I don't get acros

[Pdash]

Yep, my 90 is very lightly stocked, my fish are very vibrant and healthy as well as my coral.

Cool fish selections, planning on adding anything else?

 

[Fercho]

nitrate..... ZERO! how in the hell did those even get that low? I feed an entire cube of frozen every day plus pellets and nori. I don't think I've changed my GFO in about a month. I have Brightwell nitrate and phosphate, should I slowly start adding these to get my numbers up?

Dude, thats your problem.
GFO
Get rid of it.
It not only sucks po4 clean out of your tank.
It also takes out other important trace elements that corals use for food.

I had the same problem a couple of years back and found out here in reef2reef on another forum that using gfo 24/7 was bad for sps.

Once i stopped using it my sps colored up and thrived.

Trust me on these.

All of the diagnostics others are giving you here are good points to concider.

But gfo is the clulprit here.

Like someone already said.
Take it slowly when adding no3 so you don't shock your reef.
Add some no3 to your tank so when testing it registers, and as for po4 just feed the fish a lot more than 1 cube per day.
Try say 4.
Dont dose anything for po4, just feed more and it will rise on its own.

Red Sea (reef energy A & B) coral nutrition will add amino acids to your tank as well as no3. If you want to concider using that brand. Up to you. Not very expensive.
It also stimulates polyp extension of your sps.

Dont change anything else.
ie. lighting, flow, etc, etc.
(Ok. Maybe play around with the flow some as sps love good amounts of flow.)
Just concentrate on upping your no3 and stopping the use of gfo.

Remember, take it slow and good luck.

 

[phil bevilacqua]

Hey man ,nitrate has been and issue for me too. I add neonitro.. BIT LISTEN... Ad like 1/4 dose to start. It will shock them at regular dose and they wil RTn. I know this cause I did it. Lol. Bring them up to 5-10 very slow at first Learn from my 1000 mistake. And bring ur feeding up slowly , all those fish need more food which will in turn feed ur coral. I also put my skimmer on a timer and started cutting it back a few hrs a day I till I see my nitrate stabilize with out dosing it. Was about 6 hrs off for me

 

[Hemmdog]

Cool fish selections, planning on adding anything else?

Thanks! I would like to but I can’t settle on exactly what fish, possibly a few if they are small, just yet. Any suggestions?

 

[Pdash]

Dude, thats your problem.
GFO
Get rid of it.
It not only sucks po4 clean out of your tank.
It also takes out other important trace elements that corals use for food.

I had the same problem a couple of years back and found out here in reef2reef on another forum that using gfo 24/7 was bad for sps.

Once i stopped using it my sps colored up and thrived.

Trust me on these.

All of the diagnostics others are giving you here are good points to concider.

But gfo is the clulprit here.

Like someone already said.
Take it slowly when adding no3 so you don't shock your reef.
Add some no3 to your tank so when testing it registers, and as for po4 just feed the fish a lot more than 1 cube per day.
Try say 4.
Dont dose anything for po4, just feed more and it will rise on its own.

Red Sea (reef energy A & B) coral nutrition will add amino acids to your tank as well as no3. If you want to concider using that brand. Up to you. Not very expensive.
It also stimulates polyp extension of your sps.

Dont change anything else.
ie. lighting, flow, etc, etc.
(Ok. Maybe play around with the flow some as sps love good amounts of flow.)
Just concentrate on upping your no3 and stopping the use of gfo.

Remember, take it slow and good luck.

Dude it's highly probable he isn't lighting his tank enough, he needs to check and make changes. If he is running 130 par and he makes all these changes it won't help for jack.

 

[Pdash]

Thanks! I would like to but I can’t settle on exactly what fish, possibly a few if they are small, just yet. Any suggestions?

Pintail wrasses are amazing mine has an awesome personality, or you could look at other flashers/fairy wrasses. Helps to add color movement etc to the top of the tank imo.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

just checked phosphate.... .01ppm with a hanna ultra low checker. I am using AB+ also. wonder if someone around me has a par meter. Kind of just guess what intensity to run. tank has been set up for 3 years in this house

 

[Ike]

just checked phosphate.... .01ppm with a hanna ultra low checker. I am using AB+ also. wonder if someone around me has a par meter. Kind of just guess what intensity to run. tank has been set up for 3 years in this house

This is it, there's little doubt in my mind. .03 and trending upward was fine, dipping below .03 caused problems. This was on my checker, and I'm sure there's a little variability, but it was repeatable and obviously stressful for the corals when I tested and got .02 or lower. Based on tracking this one reading alone I could tell why I'd have some troubles with STN, corals paling and throwing out excessive mesenterial filaments at feeding time. There was a direct correlation to negative reactions in Acropora and obvious positive change when phosphates were kept at .03+. Many other coral types seem unfazed.

 

[Punchanello]

This is it, there's little doubt in my mind. .03 and trending upward was fine, dipping below .03 caused problems. This was on my checker, and I'm sure there's a little variability, but it was repeatable and obviously stressful for the corals when In would test and get .02 or lower. Based on tracking this one reading alone I could tell when I'd have troubles with STN, corals paling and throwing out excessive mesenterial filaments at feeding times that there was a direct correlation to negative reactions in Acropora. Many other coral types seem unfazed.

Are the mesenterial filaments those single or handfuls of 'feeders' that come out?

 

[Sarah24!]

I don't get it, my acros always look like trash or they brown or turn white. I have really good flow with two mp40s, 2 wavs, and then my return. Lights are 3 Radion gen 4 pros at 65%. tank is a 180 by the way. salinity is a stable 1.025, alk - 8-9 usually 8.5, calc- 415-450 mag 1510. All checked with a trident. PH- 8.0 (night) 8.3(day). polyp extension is also garbage. I'm going to check my phosphates and see what thats at

Hello,

If this was posted and I missed it oops. But your running trident which is super low nitrate and phosphate correct. When nutrients are that low run alk at 7 and calcium at 410-420, and turn lights down 10%. I have found that if my water is too clean it affects different corals at different times.

Example I have a forest fire digi on the right side growing crazy. I had another one in the middle same height etc and it’s struggling to stay alive on its own rock. At times I have issues with sps then chalices, then lps aka blue tip hammer. When I dropped alk and calcium raised nitrates 2-5 it came back. When I did that I lost a wild no name sps but it took a month for it to die. Kept fragging it and didn’t matter it was determined to die. Same with my Miami hurricane that I have had few years. One day great next day half way bleached along with a strawberry napalm. Yet 90% of the other corals are doing great. Make sure you keep alk and cal kinda even aka 1 table spoon of each.

Corals sometimes drive me nuts how some on on side do amazing and the other side is like the death zone.
Yet I have other sps in that section that’s doing amazing. So I feel your pain but I have had better luck dropping the alk and cal down when water is super clean. Turning lights down 10% or back to acclimate probably wouldn’t hurt. Hope it goes well.m

Oh and I forgot to mention if your using nopox by Redsea I’d read page 6 very closely. DO Not just stop dosing that or you will have some major problems.
I agree with most that nitrates from 2-5 and phosphate under .25 is not a bad goal and that’s where I’m at. But again my issue is the exact same coral does great in one place and terrible in another, and it use to be great as well. My corals have phases of growth spurts then nothing, then sometimes issues with sps then lps then softies I mean take your pick. Every tank is different and I’m learning what my corals like. Your may absolutely hate what min get, but proceed slowly and do not just cold turkey stop nopox. You will starve and kill your corals.

 

[Ike]

Are the mesenterial filaments those single or handfuls of 'feeders' that come out?

Yep. I think it's a stress response or something corals that are deprived of an essential nutrient

 

[Punchanello]

Yep. I think it's a stress response or something corals that are deprived of an essential nutrient

I've seen the pictures that look like disembowelment. Mine are the odd strand here or there which I I always thought was a healthy feeding response.

I feel like the OP. Been in the hobby for 18 months and struggle with something new nearly every month.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I've seen the pictures that look like disembowelment. Mine are the odd strand here or there which I I always thought was a healthy feeding response.

I feel like the OP. Been in the hobby for 18 months and struggle with something new nearly every month.

Ive been in the hobby for 20 years and 12 years ago I grew acros like crazy in a 29 gallon biocube. This was before the Hanna ultra low p, nopox, gfo etc craze. I never had any problems. 10 watts of light per gallon of water, feed the fish and water changes. That’s it. I didn’t do water tests or even dip acros back then. I neglected the tank for 6 years and decided to upgrade and caught the sps itch again. For the first year back I couldn’t keep any sps alive longer than a month, but all the r2r sps know it alls kept recommending nopox and gfo because my no3/po4 was too high. The lower the nutrients dropped, the faster the acros would die. When I noticed my 15 year old montis started stressing that had thrived for 6 years while the tank was neglected I knew that all the know it alls actually didn’t know anything.

 

[SeaDweller]

Y’all need to stop hatin on GFO ok...? Most of the time it’s noobs that run chaeto, gfo, biopellets, Carbon dosing on a brand new tank and not understanding why those are implemented.

I run gfo and my stuff is thriving. But then again I feed a ton of food to the fish. I run half dose gfo to keep PO4 in check, not to strip the water column completely. I run carbon to clarify my water. And a sulfur reactor to keep my NO3 in check too. Key word is check. I have some turf algae (barely) but I don’t care.

OP, I feel you don’t feed nearly enough as you should to maintain fish health, which maintains your microfauna health, coral health, etc. are your tangs skinny with sunken in bellies (like in Jason Fox’s video from reef builders)? They should be fat and happy; to give you an idea, I feed 2-3 heaping pinches of flakes in the AM, spectrum pellets twice during the day and the equivalent of 4-5 cubes of mysis and plankton at night.

Try feeding more and caring less about certain numbers and I bet things will turn around.

Stop hating on gfo, haters!!! ‍

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Y’all need to stop hatin on GFO ok...? Most of the time it’s noobs that run chaeto, gfo, biopellets, Carbon dosing on a brand new tank and not understanding why those are implemented.

I run gfo and my stuff is thriving. But then again I feed a ton of food to the fish. I run half dose gfo to keep PO4 in check, not to strip the water column completely. I run carbon to clarify my water. And a sulfur reactor to keep my NO3 in check too. Key word is check. I have some turf algae (barely) but I don’t care.

OP, I feel you don’t feed nearly enough as you should to maintain fish health, which maintains your microfauna health, coral health, etc. are your tangs skinny with sunken in bellies (like in Jason Fox’s video from reef builders)? They should be fat and happy; to give you an idea, I feed 2-3 heaping pinches of flakes in the AM, spectrum pellets twice during the day and the equivalent of 4-5 cubes of mysis and plankton at night.

Try feeding more and caring less about certain numbers and I bet things will turn around.

Stop hating on gfo, haters!!! ‍

Can’t stop
Won’t stop
Newbies using gfo and carbon dosing chasing ultra low nutrients kills more sps than global warming. Maybe I went too far there, but it’s the philosophy that sps need 0.25 no3 and 0.02 po4 for sps to thrive is complete and utter rhymes with zit. The average reads all the “ you should have x no3 and y po4” before you start sps drives them to either start testing and feeding less or buy gfo reactors, nopox, bio pellets etc and then feed less, and it’s not needed. 50 no3 and 0.50 po4 is not going to kill sps, but starving them to get to 0.25 and 0.02 will. Thank you and good night

I got nothing but love for you @SeaDweller
(You’ll always be @titanci to me)

 

[SeaDweller]

Can’t stop
Won’t stop
Newbies using gfo and carbon dosing chasing ultra low nutrients kills more sps than global warming. Maybe I went too far there, but it’s the philosophy that sps need 0.25 no3 and 0.02 po4 for sps to thrive is complete and utter rhymes with zit. The average reads all the “ you should have x no3 and y po4” before you start sps drives them to either start testing and feeding less or buy gfo reactors, nopox, bio pellets etc and then feed less, and it’s not needed. 50 no3 and 0.50 po4 is not going to kill sps, but starving them to get to 0.25 and 0.02 will. Thank you and good night

I got nothing but love for you @SeaDweller
(You’ll always be @titanci to me)

I knew I could count on you replying, brotha!!! Hahahaha ;Dead

I agree, trust me, once people realize super clean water isn’t always a great thing, many woes seem to drift away... look at @bubbaque .. new tank, new rock, fully stocked. But he’s also non noob, pro status!

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I knew I could count on you replying, brotha!!! Hahahaha ;Dead

I agree, trust me, once people realize super clean water isn’t always a great thing, many woes seem to drift away... look at @bubbaque .. new tank, new rock, fully stocked. But he’s also non noob, pro status!

Nite nite everybody

 

[Sailfinguy21]

What acros are you buying. Im not an acropors pro but i csn grow them. But im not perfect at it.. some of them i cant keep some ive burned the tips on.. but others never had issues.

I found the red.green planet the corn bread acro. Green slimer. And s few others dont care what you do to the water.. but others i just cant keep..

 

[mtnrunner]

You’re not going to get any answers here that will solve your problem unfortunately. And I don’t say this with malicious intent. There are just so many variables. I noticed that by adding a T5 fixture to my tank, all of my woes were fixed. Not sure what lights you use or anything but just my 2 cents.

What type of bulb do you run in your T5?

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Is this really 4 pages of people guessing at what’s wrong with someone’s coral, and not a single picture of the actual coral in question? Hard to say what’s wrong with something if we can’t see it