Bird Nest dying damaged other corals

[Difrano]

SPS advice from a newbie! I have my new RSR250 for 2 months now, is not a fresh start because I moved all the rock from my cube, as you can read in my build thread, I added some softs and LPS to test how the tank was going, Xenia, GSP, Mushrooms, Palys and Zoas. They have been doing fine, thinking that my tank may have been ready for some hardy SPS last week I added a Green Bird Nest frag, as a test frag. everything good for a week until yesterday morning when I noticed some bleaching on one of the branches of the frag, thinking about it may have been bleaching due to light I put the AI into acclimation mode and went to work and when came back around 10 PM and lights were out, noticed that the Xenia colony in the sump just was melted, then some of the GSP also looked like melted. Also found one of my goby cleaners dead in the filtration cup, the day before he was there alive and decided not to move him back till next day (bad decision) , this was his 3rd trip down there so thought it died from blunt trauma of going through the pipes. With the trauma of the loss I forgot to check the bird nest.

So this morning with lights on just realized that the Birds nest was completely gone, is my first time taking care of SPS I did not had any on my 5 years with the cube and didn't know that STN could last less than 24h,so took out the affected GSP frags and noticed that there was some slime where the polyps were missing, so I realized that was the flesh of the Bird Nest that killed the GSP and Xenias, and then realized that my goby being trapped in the filter cup was not able to escape all the poisonous flesh coming from the DT... so basically I murdered him...

So did not know that a small frag of SPS could do that big damage when dying, will wait more time before trying them again.
My parameters for those who are interested:

Salinity 1.026 (refractometer) 36.4(Apex)
pH 7.99 (Apex) min 7.76
Alk 7.78 Trident 7.70 Hanna
Ca 499 Trident
Mg 1393 Trident
NO3 0 API (Nyos arriving today)
Po4 0 API, 0 Hanna- Retested this morning and got 0.21
NH3 0 API

I think the bird nest died by poor acclimating from my part, I don't really do much acclimation for the softies.

 

[Bosreef]

No, your birdnest frag did not do this. Look elsewhere

 

[Cell]

Doubt it was the birds nest. Related or not, 0 nitrates is bad, 0 or 2.1 phosphate is bad.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Birdsnest hate nutrient spikes and alk spikes ime. There is nothing poisonous about dying sps though. Although if it’s death is from something bacterial then that could spread to other corals in the right scenario but I wouldn’t expect it to jump to your green star polyps and kill them, maybe other like corals though. If green star polyps and Xenia are dying look at the basics because those corals are extremely hard to kill in a healthy tank.

 

[BranchingHammer]

Dying sps frags shouldn’t be that toxic. An anemone though... that’s another story. I’d do a large water change and run carbon because of the problem in your water and also because of the toxins being released by the stressed soft corals and dead fish.

 

[melanotaenia]

I have never heard of this in over 20 years keeping reefs. A RTN Acro is not going to wipe out your tank.

 

[Difrano]

Ups sorry all! I had a typo on my PO4, it was 0.21. Yes I understand your point, but where the GSP and Xenia polyps were gone there was a piece of dead flesh from the Bird Nest trapped. I am not saying that released toxins in water, just saying that were the dying/dead flesh touched other corals they died. It did not caused more damage than those and all the rest of my livestock is supper happy, maybe nuked on the title was a little overkill ;Facepalm . I have another small Xenia colony on my DT that looks as happy as always.

Thank you all for your comments! I already did the water change

 

[h2so4hurts]

LOL, what? You think a single birdsnest frag killed your system? This is the epitome of correlation != Causation. I don't know what tanked your system, but it wasn't the birdsnest. The the stinging parts of corals are the polyps, not the flesh.

 

[Crustaceon]

Having RTN’d many a coral including birdsnests, I can confidently say no, that’s not the cause. I’ve had gsp melt due to zero nitrates though.

 

[Difrano]

LOL, what? You think a single birdsnest frag killed your system? This is the epitome of correlation != Causation. I don't know what tanked your system, but it wasn't the birdsnest. The the stinging parts of corals are the polyps, not the flesh.

Ok I changed the title, did you read my full post? didn't destroyed my tank, damaged some other frags and killed a tiny cleaner goby that was small enough to go thru the overflow of my RSR250 3 times. I don't think anyone can say that knows everything about this hobby and learning from others experiences is important. Just posting what happened to me.

 

[h2so4hurts]

Ok I changed the title, did you read my full post? didn't destroyed my tank, damaged some other frags and killed a tiny cleaner goby that was small enough to go thru the overflow of my RSR250 3 times. I don't think anyone can say that knows everything about this hobby and learning from others experiences is important. Just posting what happened to me.

Yes. It didn't do that either.