Crushed Coral

[Brandxn]

I just added crushed coral in a mesh bag in my HOB filter to raise my PH and KH/GH. PH is around 6.8, KH is 3 drops and GH is 5 drops using the API test kit. I have Amano shrimp, Nerite snails, neons, Otos, Panda Corys & Peacock Goby’s in a planted tank.
 

My question is how much crushed coral should I use and for how long should I leave it in. Is it something that I can just leave in or do I have to remove it when the water is in the parameters that I want. Also how much do I use or does it not matter? I have around a 1/4 cup in the bag. Thanks. 

[KBOzzie59]

It dissolves very very slowly, your pH will get to a point where it dissolves even slower.  I leave mine in, matter of fact I have a couple tanks with it as substrate and as I recall the pH hangs around 7.4.  I'll test when I get home and update if I'm wrong on that.  A quarter cup is fine, just give the bag a light rinse when you do filter maintenance.

[nabokovfan87]

On 8/24/2022 at 10:03 AM, Brandxn said:

My question is how much crushed coral should I use and for how long should I leave it in. Is it something that I can just leave in or do I have to remove it when the water is in the parameters that I want. Also how much do I use or does it not matter? I have around a 1/4 cup in the bag. Thanks. 

when I tried to buffer mine.... the HoB was about 75% of what I "needed" to buffer mine 1 degree.  Meaning, to go up 1 drop, it was .75 lb of CC to the HoB.  You can see it adds up pretty quickly and there is a point of limited returns.  I even tried to use a ziss bubble bio to hold another lb of CC and that didn't work well enough.  To be clear, the filter I had was the Tidal, which has bypass issues. That being said.... I would only recommend CC in a canister because you can actually get enough in there, as a chemical filter media, to cause enough of a difference.  You're best chance to use CC is to add it to the substrate or add it as a base layer and cap it.

I use Seachem Alkaline buffer on my tanks.