Are my Zoas dead?

[melonheadorion]

i also want to mention that zoas will sometimes just close up for periods of time. ive had a frag do it for a week, without explanation

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

Ok, what about temp and salinity?

How do you check salinity?

This was a snapshot on Wednesday, what about a few other days?

Have you ever measured PAR in the tank?

What other types of corals do you have?

Can you post a full tank shot?

Temp: 78 (sustained by inkbird)
Salinity: 1.026 (refractometer)
These are the parameters I aim for. I don't think it's a parameter issue
I haven't measured par in the tank before
I have zoas, acans, candy canes, duncans, monti, favia, ricordea, cyphastrea, etc, etc, etc.
Will post one when I get home.

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

Little update. Saw one of the polyps fully opened but it was very small and looked a little different. Fed my tank and it caught something so I couldn’t snag a pic. The polyp was much smaller though. That’s about all I remember. Here’s a pic for those wondering about what my tank looks like

you can sort of see what the other Zoas look like

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

Although in that picture, the Zoas look a lot worse than normal. That was taken a few days ago. Some days they look good and others they are closed up. The ones on the right are closed a lot in the front but in the back, they’re all opened up normally. Weird small feather duster hitchhiker that bothers them.

 

[melonheadorion]

you have a couple spots that i would move the frags to, to see what happens. you have right under that arch and that cove on the left. i would suspect that you might see them open if you put them in those shaded areas

 

[IslandLifeReef]

Although in that picture, the Zoas look a lot worse than normal. That was taken a few days ago. Some days they look good and others they are closed up. The ones on the right are closed a lot in the front but in the back, they’re all opened up normally. Weird small feather duster hitchhiker that bothers them.

All of your coral look pretty new. It is odd that all of the Zoas look like that. When you changed you light, what exactly did you do? I have my Zoas in about 220 PAR and at least medium flow and that love it.

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

All of your coral look pretty new. It is odd that all of the Zoas look like that. When you changed you light, what exactly did you do? I have my Zoas in about 220 PAR and at least medium flow and that love it.

I added some reefbars to my existing lighting in my hood, ramped them up too quickly and my corals started getting upset. Stopped making any increases but didn't decrease for a few weeks until I didn't see any change in things becoming upset. Then I decreased it down to 30%. I think I had it at 55% when things got bad but started at 30% originally and increased 5% weekly. Here's a video from my youtube channel that I made from it if you want to see the specifics.

 

[IslandLifeReef]

I added some reefbars to my existing lighting in my hood, ramped them up too quickly and my corals started getting upset. Stopped making any increases but didn't decrease for a few weeks until I didn't see any change in things becoming upset. Then I decreased it down to 30%. I think I had it at 55% when things got bad but started at 30% originally and increased 5% weekly. Here's a video from my youtube channel that I made from it if you want to see the specifics.

That is helpful. I looked up those ReefBars and it looks like they would provide no more than 25 PAR each at 100% in the bottom of your tank. I'm not sure that those are the cause based on your acclimation of starting at 30% and then adding 5% a week to 55%.

What did you do to get rid of the Dino's?

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

That is helpful. I looked up those ReefBars and it looks like they would provide no more than 25 PAR each at 100% in the bottom of your tank. I'm not sure that those are the cause based on your acclimation of starting at 30% and then adding 5% a week to 55%.

What did you do to get rid of the Dino's?

Increased nitrates and found the root of my zero nitrates issue. It’s very complicated and confusing but basically my tank ran fine at 0 nitrates for the longest time until a few months ago when I experimented with my protein skimmer. I set it on a timer and nitrates increased (about 5 ppm) but eventually it hit 0 and that’s when things went haywire. Fortunately I figured out that my nitrates had been staying at 0 because of my mechanical filtration (poly fil) so I quit replacing weekly and Now i always keep an old one in there to keep nitrates up. Now, nitrates are kept around 10. Eventually, Dino’s stopped showing up as of a few weeks ago).
About the reefbars, that’s another reason why I’m confused. It puts out very little par. I only bought them because I didn’t want to replace the Biocube lighting, because it’s good, I just find it a little too white at times.

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

Another thing to mention, after every day I increased my lights, the corals would always get a little upset but would look normal the following day.

 

[IslandLifeReef]

Increased nitrates and found the root of my zero nitrates issue. It’s very complicated and confusing but basically my tank ran fine at 0 nitrates for the longest time until a few months ago when I experimented with my protein skimmer. I set it on a timer and nitrates increased (about 5 ppm) but eventually it hit 0 and that’s when things went haywire. Fortunately I figured out that my nitrates had been staying at 0 because of my mechanical filtration (poly fil) so I quit replacing weekly and Now i always keep an old one in there to keep nitrates up. Now, nitrates are kept around 10. Eventually, Dino’s stopped showing up as of a few weeks ago).
About the reefbars, that’s another reason why I’m confused. It puts out very little par. I only bought them because I didn’t want to replace the Biocube lighting, because it’s good, I just find it a little too white at times.

Have you considered and ICP test? Your Zoas are definitely alive, but should be open. Maybe it will just take a lot more time for them to be happy, but an ICP test would rule out anything in the water.

When you say old poly-fil, are you referring to a Poly Filter that has chemicals in it or are you just talking about fill used to filter out larger debris? If it is just fill, maybe try not changing it as often to keep NO3 up instead of using old fill. If it is a Poly-filter, I would not use an old one IMO. I would be worried that after it dried out, it might release substances into the tank when it was re-used.

 

[Ocean’s Piece]

Have you considered and ICP test? Your Zoas are definitely alive, but should be open. Maybe it will just take a lot more time for them to be happy, but an ICP test would rule out anything in the water.

When you say old poly-fil, are you referring to a Poly Filter that has chemicals in it or are you just talking about fill used to filter out larger debris? If it is just fill, maybe try not changing it as often to keep NO3 up instead of using old fill. If it is a Poly-filter, I would not use an old one IMO. I would be worried that after it dried out, it might release substances into the tank when it was re-used.

i plan to do an icp test in a few months. My Zoas are actually starting to open up a lot more and aren’t folding over hardly at all. Here’s a pic from a sec ago:

It’s the latter. It’s quilt batting basically called Poly-Fil and it’s 100% polyester. May be some chemicals in the polyester that makes nitrates go to 0, but It’s working.