Corals coming back to life

DracoKat · Jun 24, 2016

A few months ago, I had a bad algae outbreak. because I was out of town taking care of my parents dog, I, unfortunately, could not tend to my tank as quick and frequent as I'd like. In the end, Cyano smothered most of my corals and I believed them to be dead with nothing but skeletons. ammonia and nitriate (or was it nitrite?) spiked. I left the skeletons there.

after about 2 months, I looked in my tank and saw the skeletons coming back to life!
Moral of the story, do not be in a rush to throw out coral skeletons. You never know! I hope they grow stronger before I get my tank upgrade.

I think this was an acan, I forget. It became bleached out and hardened. Today, I can see some tenticals and some pink coming back!

Frogspawn is sprouting heads!

Galaxia's coming back as well!

Tahoe61 · Jun 24, 2016

That is awesome. It requires a lot of patience.

jsker · Jun 24, 2016

Good advice, and glad you are on the good side to a tank turn around

DracoKat · Jun 24, 2016

don't know why my photos are huge.

I got some supplements to help the corals. I forget which ones, but if anyone has suggestions on supplements that I may not have to help, let me know!

Tahoe61 · Jun 24, 2016

Routine water changes assist in keeping trace elements in line with the values of NSW, that is really all one needs until utilization increases in demand such as with stony coral tanks.

This link is a good reference.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-05/rhf/

DracoKat · Jun 24, 2016

thank you for the link! I do 5 gals of water change weekly (its a 28 gal jbj nanocube)

Diesel · Jun 24, 2016

Did you beat the Cyano ?

DracoKat · Jun 25, 2016

I did!

I upped the WC a bit more, reduced the lighting, manually blew rocks off several times a day, and added more powerheads and CUC. Cyano was totally gone in about 2 weeks. I am slowly raising the light back up, but kept the extra powerhead in there for more water movement. been about 2 months free of cyano

Diesel · Jun 25, 2016

Did it ever occurred to you that it could be something else...... Spirulina

I understand that it completely looked like Cyano but let me @twilliard chime in as he's the expert on that subject.

twilliard · Jun 25, 2016

Sounds like it was spirulina

A healthy treat to a new clean up crew
If it was cylindrospermum they would not touch it.

DracoKat · Jun 25, 2016

Spirulina, huh? Learn something new, lol. It probably was, they look alike. and it makes sense because I was confused to why it cleared up and people are struggling.

Thanks you two!

Diesel · Jun 25, 2016

DracoKat said:
Spirulina, huh? Learn something new, lol. It probably was, they look alike. and it makes sense because I was confused to why it cleared up and people are struggling.

Thanks you two!

LOL, R2R is awesome as you'll learnsom ething new everyday.
Big thanks to @twilliard .

twilliard · Jun 25, 2016

Diesel said:
LOL, R2R is awesome as you'll learnsom ething new everyday.
Big thanks to @twilliard .

Thanks buddy!
This is where I want to make the movement in the reef aquaria.
Cyanobacteria (cylindrospermum ) and spirulina will look identical to the eye but pose 2 different traits.

Sir Chris · Jun 25, 2016

What's the affect of spiralina on rock and sand. Had a cyano problem. Tried Suckn it up with water changes and was only the sand then rock so did the treatment and turned greensand all and haven't had it since. Bout a Yr now.

Sir Chris · Jun 25, 2016

And it's awesome how corals can rebound when in right conditions. Had a percilipora for 5$ that was a 70$ colony with RTN and saved it somehow and was my 1st coral. I was shocked at the size price and figured hey it's a learner and when I showed it 2 store they were shocked I didn't frag into tiny pieces and left it alone.

Zenlikeyoda · Jun 25, 2016

Wish I saw this thread a few months back when Cyano killed my "garden" of corals I was trying my hand at. One by one they got smothered and burned. Should have kept them just in case =( My husband and I are using the Zeovit and we think we had a bad batch that caused a bloom? The first go around I did massive amounts of freq water changes and manual removal to clear them out - but it was a long battle. But the second time (no idea what caused it this time) was a bit more mild and it was during vacation season and it was tank-sat by a non-reefer so def no water changes but it cleared on its own so much faster. Not sure if it was b/c the Zeovit cleared them faster when the bacterial load was able to get upped and kept stable without all the fresh saltwater coming in. Who knows but since we had been good!