Melting corals? Bare with me trying to learn

[Mykawl]

Frogspawn/hammer head & GSP

GSP been in cycled tank for a week, never opened tried brushing what seemed to be algae off other day but toothbrush seemed too rough, will do what I can with turkey baster..

The frogspawn and hammerhead looked awesome @ LFS only closed up slightly on the ride home.

After what was probably a little rough handling they were pretty closed up
I didn’t dip or drip acclimate and they gradually retracted but never fully closed up. I also took them out of water to get them into tank but recently read they shouldn’t be taken out of water is this true? They were super deflated but the frogspawn seemed like it would expand and retract throughout the night.

This was 2 days ago, they stayed somewhat stable for a day but got home tonight and now they look like this.

It should be noted their first day in my tank I had just started using an acrylic lid to keep my goby in and out my light in a timer but this heated my tank to 85 so I decided to run the lights on an opposite cycle since I’m only home at night anyways and to combat heat. Also ofc getting a mesh screen lid...

And in their 2nd day in my tank which is today I left the lights off all day.

I understand there’s a lot here and each mistake may be enough to kill a coral but does the way they died look like something specific?

Last piece of evidence to consider is I bought a zoanthid about a week into the cycle obviously it died I didn’t know what I was doing tried saving him with prime but tank was overheating daily and I didn’t know about it, if he developed a disease could it stay in the tank despite having no corals for 2 weeks?

Only other thing I can think to add is maybe the LFS has something in their tank but this is least likely imo because most of their corals look fine, some closed etc. though

 

[Mykawl]

This is the zoa, some other things to mention i way over did phosguard so that may be 0 but don’t think that would cause reactions like these.

 

[Mykawl]

Didn’t take my own pic of when they first were put in tank but this is about what they looked like to start with, but were fully open really pretty @ LFS, using r/o only water 6 tds.

Most of this is not ideal yet I’ve read of many people who have got through all these scenarios and feel there is something really off with the tank

 

[Mykawl]

Well I was gonna try to blow the gsp off but with what seemed like a tiny amount of pressure the polyps would just bend and look like it would disintegrate if I did, definitely long before that brown algae came off... or maybe I have brown jelly I’ve read about?

 

[Qasimja]

how long has your tank been setup and what type of lighting?

 

[Mykawl]

about a month old, using a chinese black box atm hipargero aqua knight

tank parameters are pretty normal definately cycled, nitrate high around 10 ppm ph 8.0 temp 78 except for the overheating yesterday

 

[cancun]

about a month old, using a chinese black box atm hipargero aqua knight

tank parameters are pretty normal definately cycled, nitrate high around 10 ppm ph 8.0 temp 78 except for the overheating yesterday

Hi there! I am sorry about the loss of your new corals first off. You came to the right place to help! Are your Nitrites and ammonia both 0? What is your salinity) IMO your pH is a tad low...you should aim for 8.2-8.3. One big thing is the fluctuating temps in your tank. Aim to keep your tank steady at 78-79. One big key to healthy coral is stability (healthy fish too). Stable temps, stable salinity, stable pH (will fluctuate a tad depending on your photo period), and stable Alkalinity. I don't drip acclimate my corals, I might dip them on occasion though.

 

[Mykawl]

yes ammonia and nitrite 0 salinity is 1.025 and reading 0 in distilled water so im pretty sure its calibrated correctly its also new. pH now hovers around 8.2 because i leave the lid off the tank and the lid off my protein skimmer and that seemed to make it stabilize around 8.2

 

[cancun]

yes ammonia and nitrite 0 salinity is 1.025 and reading 0 in distilled water so im pretty sure its calibrated correctly its also new. pH now hovers around 8.2 because i leave the lid off the tank and the lid off my protein skimmer and that seemed to make it stabilize around 8.2

That's great news about your pH....lid off and good water movement at the top where there are ripples on the top of your water will help to keep your pH stable. The ideas I have is possibly the tank getting to warm for the coral, pH out of whack, or the tank is too new. Hammers and frogspawn are not beginners corals, but are by no means difficult. I am surprised they died on you within a few days. Hopefully others might have a better idea. I commend you for asking questions and trying to learn! We have all been there at some point.

 

[ScottR]

I’m sorry but it looks like your frogspawn is a goner. They usually won’t come back. A cheap dipping method is to go to a pharmacy and get povidone-iodine 10% and give your corals a dip for a few minutes. You just use tank water and drop enough iodine so that the water becomes very brown but you can still see through it. Rinse and then put back in tank. It helps to kill off anything that might be hurting your coral. I’ve brought back a torch (similar to frogspawn) from near death by doing that. Good luck!

 

[Mykawl]

i have seachem reef dip i feel they're so fragile atm i dont wanna put them through anything else, i should also say they were like an inch apart and currently the frogspawn has a 4" strand waving around which im guessing is a sweeper tentacle and not the zoxanthelle expulsion ive read about, maybe they went to war but i read it was ok to put different kinds of euphyllia together

either way i moved them apart and put the hammerhead in a lower part of tank

 

[Mykawl]

and i dont remmber if i did my first big water change before i put them in when i got home from the LFS or after i put them in... but my mixed water was pH 8.0 and i couldnt get it any higher with powerhead aimed at surface, and for some reason dont have any baking soda in the house is it normal to have to adjust pH in mixed water? ontop of that i mixed it a bit too salty and tanked went from around 1.024 to 1.027 instantly. and because pH was too low it dropped the tank from 8.2 to 8.0

sry trying to include everything i can think of i know my conditions are rough to say the least just getting a hang of things but i still feel they shouldnt have melted away like that within 2 days

 

[Hemmdog]

i have seachem reef dip i feel they're so fragile atm i dont wanna put them through anything else, i should also say they were like an inch apart and currently the frogspawn has a 4" strand waving around which im guessing is a sweeper tentacle and not the zoxanthelle expulsion ive read about, maybe they went to war but i read it was ok to put different kinds of euphyllia together

either way i moved them apart and put the hammerhead in a lower part of tank

It is zoo expulsion. Raising your salinity like that also shot up your alk, cal, mag. The alk in that mixed water at high salinity was most likely 13-15 dKH, basically a death sentence for your coral.

 

[Mykawl]

It is zoo expulsion. Raising your salinity like that also shot up your alk, cal, mag. The alk in that mixed water at high salinity was most likely 13-15 dKH, basically a death sentence for your coral.

alright thanks man, should have been more careful but i definately know how serious each variable is now specifically the beginner ones and the importance of keeping them consistent.

 

[Hemmdog]

alright thanks man, should have been more careful but i definately know how serious each variable is now specifically the beginner ones and the importance of keeping them consistent.

It happens, don’t beat yourself up to bad. Just check salinity of new water before water change always. Even if you made the water in the morning and do the water change at night, check it again, it could be higher from evaporation.

 

[ScottR]

I’ve killed my fair share of corals. Just learn from it. Probably what looks like a sweeper tentacle is the bailout of the tentacles. They’ll get stringy like that on euphyllia. If the coral has no more visible tentacles and gets really white, I’d toss it. They can lead to problems for other things in your water.

Also, a dip would be your last bet at this point, although I’m sure it was the salinity problems that led to it, not a pest.

 

[Mykawl]

Welp I think I found my problem with the help of @ScottR so thankyou.

Turns out LFS keeps salinity @ 1.015, pair that with poor acclimation techniques on my part I shouldn’t be suprised corals melted how they did correct? Any articles on how to deal with these situations? They’re the only decent LFS around and the only one within an hour with corals.

Looks like ideally salinity should be brought to 1.025 over a period of days...

 

[Mykawl]

Yeeesh it’s gonna take all night to raise the salinity to match mine with the drip method, currently acclimating an astrea snail blue leg hermit and blue damsal in a bucket but have no way of heating my drip bucket but think it should be fine @ room temp, could steal the heater from the tank if needed

 

[Katrina71]

Don't remove any of the "dead" coral. You may be very surprised what will come back in 6 weeks. Seriously, give it a shot.

 

[Mykawl]

I am going to leave them in there and try to get my tank under control I feel I’ve gotten a crash course in all the basic stuff so far, can’t wait to screw up calcium alkalinity and magnesium! Don’t worry I won’t be messing with that stuff anytime soon Just gonna get better and more consistent with water changes, if they came back to life that’d be amazing.

I think my best bet is the gsp but currently researching hydrogen peroxide dips to get this brown algae off him although hoping the hermit crab and astrea snail I just bought donsomething about it if they even survive the acclimation lol

Lastly gonna pray the hermit doesn’t eat the remaining corals hesbsuper tiny and there should be plenty of fish poop/ excess food in there