coral supplements

[UDJustin]

I know each different coral requires different supplements and different amounts of light. I was just wondering what supplements people use in their tanks for their corals.

[MechanicalEngineer]

Best recommendation I can give you is to not dose anything unless you're testing for it.  I dose Ca, Alk, and Mag as required.  Some people keeping a lot of "softies" dose iodine.  Keeping up with regular water changes is probably more beneficial than all the supplements (and cheaper!)

[Joel]

I would say the supplements used the most are Calcium, Strontium and Iodine however that is not to say that these are the most important supplements or that all aquariums need them.  What supplement and how much of it is needed is going to vary from each aquarium. Circumstances such as the types and quantity of  livestock (mostly corals) and even what type of filtration is being used can play a roll in what is needed & how quickly supplements are utilized or used up / removed. For example, an aquarium stocked heavily with SPS and / or Clams would have a much greater demand for calcium and / or strontium than lets say a tank full of soft corals or polyps.

I totally agree with Nikki that testing for the supplements is the best way to approach this. Simply following the manufactures instructions on dosage rarely achieves the target range / value for a given supplement. This is somewhat of a learning experience to determine what supplement is needed, how much is needed and how often it needs to be added. It may take several weeks of trial and error (dosing & testing) to determine what an aquarium needs.

Another mistake (at least in my opinion) that I see regularly is weekly dosing or random dosing. I believe that a much better method is to daily or multiple times per week add supplements / trace elements to an aquarium so it has a constant, stable and correct level available to the inhabitants. Again, the way to determine what,  how much and how often to add will be determined by regular testing. I believe that it is a unhealthy situation to add supplements, let them decrease over a week or more and then "BOOM" all the sudden the supplements are back, real strong in the water.  Corals do much better with predictable (to them) & stable conditions.

This may sound like a lot of time & effort but after a few weeks of regular testing and dosing, you will learn what your tanks wants / needs and it gets pretty easy.