NEED salt water tank advice!?

Question

I setup a saltwater tank complete with internal 3-in-1 filter systerm, new charcoal, heater (set at 78), live sand, and rainbow rock. I cycled my 45 gal tank for 6 wks w/ 5 damsels. My tank cycled then I got rid of my dams. and put in 3 nice fish (all about 1.5" big each/same size of ea. dams.), a turbo snail & 2 brittle stars. I noticed nitrite went up so I added biozyne to tank as Petco advised. Everything died except 1 brit. star, as every level spiked. I added AmQuel+ but it didn't help so I changed out all water and recycled the tank (started over). All levels have reached, maintained, & tested perfect except my PH. No matter what I cannot get it up. I was given, by a tropical fish store that specializes in sw tanks, a buffer to raise it & have used it daily for 4 days (as directed on bottle) yet no PH change. It still says 7.4... way too low. The buffer is supposed to raise it to 8.3. What am I doing wrong? My tank is cloudy now from the product too. What do I do?

The levels are testing as follows:
Nitrate 0, nitrite between 0 & .5, alkalinity 180, pH 7.4
The buffer used is: (brand) Seachem
"Marine Buffer" (premixed liquid form).
* My brittle star just died & I removed him when I found him but he could of been dead a few short hours, but now my tank has a fishy odor coming from it. Is this the product? & is water cloudy due to product. What should I do?... toss all water (because the b.star died & because water is cloudy & a bit smelly) or try another product to higher pH then add fish (& hope for the best)? I never had this happen b4 so not sure next action.

Answer 1

What did they give you to use? Sounds like it might have been AragoMite or something of that nature. I tried that stuff and it didn't get my pH higher than 7.8. The only thing I found that worked was kalkwasser.

This is highly caustic, so you want to be careful working with it. In "high tech" tanks, this is delivered by a drip system that you can buy. I found it was just as easy to mix it in an old soda bottle that I cleaned out well, added water to a tablespoonful of the kalkwasser and shook a little Let the water settle about 30 minutes, then use an eyedropper to the bottle cap to add the solution. In a 45 gallon, you'll need to add quite a bit if your mixing water has a neutral to acidic pH. I'd start with about 5 measures, then test. Keep adding until the pH gets up around 8.2. After that, it's just a matter of testing your water a few times a week to see how often you need to add another measure.

If you mix your saltwater in a 5 gallon bucket or measured container, you can add the solution before adding the replacement water for water changes to your tank. If you always mix the kalkwasser at the same concentration, you'll soon figure out how many measures you need to add per gallon of water mixed.

As a caution, whenever you mix up the kalkwasser in the soda bottle, put the bottle with any remaining fluid in ca container that can hold the volume of liquid. My first soda bottle got "eaten" by the mixture because it's so caustic. Wear gloves when handling, and if you get it on your hands, BRUSH, don't wash it off! This is like lime, and can cause a chemical burn.

Answer 2

Anemones require the same intense lighting and excellent water quality as corals. In fact, most anemones are much more difficult to keep than many corals and typically have a terrible survival record in captivity. Your best bet would be a FOWLR (fish only with live rock) tank.