Frogspawn/LPS Dropping heads

Coralfuture · Mar 28, 2018

Not my tank or system but he's a neighbor I just met who has a problem I have never seen or heard of until now. In his tank he has roughly 25ppm nitrates keeps water at 79degrees and doses kalk in ato. Now I didn't have time for a thorough look at his system I just pointed out a frogspawn's entire head sitting on the sand bed. Sorry no though pics cuz I can't likely visit him again for a few days; anyone got anything here? I mean I have seen polyp bailout on some systems but not when the frogspawns look happy and fully extended. Its the FULL head coming off in one piece leaving its branch of the skeleton behind. He tells me its common for it to happen to his corals.....I have a few of his corals in MY QT system now because he and I agreed that he was about to kill them all. Anything anyone has to help me help my friend here would be appreciated. I will see if I can get him to take some pics tomorrow for me. Apparently it has happened to his duncans and his candy canes as well....zoas he says grow well for him and from what I see in his tank that probably accurate. I directed him here a week ago....he has yet to make a profile and I can't find much on it.
Thanks all

DLHDesign · Mar 28, 2018

I had a tube worm drop it's head when my parameters took a swing; I'd guess that the stability of his system (or the lack thereof) is the cause. E.g.; parameters are within acceptable ranges for a while, but then swing out of kilter at some point. This causes the corals to undergo a stage of shock where they go into "polyp bailout" mode.
At this point, the heads are still alive, but not doing great. If you can capture them and put them into a stable system (use a pvc pipe coupling or the like to keep them from being blown about), they'll have a better chance to survive.

In terms of the tank; I would suggest taking readings of the tank several times throughout the day (temp and salinity at least, but also things like pH, Alkalinity, ammonia, nitrates, etc.). Wouldn't be bad to ask about the maintenance schedule (if water changes are done; how often, how much, with what salt, etc.)...

Reefaddict1979 · Mar 28, 2018

My hammer dropped off a head no idea why. All my others are ok and haven’t dropped one since. I have over 50 others torches and hammers. The head is still alive 2 months later not sure why

laverda · Mar 28, 2018

Pretty hard to help with out knowing a lot more about his system. Without information we would just be guessing and may cause more problems then helping.

Coralfuture · Mar 29, 2018

I know its not much to go on and I haven't been able to move on getting any more info out of him other than a few pieces. He does weekly water changes around 20-30%.....not sure if it matters but he uses a sump pump to mix his water and he does have a copper looking hose fitting on one end of his tube that he uses to pump water into the tank from his basement. Not sure exactly what I'm looking at its just so rare I felt that maybe someone had seen it before and knew the cause. I can say that his system seems to be anything but stable from what he tells me. You know when you come on here and tell people "my nitrates are at 10ppm, salinity is always at 1.026..." and really its "my nitrates float around 70-100ppm and my salinity swings between 1.020-1.028 every day....." <=== I feel like this is and or was at one point his truth....and many others truths...which would explain 90% of what goes on in our reefs.

DLHDesign · Mar 29, 2018

The copper fitting (if that is what it is - it could also be brass - which isn't much better, but some...) may be part of the problem - it's possible it's leaching enough copper into the tank to become toxic enough to bother the corals. The instability of the system is very likely also causing issues (even if not this particular one, most marine life doesn't really do well when things change a lot as the majority of the ocean is pretty stable).
I doubt that there's going to be a single thing that's causing the polyp bailout that is occurring - there are too many variables to pin it down, at least...

LV3 · Mar 30, 2018

Following this as this is currently happening on one mini colony of bicolor hammer in my tank. The heads are in the sand, skeleton looks bleached. Heads are still alive. I keep a detailed log of parameters so in my case it’s not a swing that I can tell. A rock fell on it recently that caused s little damage so I assumed it is an infection despite dipping in lugols iodine.

LV3 · Mar 30, 2018

I checked again this morning and now a nearby hammer is starting to drop a head. This is a different species of hammer that is now affected but it makes me think that this is an infection I'm dealing with in my tank.

Coralfuture · Mar 30, 2018

See a LFS owner told me that he had seen it once before and that it was some kind of micro worm infection....didn't sound accurate to me....now I haven't dipped his corals I have in my QT.....I have them on observe and report QT
(I have 3 QT tanks). None of the ones in QT are hammers but one head that was lost this way was from his Duncan and now I have one I'm watching....seems ok and a little better but have only had in my tank for a week. I feel this will be a while to get to the bottom of this however I have access to a microscope and if this does happen I may break it out and see if I can find some facts on if or if not this "micro worm infection" actually exists. Maybe I'll get some coral RX too and dip in that since its clear as opposed to my normal Bayer dips.

SaltH20Danny · Mar 31, 2018

DLHDesign said:
The copper fitting (if that is what it is - it could also be brass - which isn't much better, but some...) may be part of the problem - it's possible it's leaching enough copper into the tank to become toxic enough to bother the corals. The instability of the system is very likely also causing issues (even if not this particular one, most marine life doesn't really do well when things change a lot as the majority of the ocean is pretty stable).
I doubt that there's going to be a single thing that's causing the polyp bailout that is occurring - there are too many variables to pin it down, at least...

Hey there, I'm the neighbor that this is currently happening to. I can assure you that my tank is stable and my readings that I take (about every 3 days) are almost the same.

Readings from 5 min. ago with Hanna.

Salinity: 1.025-26
Nitrate: 25 (uses to be wayyy worse but think I have it under control. Pretty sure I overpopulated my tank until brook or velvet cleaned house for me 4 months ago unfortunately)
Calicum: 469
Alk: 9.8
Mg: 1360
PH (Pinpoint): 8.0

My tanks parameters are always stable as far as my tests every 3 days. I do 15%-30% water changes every Wednesday. I dose kalk 6tsp per 5 gal. of rodi.

As far as the brass I use to pump water up, it's literally in the water for the 5 min. it takes to fill my tank back up.
I mix carbon and high capacity GFO in media reactor.

Tanks been up for a year and this only happens to my euphilia. My Duncan's, toadstool, palys, zoas, sponges, rose bubble tip, and Kenya tree are all doing great and growing rapidly now. I just don't understand why it' doing this to my euphilia. Kind of a bummer since it's my favorite LPS.

Thanks Anthony for the post and I appreciate all of your responses.

DLHDesign · Apr 1, 2018

First; welcome to R2R! Thanks for signing up and I hope you find it useful beyond just this thread.

Some of the numbers above are just a tad bit over the "ideal" I usually suggest aiming for, but by no means are they a level that I would expect them to be problematic. Some would consider your nitrate levels high, but I've seen plenty of tanks operate in that range with great success so I don't think that's it either.

What kind of flow do you have in the tank (strong, medium, light; pulsed, gyre, constant; etc.)? They generally prefer flow on the lower side of things, in my experience.

How do you acclimate the euphilia into the tank? Euphilia can be susceptible to new-tank-shock - they are one of the worst at surviving moves from what I've experienced. Long, slow acclimation (using a drip line or the like) is generally what I've done to see success.

jbd · Apr 8, 2018

I have had the same problem first with bicolor hammer and then frogspawn. Tank parameters are similar to SaltyH2ODanny except that nitrates are 0.00 - only one fish and a few snails in a 65g tank. I turned off one of the circulating fans thinking the flow was too high.

bronsond99 · Apr 8, 2018

Hmm I️ would focus on the placement of the corals and it’s environment. From research I️ have discovered that Euphyllias “bailout” whenever they are extremely stressed. Things that could cause this is a new move or the tank parameters being not being suitable. I️ would try relocating the coral to a lower flow area and SLOWLY lower the temp and do a partial water change and make sure that calcium levels are 420ppm or so. After that that let Mother Nature work her magic because corals will do what it needs to survive and adapt.