600 ppm calcium...is it damaging?

[Original Fin]

Did a stupid thing and have been suplementing with balance bocks and Purple up before ever testing for calcium. My intention was to keep coraline algae growth healthy. After purchasing an API calcium test kit, I found that I'm way over the reccomended range...600ppm. The API lit says that "precipitation" can occur over 500ppm. Not really sure what that means? I'm going to quit the ballance blocks altogether. Should I stop dosing with the Purple up till back in normal range too? I know the Purple up has other elements besides calcium that are also beneficial to the coraline growth, so I don't want to quit it completely if I don't have to.

[7digits]

Here's the best thing you could do. Grab the bottle of PurpleUp. Walk to the kitchen. Throw it in the trash. It does nothing for your tank. It doesn't do what it says. Sorry, but it's not needed. Quit dosing till it comes down. Is there anything alive in the tank?

[Original Fin]

I lost a snail today. 2 other snails and two hermits don't look so hot...they've been pretty lethargic for about a week. The damsel, coral banded shrimp, urchin and feather duster are happy. Are you suggesting the excessive calcium is toxic to fish and inverts?

[Ninong]

Hi Original Fin,

It's important to maintain calcium, magnesium and alkalinity within reasonable ranges because when calcium gets out of balance, it can affect alkalinity. And when magnesium gets too low, it can affect calcium and your other parameters.

The blocks that you were using are not effective. In fact, they are even less than that, they are potentially harmful to your aquarium because they do not perform as claimed. I have discussed this previously and I recently found it necessary to get into this topic all over again because someone decided to dig up a very old thread to post his defense of these blocks.

Please read what I had to say about this in this post. Please follow the links in that post and read those articles in order to get a better understanding of what is involved here and what your best options are. You cannot choose a method if you don't fully understand why some methods work and others don't.

Calcium precipitation simply means that when you have too much calcium in solution some of it will precipitate out of solution. That simply means that some of the calcium falls out of solution and shows up as white, chalky deposits on surfaces, such as your equipment, etc. When your calcium is too high (meaning above 500 ppm), then it causes your alkalinity to fall.

I don't think that 600 ppm Ca will kill anything in your aquarium but it's still not a healthy environment because it's out of balance. Ideally you want your calcium to be between 425-475 ppm, your magnesium to be 1300-1400 ppm and your alkalinity to be 8-12 dKH. If you can keep your Ca around 425 ppm, your magnesium around 1300 ppm and your alkalinity around 9 or 10 dKH, you will be doing great.

Read those articles by Dr. Randy Holmes-Farley that I linked and you will have a better understanding of what's going on and what your options are for managing things. Obviously you will need reliable test kits to monitor these parameters.

Good luck!

P.S. -- My opinion of PurpleUp is about the same as that expressed by 7Digits. It's mainly powdered aragonite sand in a bottle. It's produced by a company that sells sand.

[gregony]

If you have an aragonite sand bed, and the calcium gets to the point where it precipitates, it can cause the sand bed to "fuse". I've never seen it happen, I've only read about it. If you can still stir your sand, then everything will probably be okay. Have you been measuring the alkalinity? It's impossible to get calcium to 600 without alkalinity being wayyyy to low.

[Original Fin]

If you have an aragonite sand bed, and the calcium gets to the point where it precipitates, it can cause the sand bed to "fuse". I've never seen it happen, I've only read about it. If you can still stir your sand, then everything will probably be okay. Have you been measuring the alkalinity? It's impossible to get calcium to 600 without alkalinity being wayyyy to low.

After week 2, brown algae started taking over portions of the sandbed, and where it did, a hard crust developed, but this was before I started using ballance blocks and Purple Up. As I rearraged and added more live rock, it broke up the crust and it hasn't come back since. Right now, the sand bed is nice and loose.
I have not yet tested for Alk, but perhaps I should. Just to clarify, I'm not keeping any corals at this time, so I didn't think I'd need to be testing for much more than SG, Temp, PH, Ammonia Nitrites and Nitrates.
I'm going to take my time before I even think about keeping corals and such. I don't know much, but I know enough to realize that I'm a long way off from that level of competency, and I don't want my learning curve to come at the expense of any of the living creatures I'm supposed to be caring for.

[gregony]

You have no stock and you're adding calcium?
Try not to do that anymore. In fact, the key to getting everything squared away at the start is to not add anything. There's just too much going on in the early stages.
Look up everything you can about the algae cycle. The algae, and the live rock, will tell you when you're ready to get serious about testing more parameters. During this time, I would usually change a small amount of water daily or every other day depending upon my mood, on my 40g, for instance, I'd change a half gallon. As the algae cycle progresses, you will get green hair algae (it looks like grass). This is a good time to start testing the tank. Test for organics (nitrite, ammonia, nitrate) and test alkalinity. Calcium won't be depleted in any sort of volume until macro algae (coraline, caulerpa, chondria, et al) starts to grow, so you don't need to test that yet. Some rock won't grow hair algae, you will just get coraline algae or some other macro to start growing right away - in this instance start the full testing - including occasional calcium testing. Remember, calcerous algae won't grow in tanks with high nitrite or high ammonia, so adding any calcium supplement during the tank cycle is just wasteful and a recipe for low alkalinity and a huge outbreak of cyano or other plague algae. At the point where you're starting the hair/macro algae, testing your nitrites and ammonia (should be zero). I would add a few invert herbivores to try to get things straightened out. I prefer crabs, because I believe they're more productive at this stage but most people on the forum prefer snails. I've made the mistake of adding both, if you do the same, you won't have both for long.
Every tank is different, they all start a little differently, they all mature differently, and everyone manages this "cycle" a little differently, but they all benefit from a longer than LFS recommended maturation period. It sounds like you understand that.

Now for my pro "let it ride" shpeel.
Live rock is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get. A particular algae may start growing that you find very attractive. Your tank will cycle before these macro algae start growing. This means that if you put in a herbivore as soon as the cycle is finished, you'll have never seen this algae, and would have missed out. Same thing for sponges. I have an off-the-hook purple tree sponge that grew like a weed off the live rock after my blue-face angel died a couple of years ago. Angelfish love sponges. I hated to see that fish get sick (a true rarity - he was expensive and worth every penny - MAKE SURE YOU QUARANTINE FISH YOU ADD), but he didn't leave me empty handed I guess (the sponge is probably worth as much as he was). If everything lives in a delicate balance in the ocean, guess how delicate it is in an aquarium? Don't try to force things to happen the way you want.