Losing coral, need help

[Tailfisher]

Hello All, I picked up a barely used 16g biocube with upgraded led lights and wanted to give nano breeding a try. Tank has been set up for 7 months and everything was thriving and growing good. Had a problem after I purchased a few monti frags from a show and had a out real of nudibranchs that pretty much wiped out all montipora. That was a real let down but still have the acro's and other soft corals. Now within the last couple of weeks things are headed south and have done water changes and still can't seem to put the brakes on it. Tested water parameter and look ok. So I am hear asking for help to try and salvage what is left. Parameters are
Salinity 1.025
Temp 80
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 2ppm
Phosphate 0
Alk 9.9
Cal 440
PH 8.0
Pic's are before and after

 

[Saltyreef]

What kind of water are you using for top off? Params look ok.....
Have you checked for stray voltage?
How did you find out you had nudis and how did you eradicate them? Did you dip your corals prior to placing in display?
Have you looked into the light possibly under or over powered?
Those sticks look like they suffered RTN to me...even that digi monti is gone. Wow! Im feelin for you!

 

[BestMomEver]

Omg... that makes me sad for you. So... first check all of the electric cords that are in or near water. Make sure the plastic coating on the cords is intact. I had an urchin chew through a cord that was unplugged.... leached copper into the tank. It looked just like yours does but it was 300 gallons of dead corals and fish. Check all your metal fittings to make sure you don’t have rust. For sure check for stray voltage. The only other thing would be to dip everything that’s still alive. Send off an ICP test.

 

[Tailfisher]

It makes me sick also, that's one of the reasons I got out of the hobby years back after a hurricane wiped everything out. Yes I dip everything before I put in tank. It just doesn't get rid of the eggs. I noticed the nudis one night and sucked them up in a turkey baster to get positive I'D.

 

[Dom]

Do you feed your corals? With nitrates at 2ppm, there isn't much nutrition available to them.

 

[Tailfisher]

Reef roids twice a week , plus I have 2 clownfish that I feed.

 

[Dom]

Reef roids twice a week , plus I have 2 clownfish that I feed.

I was guessing inadequate nutrition. Do you have a refugium?

 

[ReeferNtraining]

Does no one else see there glaring issue with the numbers? SPS can’t tolerate 0 phosphate. When nutrients are that low, the coral starves, gets stressed and then is burned by the lighting. I’m only saying this from first hand knowledge of losing many corals in a ULNS. PO4 needs to get up around .05 & NO3 above 5. Just MHO. Sorry for your loss : ( I do know what it’s like unfortunately.

 

[ReeferNtraining]

When my numbers get that low now, I dose NeoPhos. Balanced phos & Nitrate

 

[Dom]

Does no one else see there glaring issue with the numbers? SPS can’t tolerate 0 phosphate. When nutrients are that low, the coral starves, gets stressed and then is burned by the lighting. I’m only saying this from first hand knowledge of losing many corals in a ULNS. PO4 needs to get up around .05 & NO3 above 5. Just MHO. Sorry for your loss : ( I do know what it’s like unfortunately.

With all due respect, I wouldn't call the issue "glaring". But yes, as has already been pointed out, lack of nutrition may be the issue.

 

[Tailfisher]

So does the neophos keep the two balanced or will you have to continue chasing numbers. I was only doing weekly water changes and feeding fish every other day and feeding reef roids to corals on opposite days.

 

[ReeferNtraining]

So does the neophos keep the two balanced or will you have to continue chasing numbers. I was only doing weekly water changes and feeding fish every other day and feeding reef roids to corals on opposite days.

I don’t know the specific ratio of phos to nitrate in it but it keeps me stable at around .04-.08 PO4 and NO3 around 10-20.

There was only one other option of straight phos when I was researching but I can’t remember the product. I also was low on NO3 because I use a Sulfur Denitrator. That’s why I went with NeoPhos. I will say, the bottles seem to not be consistent with strength. The difference I need to use between the last bottle and my new bottle is quite drastic. Just go slow and follow the directions.

What kit are you using to test PO4 and NO3?

 

[SynGraves]

How are you measuring the temp? Seen this happen with a friends tank when his heater malfunctioned and stayed on for a week while he was on vacation.

 

[Tailfisher]

Glass thermometer and also have temp probe connected to controller.

 

[ghostman]

Sorry for your losses. Your Alk seems a bit high for a low nutrient system. I’ve always done better with lower alk, around 7.5 to 7.8. LED lighting still frustrates me, and I needed a PAR meter to get my lighting in check. Maybe see if you can rent or borrow one. Your SPS appears to have died quickly (RTN) which makes me feel like it’s an Alk and lighting issue. Go slow, and good luck.

 

[w2inc]

The wipeout looks awful. I am sorry you had to deal with that.

Soft corals can put out toxins that hard corals don't deal with well. Not sure if that is relevant to your situation. I have run those Cal, Alk, PO4... numbers and done fine. Slow coral growth but all living. I agree that SPS do better with po4.

ICP test will let you know what might have happened to help you prevent things in the future. I have only used ATI and coral view. ATI is my preferred. Some times they take way too long and I am looking at other options.

Bacterial infections happen. Hight temp like 80f let them happen faster. 76 is kind of a threshold for a few of the ones that kill off coral and get to humans. (tons of exceptions) The Acro die off in the Florida Keys is blamed on a bacterial infection but they have yet to isolate which one.

When I had any signs of STN or RTN in the past I always fragged out the piece. Keep the good part, toss the bad and keep the pumps off when pulling the infected colony. Solid glue line around the healthy frags to be sure that the infection is trapped.

For the past 2 months I had some STN, I had some large SPS and didn't want to frag up my favorite colonies. I searched for options. Iodine dips saved a superman Monti colony.

ICP tested, found some leads. K was low and I corrected it. My belief in the end (now) is that my corals got stressed from some change in the system, one got infected, instead of cutting off the infected parts and keeping the good I tried to wait it out, change water and trouble shoot. Meanwhile infected tissue is flying around my tank landing on all the other corals. Some handled it and others did not. Right now I am checking the tank twice a day and removing anything that looks infected for a Iodine dip or just removal. I have a second tank that I use to take one good frag too. I leave the other good frag in the original tank. It has been a week and I have watched frags in the infected tank lose tissue and die off where the new tank is holding the frags well.

Could be a hundred reasons why this is happening, and I dont have the option to test for bacterium, but in the old days, RTN meant bacteria and I would frag and discard as fast as possible. Things worked out. Peroxide or Iodine dip and holding in a Q-tank for infected parent colonies seemed to pay out.

Funny to me that my beginner, "bulletproof" corals (All Pocilloporas) took the hit and my Acro's didn't have issues.

Unexplained things happen. Sorry for the loss. You had some of my favorites in your system. Keep trying. It all gets better as you move forward.