Hi folks. This is Keith Berkelhamer from Reefbum. And I am once again,
collaborating with Marine Depot on an educational video about reef keeping
In this video,
I'm going to continue to talk about testing water parameters and go more in
depth about ICP testing. As you may recall, from my last video,
ICP stands for inductively coupled plasma,
and it is the most comprehensive analysis you can do for an aquarium with
test delivering lab grade data for up to 40 plus elements.
Perhaps the best way for me to dig into this topic is to provide an actual
example of how I utilize ICP testing to avoid a tank crash.
A couple of years ago,
I was having some issues with my tank that I dissected through Triton.
I had some burn tips in my SPS, some recession and an expulsion.
They certain sort of slime, even the polyps and some of my LPS were retracted.
And on some, the skin was shedding.
The standard test kits I was using at the time did not provide any insight into
the problem. So it was time to dig deeper. Fortunately,
a few months before the problem, I did an ICP test when the tank was doing well.
So I had a benchmark.
Here's what stood out when comparing the benchmark period to the period where
the issues phosphate dropped from 0.018 to 0.006
part per million,
a 64% decline and lithium climb from seven 13
to nine 29, a 30% increase.
The low phosphate was concerning, but what about the high lithium?
Some industry experts claim high lithium levels are not detrimental to corals in
a reef tank, but in my view, it was a small red flag. Nonetheless,
I decided to act fast with the hope of quickly turning the tank around.
I ended up switching from one salt brand to another and changed out 50% of the
water. Over three days.
I also doubled the dose of trace elements I was using soon
after the tank began to stabilize and the coral started to rebound.
The tank continued to do well over the next several weeks.
And I decided to order another try and test to see how things compared to the
other two tests.
What did I learn from the test after the rebound versus the test during the near
crash phosphate increased from 0.006 to 0.011 part per
million, a 76% jump.
I actually started dosing phosphate and continued to do so to further increase
levels and lithium declined by 18% from nine
29 to seven 66.
Based on the results from these three tests,
I would have to conclude that very low phosphate levels had something to do with
the near crash.
Perhaps elevated magnesium was an issue as well with levels coming down from
1538 during the near crash to 1434 during the
rebound,
I'm going to assume the large water change has helped mitigate the concentration
of magnesium and maybe the switch to the new salt played a role as well.
Was the near crash due to a combination of low nutrients,
phosphate and nitrate and high alkalinity burnt tips on SPS is a
certain sign of this.
As the tissue may not be able to keep up with the skeletal growth,
leaving the thin tissue prone to burning by high intensity light.
According to my seller for test kids,
the alkalinity was 8.9 DPH before and during the near crash while
nitrates were 2.5 part per million during both periods during the
rebound,
the alkalinity declined to 9.9DKH and the nitrates were five parts
per million.
I am just not sure though that the alkaline need was high enough during the near
crash to be an issue, but my nutrients did climb during the rebound.
So what about lithium? Well,
my lithium level after the rebound was actually a bit higher than the level
before the near crash.
So I don't really think that was a factor ICP testing can certainly be an
important tool for maintaining a successful reef tank,
but be careful not to chase numbers.
Problems can also arise if too many changes are made too often to a tank.
You see our captive reef ecosystems do not like change.
They prefer stability. So course correction should be done in moderation. Well,
folks that will do it for this video. If you liked it,
please give it a thumbs up and hit that subscribe button.
I'll put links to Marine Depot and reef bum in the video description below many.
Thanks for watching. See you next time.