Corals suddenly retracting.... Dying?

[Aparker2005]

Hey everyone. Our corals are suddenly all retracting and not looking good. They've been this way for about a week.

I had a salinity spike up to 1.030 and got the water back down to 1.025. I've also been treating the tank with api algae fix due to a bit of hair algae.

Going to retest parameters this evening. Any ideas until then? Only other thing I've done is remove the chemi pure blue out of the filters.

Tank is a 75 mixed reef.

 

[Aparker2005]

We took a 5 day vacation during Christmas. Did a normal water change once we got back. Since then, torches and my soft corals have all been retracting.

Our beautiful birds nest is turning white. We had long extension and growth before this.

 

[Aparker2005]

Edit: double post

 

[dvgyfresh]

What are your other parameters ? How did the salinity happen? And did you correct slowly or immediately? I think I would put the chemi pure blue back in firstly and stop running api algae fix

 

[dvgyfresh]

Also there are multiple versions of algae fix , did you make sure to get the marine one?

 

[Aparker2005]

What are your other parameters ? How did the salinity happen? And did you correct slowly or immediately? I think I would put the chemi pure blue back in firstly and stop running api algae fix

Before we left for Christmas they were...

Ca - 440
Phos - 0.25
Nitrate - 5
Kh - 8 - 143.2
Temp - 78

Checking again in a bit. I don't have the chemi pure to add back. Threw it away. I did stop the algae fix though. Will post results later today

 

[Aparker2005]

Also there are multiple versions of algae fix , did you make sure to get the marine one?

Yeah. The first time I used it, it cleared the algae with no coral issues

 

[vetteguy53081]

Take a look at water parameters . Parameters suggested below. I suspect high phosphates or alk
What test kits are you using ?

Temp 77-79
ph 8.1-8.3
salinity 1.025
nitrate < .10
phos < .04
Ammonia < .03
mG 1300
Alk 8-11
CA 400- 440

 

[Aparker2005]

Take a look at water parameters . Parameters suggested below. I suspect high phosphates or alk
What test kits are you using ?

Temp 77-79
ph 8.1-8.3
salinity 1.025
nitrate < .10
phos < .04
Ammonia < .03
mG 1300
Alk 8-11
CA 400- 440

Api kits are all I have currently. Switching soon

 

[dvgyfresh]

Api kits are all I have currently. Switching soon

I would get alk - Hanna
phosphate - Hanna
Red Sea for mg , cal
your sps looks like RTN which can happen from a parameter swing like the salinity which would affect cal alk and mg

 

[Aparker2005]

Should they bounce back after a bit? Or are the birds nest.... And others gone likely?

We're about to move all these to a 125. Would really hate to lose all these.

 

[dvgyfresh]

I honestly have little experience with sps, I just have digitas and one acro but I have lost a branch of digitas before due to chemical ware fare and it’s growing back after I moved it away from GSP, the little branch on the right completely died , after I moved it has polyps again and growing. However this wasn’t RTN, wait for someone with more knowledge you may have to frag them before it spreads to entire coral not too sure

 

[Aparker2005]

So after checking, it looks like Phosphate and Nitrate are definitely the issue. Phosphate is up to at least 0.5, and nitrates have shot up to between 10 and 20.

Work has been incredibly busy, wife has had Corona for 2 weeks, and we had no baby sitter. So the tank took a few days neglect than normal. Gonna do a water change asap and monitor levels.

Hopefully this helps things recover.

 

[Aparker2005]

Is there any media for hob that helps keep phosphates down that lasts longer than chemi pure?

 

[dvgyfresh]

Chemi pure works well, if you need to you can use gfo to reduce phosphate just go slowly

 

[Porpoise Hork]

Is there any media for hob that helps keep phosphates down that lasts longer than chemi pure?

Seachem Phosguard and a media bag. Toss it in a decently high flow area and monitor phosphates. Just use it sparingly as it can remove too much and cause other issues.

I use it in my RO/DI to pull out phosphates and silicates and does an amazing job.

 

[Aparker2005]

I temporarily got some chemi pure blue ordered. I had no issues when I was running it before. Removed it and started having issues.

Doing a water change soon as well. Hopefully these all bounce back. I only see what looks to be dying/turning white on our birds nest.