HELP! Red Sea Colors

[Kermit13sg]

Hello, I've been given the four bottles of Red Sea reef colors ABCD. I have a mixed reef tank of size 50g. I'm having trouble understanding the dosing instructions. It's says to measure the FE, I and so on and so forth but I do not have these test kits. The the alternative is to dose based on calcium take up rate, how do I do that? Does it mean if my CA is 450 this week and next week it's 430, then I dose based on 20 being consumed? What if CA does not change in that week? Does that mean I don't need to dose?


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[DaveK]

The best rule for additives is that if you can't test for it, don't use it. You'll do a lot more harm than good.

Ideally, you run the test, and then use the additive to bring your level up to where you want it. However, things are seldom that simple. Ca, Alkalinity, Mg and pH all work together and need to be balanced. For example if Mg is low, it's very difficult to maintain Ca and Alkalinity at levels you want.

If you can maintain the levels by doing water changes, then you don't need them. In any case, if your going to use them, get the test kits.

 

[SPR]

If you dose according to calcium uptake then you dose 1ml of each Coral colour element per 20ppm of Ca uptake for every 100 litres of aquarium water so basically you adjust the coral colours dosage depending on how much Ca your tank is using.

Ideally you could get the test kits, but i purchased these, looked inside the box, and sent them straight back! Lol

In my tank which I estimate is 500litres to be on the safe side after allowing for displacement, I dose 5 ml of each around every 3-4 days and keep a log of it. I auto dose around 4ppm of Ca each day.

I manual dose the coral colours as I read overdosing will do bad things so I feel more comfortable using syringe every few days.