard so I tried phosnet. Corals didn't like it so I haven't been running any gfo. I have a platygyra that's receding and I'm trying to get my zoas to open by raising the nitrates, so I also removed the poly pad and use an autofeeder to broadcast for the platygyra at night. Nitrates have not gone above 2 and all the zoas are still closed. And the platy is not recovering. Too many problems to solve at the same time.

 

Recently, every LFS has been mixing too low (or using nsw) so I decided to mix it myself. I did less than a 10% wc today with new sponge and new chemipure blue. Every single coral retracted. Now I'm just frustrated. Did I get a bad bucket of salt? Should I go back to 15% weekly wc and just get rid of the zoas that won't open? Will adjusting the water for my zoas irritate all the SPS? Can I transition from mechanical to natural filtration? Do I have to run gac 24/7 because I have a toadstool and palys?

 

[Ranjib]

zoas can stay closed due to other reason also, like high flow or some pest etc. Not saying that the saltwater change has no effect.. just that there might be some other issues as well

[KMitch]

Sounds like you are tinkering with too many variables at once. What sort of lights do you have? How about flow? Have you tried moving the zoas to find a place the may like better in the tank?

 

I doubt the salt is bad. Likewise, corals need time to adjust to changes...not sure how long between the tweaks you mentioned, but try changing one variable and then give it a few weeks for the coral to respond. 

[dandelion]

Just wanna make sure when you mix your salt did you at least let it completely dissolve, if not let it mix for 1+ hours? Also did you agitate the water? If you didn’t oxygen may be low in the new water

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Accidentally mixed it high, then added water to dilute it until it matched the tank... then heated it.

Tank 12"H. Lights 6" above tank. 4x39w T5 plus a single row of blue leds. Palys seem fine in front on floor so I also placed Sunny D and Tubbs Blue zoas on floor. They just don't open.