Can't figure out what's going on, need help

[goody]

I've had this problem with a few frags/colonies in my tank for over 6 months. I lost an entire colony of Darth Mauls and most of my CAR's to this. The polyps get really small and almost appear as if they are turning inside out, and the polyps become very small and have pinhead size polyps. In the pics. below, you will see my Nightmares and the CAR's, which used to be My Nightmares 60+ healthy polyps. I've dipped in Revive, CoralRx, Furan2. I have over 25 other zoas/paly frags and colonies that are all healthy. Any suggestions of what it is or how to get them back to being healthy?

BEFORE

NOW

 

[KLR]

one colony of mine did that..check your alk and salinity 1st

 

[goody]

one colony of mine did that..check your alk and salinity 1st

Alk 9dkh (Sailifert)
Salinity 1.026 (Refractometer)

Thanks for the suggestion, but this is not a new problem, so I don't think it has anything to do with water parameters. Plus, all of my other colonies and frags are all healthy.

 

[Sasquatch]

allelopathy? what else is in the tank?

 

[Paul_N]

About a year ago when I tried to get into zoas I had Nightmares and Darth Mauls and they did the same exact thing. I tested all my params and they were fine. I dipped in Furan2 also and I kept losing them 1 by 1. I only had sps in the tank with them and they were both on frag racks midway up the side of the 75 gallon. I eventually lost them both. I never got another zoa after that and sold the rest. I had other everyday zoas and they were fine like eagle eyes which started out with 8 polyps and ended up with over 75. I never did figure it out.

Some people said they had luck with dosing vitamin c and it helped when they had the same issues with high end zoas. I never tried because I was dosing vodka at the time and didn't want to mess that up.

 

[cool*reef]

what do u have for water movment

 

[Junkie]

Out of curiosity were they doing this before you got your LEDs? I have the same fixtures from Larry, but haven't put them up yet. But they are are way more white than my 14k phoenix mh. Big change in lighting may be the culprit? Maybe in a "hot spot" did this start before or after the browning out of your acros?

 

[FiReBReTHa]

same two zoas I lost randomly. both my CARs and darth mauls at the same time...

 

[Speg]

what range of temperature is in the tank where the problem occurs?

also, do you feed these?

 

[OMG Corals]

I see some algae in the background and on the rock. Looks like diatoms or cyano. Are you sure your alk is good? How bout ph? I understand that other zoas are fine but these particular types can be very sensitive. Are they the newest addition as far as zoas go?

How bout PO4?

Test kit expired?

Based on the pics you posted, it looks like one or more params are not in range.

Also what corals are upstream from these particular frags? Allelopathy? like said above. Maybe a bali slimer or another heavy sliming acro?

my .02

 

[FaviaFreak]

how clean is your water? are you dosing a carbon source? have you looked into Vitamin C dosing

 

[Emoney]

Proxide dip! worked well for me..Helps with and bactiria infections they might have (if they do) cant really hurt at this point

 

[Wy Renegade]

Your alk is currently at 9, but have you experienced a drop and then reraised it recently? As stated above, both these are sensative polyps, and very subject to changing parameters. Beyond that, I would check your Magnesium levels, Iodine levels, and Strontium levels - when the others are in balance those are what I check next. The fact that your others are fine may simply mean that levels haven't dropped low enough to start affecting them yet, as they are not as sensitive.

 

[goody]

Wow! I check today and have a lot of great questions. I will try and answer some of them now, but won't get to all of them as I am at work at the moment.

Lights-just started the LEDs about a month ago, so I had this problem when I was running only t5
Algae that is present in tank- some bubble (mostly very tiny in clumps), and some HA that comes and goes on the overflow. No cyano in tank, that is my coralline.
po4 reads 0ppm on my Hanna Handheld checker, so I don't understand why I have the HA
Temperature of tank 79-81
I do dose Sodium Ascorbate (Vitamin C) and also run Carbon and for about 6 month now have been running ecoBak pellets
These are not new frags. Had them both for over a year and like I said, they grew into large colonies DM 100+polyp and CARs 70+ polyps. These are on the sandbed and only zoas/palys are near. My nightmares have only grown from 1polyp to 9polyps.
Water movement-2 modded tunze 6025, mp40, and Oceanrunner 3500 return

As a side note, I have a lot of other high end zoas/palys, not just your everyday run of the mill.

I appreciate all the questions. Makes me think of things I haven't thought about as possibly the cause. I do have a question regarding lifespan of zoas. I know I've had these for a least a year, but I've had others even longer. Any chance that it is just their time or do you think there is something wrong. Should I try and frag any that look somewhat healthy or would that just cause more stress?

 

[FaviaFreak]

how long have you been running the bio pellets? maybe the water column is too stripped of nutrients, from the pictures they look paled out

 

[Speg]

For your question on lifespan...

I've had some palys for roughly 10 years now as they refuse to die...even after moving them into new unestablished tanks. lol

I doubt your year-olds are senior in any way

Some scientists believe that coral can live forever, or at least a VERY long time...then again, some scentists believe that coral die-off naturally after some time.

 

[Junkie]

Have you tried any types of dipping? I'm thinking if it was a water parameter issue all would have symptoms... Maybe a fresh water dip, if it's a bacterial or pest problem it might take care of it, also afterwords try moving them off the sandbed, you never know what might be lurking in your sand.

 

[Junkie]

Might... Wow... I think I might have to lay off the word might

 

[FaviaFreak]

my thinking is not all z's and p's would be affected by lowered nutrients but certain ones would just like some corals would but not all

 

[Junkie]

From my understanding he has many acros in his tank as well, which react much quicker and more harshly to off parameters than Zs and Ps. Im thinking he would have noticed changes in his sps as well.