Do yellow corals cause harm?

hikermike · Jan 15, 2021

I have been growing corals for 2 years with good luck except for sps, but suddenly some of my healthiest are taking sudden dives...except my yellow corals which keep spreading like mad. Even the last 2 days myGSP "carpets" aren't opening. The clove was growing like mad and today drooping badly and receeding. The 4 mushrooms on the bottom are ok. the duncan is dying and moved to quarantine and stabilized as is the brain. The gorgonion is uneffected. The different xenias are the same grapefruit size but not there best. It's just that the yellows seem to be pushing out. do they sting or release a poison like the palys? The Paly is doing ok but not getting bigger. Use Instant Ocean but did 2x 20 % changes with IO reef cuz the Alk dropped to 8 and the pH dropped to 7.8. Usually do 10% water change weekly. 30 gal tank with 1 gal refugium the clean up crew, invertebrates and fish are all ok. Temp is 78 degrees.
Killed 1 aiptasia with lemon juice and the peppers took care of the two others. Can't see bugs or algae or what ever. 2 months ago I dosed with chemiclean as I had some red algae but followed instructions. any ideas? I supplement with Fusion series weekly, iodine, but ran out of acropower 2 months ago. would that have and effect now?Thanks for thoughts I alsoswitched from reef rhoids (loved em and so did the corals) to reef chili (not so impressed)

hikermike · Jan 15, 2021

Just found out they're powerful stingers. Now need to find out if they release poison or cause others to.

burningmime · Jan 15, 2021

I'm fairly certain the color of the coral doesn't make much difference. Certain species have stronger stings, and others (like Leathers) tend to release toxins that can harm other corals. But I've never heard of yellow corals being more dangerous than any other kind.

The toxins can be solved by using carbon (either wash it well or use BRS ROX 0.8 to prevent HLLE on fish). A bag of it in your sump is probably almost as good as a reactor and much cheaper. I would use carbon any time that corals seem mysteriously dying because it can filter out some other pollutants/contaminants, not just from corals but also from your home or that might come in on your hands. Honestly I run it 24/7 because it's reasonably cheap, but it seems like many people use it only once a month or so.

The stingers can be solved by moving the corals away from each other. Mushrooms, Cloves, Palys, and GSP don't have them, but duncans and most of the various types of brain coral (there's at least 10 different families referred to as "brain coral" from acans to lobos to trachys to playgyra to favia/favites, and sometimes even scolys) have stingers.

It doesn't sound like your problem is coral warfare, though. Sounds like it's a water issue of some sort. What are your parameters?