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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

Interesting find. The long polyp leather is making its effort to extend its polyps. It may be triggered from the water change I did previously as I saw it more active since then. I also finally got around to buying another 4 pack of bit carbon from work and I'm planning on running it for about 2 weeks. I may be tossing it before it's fully utilized but from my understanding 100g of bituminous carbon can exhaust pretty soon. (at least that's what BRS is selling me)

 

At least I'll be opening my filter box and servicing it more regularly.

 

My next idea is that this leather coral may be overexposed to light even though my other leather corals do not behave in a retracted manner.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

A really late parameter update. I have been playing too much Shogun 2: Total War.

 

May 10

 

Temperature: 74F

Salinity: 1.025sg

Nitrate: 0ppm

Phosphate: 0ppm

Ca2+: 380ppm

Mg2+: 1170-1200ppm

 

Either the new package of Purigen I put in was super effective or the EcoPak I added several weeks ago did the trick. I think it may be both as the new, fresh out of the box resins were able to take in what would have been nitrate while the stuff that is in the AlgaeBarn EcoPak took in whatever free nitrate was remaining. Interesting stuff as I was a little skeptical on their claims on such product, but I might have to believe it now.

 

Since water change the coralline algae is slowly getting greater in number. I have less of a green wiry algae near the acan colony. I think the bubble algae got out competed from the other algaes. In response, I'll be increasing the amount of Reef Fusion 1 to 4mL/day.

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I really admire how diligent you are with testing. I can barely be bothered to test KH and Ca in my tank on a monthly basis, but you really seem to be super on top of it. It's great to have so much data when your tank is still pretty young! 👍

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ
18 hours ago, billygoat said:

I really admire how diligent you are with testing. I can barely be bothered to test KH and Ca in my tank on a monthly basis, but you really seem to be super on top of it. It's great to have so much data when your tank is still pretty young! 👍

It's also partly because I'm reeeeaaalllly wanting to get rid of my API kits for something more finite and precise. However, I do have a reason to test my alk really diligently because I'm running with the hypothesis being if my KH is stable then I wouldn't need to think twice about pH as the amount of carbonate ions present in the water column is directly related to buffering capacity. If someone asked, do you have any data for your pH? My pants are totally down and off and probably folded in the closet. But I can tell you the world about my CO3!

 

With all this data available I'm considering putting this all into an Excel spreadsheet and displaying it graphically. I might make it a semi-annual post. I know people like pictures. I'm hoping these parameter checks are useful for anyone reading and/or needing some inspiration.

 

to all my readers: my eBay wishlist currently has the NYOS Phosphate and Nitrate test kits. The Christmas splurge is getting inTank media basket for my Aquaclear 70.

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On 1/31/2020 at 11:54 PM, Diamonds x Pearls said:

So we're up to speed now. I'm a total newbie here on n-r forums and I'm more than settled in my parent's home in California. After just searching on Google maps of local fish stores. It made me remember why I still miss California while living in Maryland.

 

This past week there's nothing special to report since I'm so removed from my aquarium, but I do want to keep it up to date to what I've been doing for the tank in the abstract sense. Yes, the Amazon orders keep on coming. I just ordered some test kits, a refracto, and IO Reef Crystals (since I've had a meh experience with their normal salt). This past week also has been a lot vision and dream casting for what the aquarium will look like. The easiest part was the more obvious stocking being fish and larger invertebrates. I should probably discuss a little more on my design theory.

 

Ever since I started keeping fish, I had this belief where if you were to keep an animal you should probably do your best efforts to have your animal feel most at home. It's probably most true if you're keeping wild-caught specimens. Lately in this day in age where aquaculture has progressed pretty well we don't really need to do it. However, I feel like there's a charm and challenge when you're building any tank and you want it to reflect something plucked from any body of water. A lot of my previous tanks were stocked region or even down to the corresponding river. I always made efforts to not "mix the rivers" in my freshwater aquariums.

 

So I had to pick a region. I wanted to challenge and frustrate myself. No, I can't pick this coral and that fish and that other thing because neither all those elements could occur at the same time. Sorry, royal gramma as much as I like you...species not found in the Pacific. Same principle "don't mix your oceanic currents."

 

Recently, I was a little frozen over how speciose this region "Indo-Pacific" really was, so I immediately went poleward so I can restrict the list even more. I went north along the Kuroshio current and decided "why not do a Japanese reef? Biotopes aren't exactly a thing in the reefing world. Do that biotope." Admittedly, there's a level of Japanese bias within my wife and I. I began googling coral species found in Japan. To my surprise corals grew as far north as the Sea of Japan and even just outside of Tokyo Bay where I would assume those waters would be a little more on the temperate side like my home waters in California.

 

Reading List: (available upon request)

Ministry of the Environment. Coral Reefs of Japan, 2004

Veron. Hermatypic Corals of Japan, 2000

Benayahu, Y. Soft Corals (Octocorallia: Alcyonacea) of the Southern Ryukyu Archiepelago: The families Tubiporidae, Clavulariidae, Alcyoniidae, Briareidae. 2002

Iha, C and Yoshino T. Octocorals (Coelenterata: Octocorallia) in the collection of Department of Marine Sciences, the University of the Ryukyus. 1997.

Muko, Suzuki, et al. Transitions in coral communities over 17 years in the Sekisei Lagoon and adjacent reef areas in Okinawa, Japan. 2018

Koido, Imahara, Fukami. High species diversity of the soft coral family Xeniidae in the temperate region of Japan revealed by morphological and molecular analyses. 2019.

 

Viewing List:

Prime Scuba Ishigaki - Diving Okinawa Ishigaki  沖縄県石垣島ダイビング

Diving Ishigaki Japan

Gareth Leonard - Scuba Diving in Japan | Ishigaki Island

Ronald Stark - Diving the Sunabe Seawell in Okinawa, Japan

Miru Kim - Underwater | Iriomote, Okinawa, Japan

Iriomote-jima SCUBA diving

奈良谷優季 - Dive in IRIOMOTE 2017

Leonidas1993 - Chibishi Reef, Okinawa Japan

Tidal Gardens - Okinawa Scuba Dive 2016 Manza Beach Onna

 

If you're going to pick one video I would recommend Tidal Gardens since not just he's part of the industry we care about but also he lists the genuses he sees as we dive. There's a treat towards the middle-end of the video many of us would definitely appreciate. (whole video is 12 minutes of your time)

 

There's more that I looked at, but I'm just going to share what is most relevant.

 

Yeah, I learned that it's freaking SPS dominant. Fortunately with the power of Ctrl F I was able to find tiny glimmers of soft dominant coral communities. I built a stocking list on my OneNote app on my phone.

 

You made it this far in the journal. I'll reward you with a stocking list.

 

CUC

  • 8x Trochus snails
  • 8x Cerithiidae
  • 10x Nassarius snails
  • 3x Margarita snails

 

Fish

  • 1x Misbar ocellaris (April 18th)
  • 1x Frostbite ocellaris (Moved the other one out due to aggression)
  • 1x Yellow watchman goby (divorced TT__TT )

 

Other invertebrates

  • 1x Pistol shrimp (divorced q.q)

 

Corals

Upper two-thirds

  • 1x Sinularia spp.
  • 2x Sarcophyton spp.
  • 2x Lobophytum spp.
  • 3x Caulastrea furcata (ORA origin)

Lower third (it'll be a shit show)

  • 1x Fungia spp. to add something interesting to the sand (maybe repanda species)
  • 2x Favia speciosa
  • 1x Acanthastrea echinata

If sweeper action gets bad I'll just let whoever wins wins and get some powerheads to blow the sweepers in a safer direction. Initial LPS colonies will be spaced out to ensure less violence occurring and I'll spend some time staring at the water flow pattern to create an educated guess where and how the sweepers will behave. Based on the AC70's flow pattern there will be an imaginary bifurcating line that anything to the right of it the sweepers will passively go right. True of the left side.

 

Of the leather corals, I still feel a little hard pressed on distribution as there's somewhat of a lack of publication on soft corals. I probably should have used that as a potential master's thesis if I do go back to school. However based on people's dive videos it seems that if there was leathers to be found it would fall either Sarco or Lobo genuses. I noticed based on videos when dominant species they were right up there where an Acropora would be. I also sense based on reading care requirements for leather corals they need a little more light and at least moderate flow so their skin will shed whenever its kind to grow and/or exfoliate. The plan is to generate enough leather coral cover. I also didn't want to risk the LPS to be overexposed to light and suffer, so I'm having them occupy the lower parts of the aquarium. I would also guess less flow would help them capture whatever food is thrown at them at night.

 

Speaking of food. Reef-Roids.

 

When I get good, I'll sprinkle in some Montipora digitata or Pocillopora damicornis, but that'll be for another year or two down the road. I'll mow down some leather corals to ensure real estate for the SPS arrival. Of course, I'll get a better LED strip.

Would you be able to share that 1st source with me? That's the one that mentions the lps/sps type yes? Does it also take into account depths? 

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ
13 hours ago, Ratvan said:

Would you be able to share that 1st source with me? That's the one that mentions the lps/sps type yes? Does it also take into account depths? 

Oh my, I didn't realize it got 404'd recently. I'm glad I have a personal digital copy on hand. If you click on this, it'll take you to my Google Drive.

 

Appendix 4 will give you a big big chart of every stony coral observed in mainland Japan or the Ryukyu Archipelago. It is sorted in alphabetical order by genus. The first two columns you can disregard as they refer to Taiwanese or Philippine distribution/occurrences. However the data is included as to show the reader that many of the corals found in further south latitudes can still live in what is considered "cooler" latitudes. The subsequent columns are regions belonging to Japan. Yaeyama is the southernmost. Izu is outside of Tokyo being the northernmost. The final column are some outlying territories east of Japan in the Pacific Ocean. As great as this appendix can be, It does not account depths, just point occurrence.

 

You may want to look at page 19-20/320 on the pdf document as there are "Figure 4" and "Figure 6" that provides a schematic diagram of a fringing reef.

 

Figure 4 is a diagram of coral reef zonation found on Ishigaki Island. I am inferring that corals populate the first 20 meters of depth. Surely soft corals may be more competitive on the outer slopes.

 

Figure 6 only relays three species, (A. digitifera, M. digitata, and P. lutea). Nonetheless these are probably the most dominant types of coral in a matter of 0 to 7 meters deep. Understand that sea level can change in a matter of days even hours due to tidal action, so you can give or take an extra meter. I recommended reading 1-2 and 1-3 to get a better view. This publication gives big brushstrokes so it may not be as specific as you may want to be.

 

If you take a look at the second source listed, Chapter 5 lists the collecting stations throughout Japan and what I am assuming the depths and not how offshore from the island of interest (since some of the ranges are so small that even a whole person could lay flat and be that much offshore). Many of the collection sites did not go past 30 meters deep.

 

I figured I would relay and parse information before reading it since it can be a little dense to sift through. These references don't exactly tell you where at what depth each specimen was found. How I was able to guess my biotope apart was through the diving videos.

 

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

May 15

 

Today is a hot day here in Maryland. Summer is coming, so that means in about a month or two I will adjust the sunrise and sundown times accordingly.

 

Temperature 80F

Salinity 1.026sg

Nitrate 0ppm

Phosphate 0ppm

Alkalinity 9-10 dKH

Calcium 380ppm

Magnesium 1170ppm

 

I have not been diligent in my dosing lately. I've been eyeballing it by using the bottle caps and not the dedicated syringes I normally use.

 

If you're wondering what kind of syringes I get, I go to the small mammal section of your local big box pet store and buy those syringes for medicating or liquid feeding your favorite ferret, rabbit, rodent, etc.

 

...I should probably post something about the equipment cabinet, might be helpful.

 

My toadstool is expanding yet again to where it's actively touching my Lobophytum, so I am considering changing the placements for some of the soft corals. . I am expecting the warmer weather will make my tank go warm and probably accelerate everybody's growth in the tank. When I mean everyone, I mean down to the tiniest microbe.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

Unrelated, but I should probably mention this if anyone wishes to go this route.

 

I get my RODI from Whole Foods still, but the original plan was to get RODI from my work as my coworker lent out his Coralife Pure-Flo II unit. He bought it secondhand and it appears the first owner never seemed to do much or anything with it. I was essentially seeing an opportunity for free water. However upon installing it at work, I decided to run a quick check for N and P compounds. There was a signature in the API kit and Tetra test strips, so it wasn't RODI water at all. Definitely one thing that made me think something was wrong as that the effluent moved 1 gallon of water in 3 minutes. Pretty fast no, 20gal/hr? Another red flag: waste water effluent was a mere dribble. I should have known and said something.

 

Still, it was a much better filtered water option compared to whatever single sediment filter Petco provides. I am still getting RODI from Whole Foods. Our tap water in Montgomery County comes around 300-350 TDS. Some less than others. I think Potomac River sourced water runs higher than Patuxent-based.

 

Recently, same coworker asked if we actually did have RODI, so I asked if he ever got a TDS meter with the purchase. Interestingly enough, TDS meter procured. I mentioned earlier in the journal about it. I decided to test our unit at work and it was at a wild 125. Last week we decided to replace everything quite literally. I first suggest just getting a more user-friendly unit, the Aquatic Life Twist-In. However coworker's dad installed it at home, so no luck there. Oops. We had to do with what we had on hand. An old unit with cartridges of an unknown age.

 

We were able to change out the sediment and carbon cartridges. We were under the impression of being able to repack the DI resin, but it appears we need to get a new cartridge housing to accept the bulk BRS resins. The current DI cartridge seems to be hard to open and repack. We were figuring out what was the 4th cartridge, which we learned that it was the TFC membrane. This is probably the culprit of high TDS. We're expecting a new TFC membrane on Wednesday.

 

Now the work RODI unit is at 30 TDS. How? So after some tinkering earlier today we actually got the TFC portion out. I decided to clean it with some tap water and rinse the membrane. I'm wondering tinkering on that membrane and nearly messing with the DI resin. The flow coming out the unit seemed to be a dribble as it should.

 

It's not DI water at all, but I'll take 30 over the 125 I originally had.

 

This is just a kind remind to make sure all your stages are serviced at the correct intervals. Sediment and carbon the very most likely to foul out first.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

May 20:

 

Temperature 78F

Salinity 1.025sg

Nitrate 0ppm

Phosphate 0ppm

Alkalinity 9 dKh

Calcium 380-390ppm

Magnesium 1230-1260ppm

 

A little more diligence makes a slight uptick in our minerals.

 

Work schedule is shifting a lot more now as the United States is doing an untimely reopening. I don't have Tuesdays off so I need to push my water change this week to Friday.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

May 23:

 

Temperature 80F

Salinity <1.025sg

Nitrate 0ppm

Phosphate 0ppm

Alkalinity >10ppm

Calcium 360ppm

Magnesium 1170ppm

 

20% water change occurred Thursday evening after I came back from work. The substrate is really starting to speckle with coralline algae. Filter box was serviced. New carbon packet and replaced the filter fluff. My watchman goby has been less shy and has been wandering a few times out of the day.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

Long before the idea of owning a reef aquarium I was really enamored by the idea of a simpler saltwater aquarium of just bubble-tip anemones and its natural hosting partners like cinnamon anemone fish. I sometimes wish I just did that and wouldn't worry about dosing elements as much.

 

Anyway, at the end of summer, my aquarium will get to the age where it's socially acceptable to get an anemone. While I'm not really look to get a BTA because they race around the tank. I have been seriously considering on buying a couple mini carpet anemones and fragging them to make more to further populate the tank. On top of that, if I can find some sexy shrimp, it'll be a very interesting hosting pattern.

 

Does S. tapetum exist in Japan? Maybe. There's one record in South Japan in the Smithsonian's EOL (Encyclopedia of Life). What is south Japan? Their map is marking just off Kanagawa. There's another record published this year January 2020 in a book that says generically southern Japan, (page 279).

 

It feels dubious...from what I have dug up from Dr. Fautin's works is that this anemone is more often found in the Red Sea and the Pacific regions from Taiwan to Australia. It's tough to find a solid description remotely Japanese.

 

(I don't have space for a haddoni.)

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

May 26

 

Doing a journal entry from mobile isn't easy so I don't recommend it.

 

This morning I came across bubble algae again! Darn! I thought I navigated through that already but I suppose one of my margarita snails that bit the dust recently may have been a contributing factor. I wonder if having too low nutrients may even cause this tiny outbreak.

I found it on the usual frag in question but I found a dime sized patch next to my big hand coral. I removed it gently with an airline tube. For any leftovers, I went over the patch with some cyanoacrylate gel to seal up any algal tissue.

 

I think I should stop experimenting around as much and continue what I had going best. I'm pretty impressed from what I think the AlgaeBarn Ecopak did for what it was worth. It did what it was marketed for and that was to get your tank to a very low to zero nutrient level. Considerably, this product is more appropriate for larger systems that accommodate for big loads (or if you're a big SPS junkie). I would still recommend it even though I have been running ultra-low levels for most of this month now already. However, I really like my tank when it was hovering between 5-10ppm according to the API kit.

 

In the meantime, I ran out of water, so I'll need to go to Whole Foods to get more RODI water. I'll probably do what I originally done before and that would be 2 gallon water change weekly. Feed the fish per morning and feed the coral every Monday night.

IMG_20200526_104809.jpg

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

May 26

 

Parameter Report:

 

Temperature 78F

Salinity 1.023sg

Nitrate 0ppm

Phosphate 0ppm

Alkalinity 8 dKh

Calcium 370ppm

Magnesium 1000ppm

 

Welp, I poured in too much freshwater. What happened was I was siphoning out the bubble algae today but I didn't have any saltwater ready so I poured in the filtered water from my Brita pitcher.

 

I also noticed a tiny tiny aiptasia in the far right corner near my maroon and green favia. I don't have kalkwasser so I made really salty slurry of IO Reef Crystals hoping the injection of salt burns the little bugger. I like anemones, but wrong species. To follow up I'm planning to inject Reef Fusion 2 at the area since I know that stuff could burn a fellow cnidarian. I'm recalling my poor application of the stuff and it grazed my green and ice blue favia melting half of the coral heads.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

I applied the area in question that had aiptasia with Reef Fusion 2. We'll see how things go. I didn't see the anemone head in the corner so I observed the other day. I think I sufficiently melted it. We'll see how it goes.

 

On a sidenote, that RODI unit at work?

 

TFC membrane got changed out and I decided to hook it up to the normal tap sink and I got 7ppm. I guess I am one resin cartridge away from 0. However my store manager learned about how much brine water it tosses out as waste and got worried about running up the water bill. You know rejection rates and all. Unfortunately I'm limited to just having one of my saltwater systems running RODI water. Fortunately I was smart enough to migrate all my inverts to one system so I'm not hamstrung over water quality as much.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

May 29

 

Temperature 79F

Salinity 1.025sg

Nitrate 0 ppm

Phosphate 0 ppm

Alkalinity 8-9 dKh

Calcium 420 ppm

Magnesium >1270 ppm

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

Micro-photo-update Dated May 16th.

 

IMG_20200516_112057.thumb.jpg.da8478b256a4ff6c2ea388260fc7cd51.jpg

Fuzzy

 

IMG_20200516_112206.thumb.jpg.37d71a017a38ef93992a0666abfc4900.jpg

If you look at the bottom edge, the coral heads look droopy. I'm not sure if those are new growths or they're trying to attempt an escape.

 

IMG_20200516_112232.thumb.jpg.51d8b0e2aa880e8b977ec2ff4952dc39.jpg

Some nice macroalgae.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

End of May photoshoot 1 of 2 (Full Tank/System Shots)

 

I'm experimenting with a new shiny toy called Photoshop 2019, so yes unlike before I am post-processing my photos. I'm working with a camera phone from 2015 so there's only a level of sharpness I can capture up to. Sorry, no 4K or whatever definition our pictures are at now.

IMG_20200601_185153.thumb.jpg.e0b09d3e0bab4d20c0e37d6f313f5bcf.jpg

 

Full tank (length-wise)

IMG_20200601_184824.thumb.jpg.91def1d0271c4e03fc1fe351f88b35cc.jpg

 

Full tank (width-view)

IMG_20200601_185136.thumb.jpg.daa54624335aa9939623a9fc772a7bdb.jpg

 

Comprehensive (or for the future TOTM nomination)

IMG_20200601_184755.thumb.jpg.82b7ddc4411c9ec0da2c9258624107d2.jpg

 

 

Shot from OnePlus 3T in Pro Mode. ISO 800, WB 5600K ish... 1/30th Speed.

Processed in Photoshop 2019 using basic adjustment tools: brightness/contrast, auto leveling, vibrance, and exposure.

 

I tend to shoot under exposed and I will intentionally sink it a little more to create a more focus into the water.

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

Nano update:

 

We got the RODI unit reporting 1ppm TDS after changing a new DI resin from BRS.

 

----page break----

 

Also: unedited because I don't feel like messing around Photoshop 2019.

IMG_20200601_185111.jpg

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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

June 3rd

 

It's a scorcher today. I feel like glue and my kidney stones have been acting up these past few days. I need to lay off the McDonald's.

 

Temperature 84F

Nitrate 0 ppm

Phosphate 0 ppm

Salinity 1.025sg

Alkalinity 8 dKh

Calcium 400ppm

Magnesium 1200ppm

Edited by Diamonds x Pearls
I forgot to mention salinity
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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

June 6th

 

Temperature 84F

Nitrate 0 ppm

Phosphates 0 ppm

Salinity 1.024sg

Alkalinity 9 dKh

Calcium <420 ppm

Magnesium <1260 ppm

Edited by Diamonds x Pearls
I forgot to mention salinity
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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

June 9th

 

Temperature 84F

Nitrate 0ppm

Phosphate 0ppm

Salinity 1.025sg

Alkalinity 8dKh

Calcium 430ppm

Magnesium 1230ppm

 

The little aiptasia head made a comeback. I might take the rock out and just smack it with a hammer to "remove" it.

Edited by Diamonds x Pearls
I forgot to mention salinity
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DISQUALIFIED-QQ

My right thumb is swollen from a sting from either a long spine urchin or a zoanthid colony. It's not easy to grip and hold stuff, but the testing must continue. It's weird how I've handled anemones and moon jellies, but I would not have thought zoas would pack such a serious punch. I also managed to do a water change today as well.

 

June 12th

 

Temperature 84F

Nitrate 0ppm

Phosphate 0 ppm

Salinity 1.025sg

Alkalinity 9 dKh

Calcium 450 ppm

Magnesium 1230 ppm

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