Candy cane coral shrinking...help?

Nano101 · Oct 30, 2016

Perfect parameters, but my candy cane is shrinking while everything else is flourishing. The coral is sitting on the bottom of the tank, but in direct light view. Could my water be too clean? Not enough light on the bottom? My frogspawn next to it is doing great, showing good growth. Not enough flow, not enough light...I'm just unsure. Help? You can see it shriveled. I really want to save it.

Diesel · Oct 30, 2016

What are your parameters?
ALK
CAL
PH
TEMP
Po4
No3
Can you post a pic of the coral and a FTS as well?

Nano101 · Oct 30, 2016

My lights are ramping up, will post later today. Pic included is a couple days old. Alk 12dKH, Cal 435, pH 8.5, temp 78.4, 0 phosphates and 0 nitrates.

Nano101 · Oct 30, 2016

Don't have a PAR meter so unsure of light it is getting. about 14" under a prime HD

TRPlacek · Oct 30, 2016

How long have you had the candy cane? I've placed mine in several different spots and I found that they did best in low flow with moderate light. I believe flow had more to do with it than lighting though.

Nano101 · Oct 30, 2016

Have had about a month, it is in a low flow area, shadowed a bit by my LR. I was more worried not enough light, but sounds like might not be the issue

TRPlacek · Oct 30, 2016

Have you tried spot feeding it?

Diesel · Oct 30, 2016

Nano101 said:
My lights are ramping up, will post later today. Pic included is a couple days old. Alk 12dKH, Cal 435, pH 8.5, temp 78.4, 0 phosphates and 0 nitrates.

Thanks for posting the results.
I see the problem.
Your ALK and No3 are way off, not to mention a high PH and low Po4.
Here's the deal with a high ALK on low No3 your corals don't think it's at 12 as you test but they think or feel it's a lot higher.
Common rule in this hobby is with low No3 you drop your alk, in your case your No3 needs to be at 2ppm or higher close to 3 or 4 ppm and alk can be at 8.5.
You just need to find the right balance.
I have my No3 at 3ppm as we speak but ALK at 7.8 give and take.
As far of PH that needs to drop between 8 and 8.2.
Never seen a tank do good at 8.5.
Feed a little more to the fish so that Po4 is detectable around 0.04 but not lower, higher is better but 0.08 should be a limit till you can play around with nutrients control and consumption from your corals.
If you need to know the scientific results from High and Low ALK on No3 shoot a note to @Randy Holmes-Farley

ahiggins · Oct 30, 2016

Diesel said:
Thanks for posting the results.
I see the problem.
Your ALK and No3 are way off, not to mention a high PH and low Po4.
Here's the deal with a high ALK on low No3 your corals don't think it's at 12 as you test but they think or feel it's a lot higher.
Common rule in this hobby is with low No3 you drop your alk, in your case your No3 needs to be at 2ppm or higher close to 3 or 4 ppm and alk can be at 8.5.
You just need to find the right balance.
I have my No3 at 3ppm as we speak but ALK at 7.8 give and take.
As far of PH that needs to drop between 8 and 8.2.
Never seen a tank do good at 8.5.
Feed a little more to the fish so that Po4 is detectable around 0.04 but not lower, higher is better but 0.08 should be a limit till you can play around with nutrients control and consumption from your corals.
If you need to know the scientific results from High and Low ALK on No3 shoot a note to @Randy Holmes-Farley

I 150% agree!
I had a alk of 11 and 0 nitrates in my system. While things inside my tank were fine with softies and a few acans-once I bought cyphastreas and lithos, they bleached immediately.
Once I got them into check, 5 nitrates and 9alk, everything started gaining color again.
One thing I found...even though I switched salt (the salt I had been using was made up to 11 alk!) water changes slowed the process. I left the tank alone and fed heavily for about a month. My corals used the alk and my nitrates raised. Then I did a 50% water change-its a 25 gallon tank.
Good luck!

Nano101 · Oct 30, 2016

water change coming up

Nano101 · Oct 31, 2016

24 hours later after a waterchange, I can see the slightest of improvements. Hopefully by the end of the week I see a large difference.

Reeferdood · Oct 31, 2016

Alk and Ph are too high and I would not have in in the direct path of the return...
My .02

Nano101 · Oct 31, 2016

I did a 50% water change yesterday to correct the parameters. The coral is in the slowest flow in the tank

Reeferdood · Oct 31, 2016

Judging by the photo it looks like it is in the direct path of the return.. I have a very large colony that I keep in the slow flow area.

WetWhistle · Oct 31, 2016

These guys like some dissolved organics in the water and like it a little more dirty then your tank is as they don't gain as much nutrition form zooxanthellae as some other corals do. Since they use organics as one of their main ways of getting food you will need to supplement feeding. Once you have gotten your Alk a little lower (I would run it around 8 to 9 dkh) and you supplemental feed you will notice a big difference. For now i would take a 2L pop bottle and cut the top portion off. Take the cap off and place it over the LPS. Then feed a little and leave it of for like 20 min. Do this every day to every other day till you notice improvement. Then you can lower the frequency of feeding. I like to use finer foods as they are more easily absorbed and digested with lower metabolic cost then larger foods are. You can use detritus or broken up brine shrimp. For the detritus you can just take a turkey baster and do a few squirts into the substrate in the pop bottle once you have placed it over the coral.

saltyfilmfolks · Oct 31, 2016

Nano101 said:
I did a 50% water change yesterday to correct the parameters. The coral is in the slowest flow in the tank

are you running gfo? every time i would add it, my canycanes would "die"(that same colony has been playing that game with me for three years now btw), and is the result of course of the Po and alk.

WetWhistle · Oct 31, 2016

My corals are not fans of GFO. I have issues when I run it so I only do in emergency situations.

Nano101 · Oct 31, 2016

saltyfilmfolks said:
are you running gfo? every time i would add it, my canycanes would "die"(that same colony has been playing that game with me for three years now btw), and is the result of course of the Po and alk.

no gfo

saltyfilmfolks · Oct 31, 2016

WetWhistle said:
My corals are not fans of GFO. I have issues when I run it so I only do in emergency situations.

Nano101 said:
no gfo

Interesting.
I do wonder if its the alk relationship. I think it is. Of late Ive been trying to wrap my head more around that relationship.
Folks(and me) seem to forget or misunderstand that alk is a result of things not A thing(bittle). Ie low alk add buffer, not feed more.
#scienceissilly

Nano101 · Oct 31, 2016

saltyfilmfolks said:
Interesting.
I do wonder if its the alk relationship. I think it is. Of late Ive been trying to wrap my head more around that relationship.
Folks(and me) seem to forget or misunderstand that alk is a result of things not A thing(bittle). Ie low alk add buffer, not feed more.
#scienceissilly

Since I'm only a 12 gallon, I am thinking of no dosing period and just water changing 10-20% once a week. I have red sea coral pro salt which should be enough to get me what I need. Also more consistent.