corals out of water?

Peter Houde · Jun 24, 2022

What corals cannot tolerate exposure to air (up to a couple or few hours) when performing water changes?

HBtank · Jun 25, 2022

damsels are not mean said:
If this caused dieoffs there would be no shallow reefs as it happens every day in many places some for several hours at a time.

I doubt it, the pictures of beds of exposed SPS are likely extreme “king tides” that happen a couple times a year. While they can obviously tolerate it, those tides also swing very quickly,

Big Smelly fish · Jun 25, 2022

Peter Houde said:
My tank is two feet deep. I do a 25-30% water change weekly. The water level is down at least 30% because a lot drains into the sump when the power is off. The level isn't at its lowest for the duration of the change, but it takes time to siphon out old water and there's always a couple hour delay to get the last 10 gallons in because I have only so much capacity to premix and aerate new water and then restart the pump. I've never exposed corals - yet. But I'd like to place some closer to the surface if there are any that could tolerate it. I think some corals are exposed at low tide in the wild.

How long have you been doing it like this. If all are doing find then no problem.

HudsonReefer2.0 · Jun 25, 2022

If u have a sump and change that water the coral will b submerged. I also change water from the DT and that exposes my sps but that’s for like 5-10 min and Nvr an issue

brandon429 · Jun 25, 2022

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[youtube width=”640″ height=”505″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6MUPVyFDUM[/youtube] Simon Garratt, our reefing friend across the pond, recently posted a video of his latest experiment an intertidal…

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HudsonReefer2.0 · Jun 25, 2022

vetteguy53081 · Jun 25, 2022

Peter Houde said:
What corals cannot tolerate exposure to air (up to a couple or few hours) when performing water changes?

As many are exposed to atosphere during tides, its not an abnormality however many deep water species wont do well and torch coral known to develop bacterial issues lkeading to loss of strands when exposed to air

HudsonReefer2.0 · Jun 25, 2022

Interesting article https://reefs.com/magazine/short-take-coral-survival-after-long-term-exposure-to-air/

ZombieEngineer · Jun 25, 2022

Peter Houde said:
My tank is two feet deep. I do a 25-30% water change weekly. The water level is down at least 30% because a lot drains into the sump when the power is off. The level isn't at its lowest for the duration of the change, but it takes time to siphon out old water and there's always a couple hour delay to get the last 10 gallons in because I have only so much capacity to premix and aerate new water and then restart the pump. I've never exposed corals - yet. But I'd like to place some closer to the surface if there are any that could tolerate it. I think some corals are exposed at low tide in the wild.

You don't need to do that much water change weekly in that large of a tank. In small tanks, that much is important to avoid dosing, but in larger tanks most people do around 10% weekly.

If your capacity is less than what you can premix, you are far better off reducing your water change amount by at least 10 gallons.

homegrowncichlid · Jun 25, 2022

plus 1, corals are exposed to air normally during low tide, which explains why some corals ship better dry than wet. take a frag, wrap it with wet paper towel, place it in a sealed bag. I read a famous article regarding survival rates of corals shipped dry in this manner had much higher survival rates as opposed to corals that rot in the bag of water. The paper towel insures that no part of the coral tissue is pressed against the plastic, cutting off circulation. Also insures plenty of oxygen exchange, which is lacking when shipped completely submerged.
As such I repeated the process with a frag of M. digitata, which I left in the bag for 3 days. (3 days to simulate USPS priority shipping.) After the time was up, the frag opened up as normal when placed back into my aquarium. The key to keeping corals heathy when out of water, is that it must be maintained at 100% humidity.

As noted, this only applies to shallow water species.

For your situation, a plastic wrap over the aquarium may be helpful.