Help! Speckled krak hasn't opened due to green algae

Christopher Poore · Feb 7, 2017

Pic attached. About a week ago this speckled krak closed due to algae growing on it. It hasn't opened since and I'm afraid I'm going to lose it. So far I've tried the following:

-Cleaning with Q-Tip
-15/85% Hydrogen peroxide / tank water dip for 10 minutes
-Furan-2 dip
-Moving to lower light

My last thought is to stick it in the sump and turn off the light for 2 days hoping it kills the algae.

Need help!

Emmagmrtz · Feb 7, 2017

Your stressing it out to much. Just got leave it alone and try to find some shading

Christopher Poore · Feb 7, 2017

I don't think just moving to shade will help it open up. But for now he's in a shaded area

Emmagmrtz · Feb 7, 2017

Not in total darkness. Just some shade. It will open up toward the light. I have Rasta and some eagle eye with algae and they opened up and I ripped off the algae

Christopher Poore · Feb 8, 2017

Hoping for the best! All my other Zoas are doing wonderfully. Quite upset the most expensive one in my tank has been closed for a week >_<

Jonathan Presseau · Feb 8, 2017

As the rest of the plug and rocks looks quite clean I would wonder if that is not more of a fungus on the zoa. I have had this issues before and have had success doing furan-2 for 3 days in a row then a break for a week. Turkey baste 2-3 times a day. It does looks stressed at this point so perhaps the lower light will help.

ahiggins · Feb 8, 2017

Ive been seeing this pop up more and more lately

I lost a frag of zoas last year to it. Just never opened then started to disintegrate on me.
Didnt spread to anything else though so I chalked it up to an immunity thing for that specific one.

Rhaegar · Feb 8, 2017

I used an eye dropper (underwater) to blow it off when that happened to my Sunny Ds. May have to be persistent, but gets job done and doesn't harm the zoa

akitareefer · Feb 8, 2017

Did the peroxide help at all? I'm surprised it still has that much algae....keep in med flow low light. Polyps can survive weeks without opening, I wouldn't give up. I wipe off the algae with my fingers but that stuff looks calcified..

ahiggins · Feb 8, 2017

The polyp itself doesnt look bad in the pic. its just preventing it from opening.
What helped me when that happened was raising my nitrates and moving it a tank that was mature-it was previously in a newer tank. (<6 months at the time)
Keep at it. polyps are very resistant little critters. I once had a 10 frag of fruit loops that completely died off. I accidentally left the (what I thought was empty) frag plug in the tank and now I have 3 polyps growing on it.
@A. grandis was extremely helpful while I was going through this "dark time" lol maybe he has some insights here

saltyfilmfolks · Feb 8, 2017

I would give it light.

bios · Feb 8, 2017

Only for suggestion algae can't grow over living tissue
Generally bacterias can do it

Christopher Poore · Feb 8, 2017

akitareefer said:
Did the peroxide help at all? I'm surprised it still has that much algae....keep in med flow low light. Polyps can survive weeks without opening, I wouldn't give up. I wipe off the algae with my fingers but that stuff looks calcified..

I dont think the peroxide helped much. There was some bubbling but that's it. Yeah I used a Q-Tip to gently do it, but that is what is remaining.

bios said:
Only for suggestion algae can't grow over living tissue
Generally bacterias can do it

So it's some form of Bacteria?

----

I think I am going to try another round of Furan-2

bios · Feb 8, 2017

I think yes, maybe cyano or something like that as the green color
@twilliard could help

saltyfilmfolks · Feb 8, 2017

coral rx or iodine as well.

sil40sx · Feb 8, 2017

I dipped a cheap zoa colony with 30/70 (H202/H20) for 5 mins, and I kid you not, almost all of them died, and the remaining ones are still looking bleached even after 2 months,.

But other people are lucky, and get good results most of the time. Maybe depends on the zoa/paly species?

Christopher Poore · Feb 8, 2017

saltyfilmfolks said:
coral rx or iodine as well.

I do have Coral RX on hand. The question is, Coral RX or Furan-2? Especially if some are guessing its bacterial.

dang shame, it was doing so well too

Christopher Poore · Feb 9, 2017

Did a second round of Furan-2 last night. Will do 1 more today, and let it rest for a while

Pole04 · Feb 9, 2017

Following along. I have had some algae?/bacteria? growing on my tiny little rasta polyp, and another small colony of unidentified zoas. I have been using a qtip to rub everything off of them, they will open for a day or two and then whatever it is grows back.

Mine had a bad odor when I was wiping them off. Hard to describe but it was pretty strong.