Acan echinata turned brown
- Thread starter baslewprime
- Start date
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C. Eymann
2500 Club Member
Can I see a closer/better picture of this coral, top down oriented preferably? I have doubts of it being Acanthastrea echinata. Almost looks like a bowerbanki need better pic.
How are you testing phosphate and nitrate?
Nitrate @ 10ppm is a bit high for a reef IMO and can be associated with browning colors sometimes, hard to know for sure if it's the only cause in this case though, and the perfect NO3 levels are debatable
lighting setup?
How are you testing phosphate and nitrate?
Nitrate @ 10ppm is a bit high for a reef IMO and can be associated with browning colors sometimes, hard to know for sure if it's the only cause in this case though, and the perfect NO3 levels are debatable
lighting setup?
OP
OP
baslewprime
Active Member
C. Eymann
2500 Club Member
NVM on the bowerbank, that would have been a score !
Its echinata
Personally for LPS/mixed reef I like to keep nitrate around 3-5 max if you really want your LPS to pop, they will be fine in higher levels but it will cause the population of symbiodinium (brown) (zooxanthelle) to increase inside the tissue if the coral, causing it to darken in color.
my .02
Its echinata
Personally for LPS/mixed reef I like to keep nitrate around 3-5 max if you really want your LPS to pop, they will be fine in higher levels but it will cause the population of symbiodinium (brown) (zooxanthelle) to increase inside the tissue if the coral, causing it to darken in color.
my .02
OP
OP
baslewprime
Active Member
Gino Rodriguez
New Member
C. Eymann
2500 Club Member
This is a good article that explains population density correlation between symbiodinium zooabthelle and nitrogen
Nitrogen cycling in corals: the key to understanding holobiont functioning?
Corals are animals that form close mutualistic associations with endosymbiotic photosynthetic algae of the genus Symbiodinium. Together they provide t…
erk
Valuable Member
I have my LPS and SPS in 25ppm+ NO3 and .3ppm PO4 and the color is not brown or faded. So I don't think 10ppm NO3 is the reason it turned brown. Your echinata looks great. It is puffed up and while not super colorful, still has color. Do you feed it? How long have you had it?
C. Eymann
2500 Club Member
Aquarium Chemistry: Nitrate in the Reef Aquarium
This article provides background on nitrate in the ocean and in aquaria, and describes a number of techniques that aquarists have successfully used to keep nitrate levels down to more natural levels in reef aquaria.
10+ppm of Nitrate is way too high IMO
Reef waters are usually less than 1ppm,
I have always shot for .25- 1ppm in my reefs
I dont want to start a debate, but I do believe this could be affecting OPs coral
NO3 @ 10+ppm being "fine" goes against everything out there on recommended reef aquarium water chemistry
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I don't think anyone is debating that there is no "one size fits all" in reefing, even with a BRS video. Lol. Plenty of tanks ran at higher than ocean levels of nitrate that are down right stunning with colors bright as the sun.
Gino Rodriguez
New Member
Believe the issues pertain more to the ratio of NO3 and PO4. Also I read last night that the corals actually have a way higher concentration of each bound up in their mucus. Where the levels in the sea area a quarter or less than on the surface of the coral.
