AWT test results. Help needed.

kb27973 · #1 11/20/2007, 12:09 PM

Hi,
I sent a sample to AWT after my tank started to decline. It has been going strong for about 2 1/2 years with excellent growth. A couple of weeks ago it started going downhill. It now looks terrible. I'm losing acro's left and right. They just seem to turn white over a couple of days then start to grow algae on them. I changed lights (after this started), water changes, changed spectrapure filters and more. Here are the AWT results:

Ammonia (NH3-4) 0.002 Good
Nitrite (NO2) 0.014 Good
Nitrate (NO3) 2.0 Good
Phosphate (PO4) 0.03 Good
Silica (SiO2-3) 0.8 High
Potassium (K) 261 Low
Calcium (Ca) 391 Good
Boron (B) 1.8 Low
Molybdenum (Mo) 0.2 High
Strontium (Sr) 6.5 Good
Magnesium (Mg) 844 Low
Iodine (I¯) 0.01 Low
Copper (Cu++) 0.01 Good
Alkalinity (meq/L) 2.96 Good

The one that really got my attention is Molybdenum. From reading what they put I am way over the upper toxicity level of .12 mg/L with my .2. Is this what's killing my corals? I use IO salt. The only other new thing was I added quite a bit of Seachem Reef Advantage magnesium supplement over a few days around the time in question. I can't find a listing of what's in the product though. On that subject, where is my Mg going? After adding all the seachem mg and some epsom salts it is still WAY low. I'm lost and depressed....

Any help appreciated.
Thanks,
Ken

Boomer · #2 11/20/2007, 01:58 PM

Stop the sup's and and use some activated carbon, that will help lower it.

Billybeau1 · #3 11/20/2007, 02:35 PM

Instant Ocean is inherently low in Magnesium. You will need to get this up to at least 1250 ppm. 1300 would be better.

It takes a lot of mag supplement to raise magnesium. The good thing is once you get it there, it depletes rather slowly.

I use Kent's Tech-M. Its listed on jd's calculator for dosage. Do not raise mag more than 100 ppm per day.

Reef Chemicals Calculator
http://home.comcast.net/~jdieck1/chem_calc3.html

BTW - It is of my opinion that you may be better off with Reef Crystals rather than IO. Same great quality but has more calcium and magnesium for reef tanks. A lot of folks are using it now.

Also, Warner Marine makes a Balanced Ion Potassium Supplement that you may want to try. Used regularly will keep your potassium level around 400 ppm. They also have a product called Ultimate Aminos which is a coral growth accelerator.

kb27973 · #4 11/20/2007, 03:19 PM

Boomer - I do have carbon in my phosban reactor. Probably 1/3 of it is carbon. Do you think more is required?

Billybeau1 - I will switch salt. I'm a creature of habit and have been using IO for years. I also noticed the low Mg. I will dump more Mg in to bring it up. I don't understand why it keeps falling so fast. We are talking a time span of maybe a month where it dropped from 1350 down to 844. Maybe my Salifert Mg test kit was way off.

My main question is why my corals are dying? Would low Mg (844), low K (261) or very high Molybdenum (.2) cause coral death? I have never even considered Molybdenum before. I don't know how it got so high. All I know for sure is that I'm losing lots of corals...

I will do another water change today to try and get things in line.

Ken

Billybeau1 · #5 11/21/2007, 12:43 AM

Well, I don't believe any of those things are causing your coral problems. Something may have gotten in your tank which is why Boomer recommended running carbon. I would renew it every few days for a couple of weeks and see if things improve. The water changes should help as well.

melev · #6 11/21/2007, 09:25 AM

Something is wrong with your Mg test results. I've never been able to have it drop like you are seeing, even when I only dosed every couple of months. Over the past two years, the lowest my tank has been is 1230ppm and the peak was 1470, and that was just dosing 'what felt like enough' rather than applying any real math to the needs of my tank. I'm using jdieck's calculator now to be more precise, staying between 1380 and 1425.

Do you have any children? Have you checked your sump for anything that doesn't belong such as tiny toys or batteries? A club member watched his SPS decline and discovered junk in the sump.

aiko670 · #7 11/21/2007, 09:44 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by melev
junk in the sump.

That's great!

melev · #8 11/21/2007, 10:36 AM

lactose · #9 11/21/2007, 10:59 AM

I would be suspect of their Mg results. My tank has consistently measured in at ~1300-1350 with salifert and other tests and my first sample to AWT came in around 1311 and the second came in at 1183. It was only a week later with no water changes or additives and no reason for a drop.

I really want to be able to outsource my testing for the next few months (travel and other things are eating my time up) but I think they are still finding their way on repeatable, accurate tests right now.

kb27973 · #10 11/21/2007, 11:10 AM

Ok, I threw another bag of carbon in the sump. Will keep changing it out.

Didn't see anything unusual in the sump... I even checked wiring for cracks. Fish and inverts are doing great as well as some of the coral, while other coral is dying. I have a Raspberry Goniopora that has been red for the past year start to turn green! It is now back to red so I think the water may be getting better, but corals still dying.

I went through a Mg bumping exercise a few weeks ago. Couldn't seem to get it to the proper range. Wanted a check on the Salifert values so I bought another test kit. The only one I could find locally was a Sera kit. Salifert showed 1100ish, Sera 1320 and AWT 844. AWT is the one I should go with I guess and that means adding more... I have put a LOT of Mg into the tank in the previous weeks.

Another change I thought of was a few weeks ago I bought a new 5gal bucket of IO salt. If something is wrong with the salt then doing water changes is actually making me worse off. I will take Billybeau1's suggestion and try Reef Crystals, but it would be next week before I could get it. I checked on overnight shipping for the salt and it was like $200 :O

Thanks,
Ken

bertoni · #11 11/21/2007, 11:30 AM

$200 is rather steep.

IO should be around 1100 ppm freshly mixed, if you haven't tested that.

kb27973 · #12 11/21/2007, 11:39 AM

lactose - just read your reply. I guess I figured their equipment would be better than my test results. I don't know what to trust anymore. The numbers are all over the place. As far as you know can to much Mg be toxic? Over the past month I have dumped a whole bottle of Seachem Mg and a box of Epsom salts. Don't know how much more would be safe?

Ken

kb27973 · #13 11/21/2007, 11:42 AM

I agree bertoni. I had to pass on that. Thanks for that number. I will check some freshly made up IO and see how close I get to 1100 with my test kits.

Ken

melev · #14 11/21/2007, 02:01 PM

Too much magnesium may cause bleaching.

The numbers from AWT have been suspect for a while. Overall, it is a new company and the threads that talk about them are maybe a few months old. While many (including myself) have sent in water samples, we are doing that to compare their results to our own water tests. Just because you get lower number doesn't necessarily mean that AWT is correct. You'll see more threads on this topic with some of our resident experts discussing why they question the numbers.