Duncan and Leather won't open - help

[StrayAmoeba]

I have a Red Sea Reefer 350 with 8 fish and a few frags. Tank has been set up for about 2 months. Cycled with Dr Tim's and had a full cycle before I started adding things.

- The Duncan frag was one of the first added (its been in there for about a month) and it looked like it was doing great for a while. For the last 2 days though it hasn't opened at all.

- The last coral frag I added (about a week ago) was a Green Polyp Toadstool Leather which was also doing well and opening up daily but this too hasn't opened up for a couple of days. While the polyps dont open during the day I do see the tentacles come out when the lights go out.

A few changes made in the last few days is that i increased my lights from about 60% to about 75% (I was trying to slowly turn the lights up) and my tank was a little more smelly so I did a 10gal (10%) water change (I did pull out a dead snail) and I also increased my return pump from 50% to 60% to have more water turnover.

Lastly, I am having a bit of a diatom bloom right now, was worse on the sand but this is almost cleared up now and I have some diatoms on the glass still. I try not to clean the glass but I did break down and cleaned it a few days ago after it got a bit too cloudy, I have since left it alone and now Im back to having a fine dusting of diatoms on the glass again.

All my parameters tested today:
Temp - 79
Nitrate - 0
Phosphate - 0
Ammonia - 0
pH - 8.1 - 8.2
Salinity - 1.026 - 1.027 (adjusted this a bit today too to get it to 1.025)

Alkalinity - 6.5 (getting stuff to dose tomorrow and get this back up a bit)
Cal - 420
Mag - 1400

Any thoughts as to what could be causing this? All the fish look to be doing well. I have a few other frags in there that are doing well and are open, including a few different types of zoas and palys, a few types of mushrooms, a larger candy cane colony and a hammer euphyllia.

All my equipment is plugged into a Apex Classic and has been running well as far as I can tell

 

[PTXReef]

I have a Red Sea Reefer 350 with 8 fish and a few frags. Tank has been set up for about 2 months. Cycled with Dr Tim's and had a full cycle before I started adding things.

- The Duncan frag was one of the first added (its been in there for about a month) and it looked like it was doing great for a while. For the last 2 days though it hasn't opened at all.

- The last coral frag I added (about a week ago) was a Green Polyp Toadstool Leather which was also doing well and opening up daily but this too hasn't opened up for a couple of days. While the polyps dont open during the day I do see the tentacles come out when the lights go out.

A few changes made in the last few days is that i increased my lights from about 60% to about 75% (I was trying to slowly turn the lights up) and my tank was a little more smelly so I did a 10gal (10%) water change (I did pull out a dead snail) and I also increased my return pump from 50% to 60% to have more water turnover.

Lastly, I am having a bit of a diatom bloom right now, was worse on the sand but this is almost cleared up now and I have some diatoms on the glass still. I try not to clean the glass but I did break down and cleaned it a few days ago after it got a bit too cloudy, I have since left it alone and now Im back to having a fine dusting of diatoms on the glass again.

All my parameters tested today:
Temp - 79
Nitrate - 0
Phosphate - 0
Ammonia - 0
pH - 8.1 - 8.2
Salinity - 1.026 - 1.027 (adjusted this a bit today too to get it to 1.025)

Alkalinity - 6.5 (getting stuff to dose tomorrow and get this back up a bit)
Cal - 420
Mag - 1400

Any thoughts as to what could be causing this? All the fish look to be doing well. I have a few other frags in there that are doing well and are open, including a few different types of zoas and palys, a few types of mushrooms, a larger candy cane colony and a hammer euphyllia.

All my equipment is plugged into a Apex Classic and has been running well as far as I can tell

I do not have any duncans so not enough experience to offer my opinion there. However, it is not unusual for your leather to close for a few days. It is about to shed (growing and also getting rid of debris). My finger leathers and toadstools do this regularly!

As for your parameters, do not raise or lower anything too quickly! It is better to have sub optimal conditions that are stable and consistent rather than chasing numbers and dumping in chemicals to chase specific numbers. I would slowly lower your salinity to 1.025-1.026 over a few days and dose to raise your alkalinity slowly. I would raise at most 0.5 dKH a day just to be safe. Your system may not be mature yet so there will be fluctuations. Nothing good in this hobby comes fast so be consistent with water changes, lighting schedules, and make sure parameters are stable. Everything else will follow!

 

[StrayAmoeba]

I was able to get a picture of the toadstool, not the greatest picture but hopefully it gives an idea what I'm talking about. How long can I expect it to be closed? I fed the tank after lights went out last night and I did see it grab some stuff and pull it in but still no open polyps during the day.