Monti dying?

[Reefltx]

I noticed my monti are not doing so well, faded colors, barely any PE. Though, my acros seem to be doing great. The montis were moved from my old tank with leds. The new system is running ATI 6 bulbs t5. They have been in the new tank for a month or longer and were doing well for the first few weeks. Only thing I could think of is the new addition of a GFO reactor which was adding about 2 weeks ago and a chiller to keep the temp constant at 79-80.5F. Before the chiller, temp was hitting 82-84F. Only thing I am dosing is alk & cal. to maintain at those levels below. This seem to be only affecting my monti's, have a green cap that started slighting bleach from the middle, but seems to be coming back. A pink cap that is now a light rusty color and 3 of my digitata are looking like the picture. Got a acorpora frag from the lfs for cheap because it was brown, within 5 days it turned metallic green with blue tips in my tank on the sand bed. So, basically, acros are thriving and montis dying? Could it be the diatom outbreak causing the problem? I know the tank is young, but perimeters seems fine and coraline has already started growing. The tank is a 40g, flow is 2x mp10 and 660gph return. Skimmer is a bubble magus nac6.

Temp. 80.5
PH. 8.32 w/ pinpoint probe
SG. 1.025
Alk. 9 dkm
Cal. 460 ppm
Mag. 1400 ppm
Ammonia 0
Nirite 0
Nirate 0
Phosphate 0.02 ppm with Hanna.

 

[Reef keeper]

wat flow do you have cause i think if algae can grow on the dead spots their may be not enough flow?wait for other to answer

 

[Reefltx]

Judging by the millepora to the right of it, I think it gets a decent amount.

 

[WVUreefer]

Could be montis adjusting to new lighting?

 

[WVUreefer]

I've had sps bleach in the first weeks just to turn around and bounce back stronger and brighter

 

[skinz78]

They look like they are getting too much light, I would move them down.

 

[AcroholicReefer]

GFO is your problem my friend but the tank doesn't look mature yet.

 

[Reefltx]

They look like they are getting too much light, I would move them down.

Can't move it down to far, 2inch more and its at the sand bed. I moved my lights up to 8" from the water surface a few days ago, before that I had it about 3". Maybe I underestimated the power of the t5s.

 

[Neptune Aquatics]

Have your check your iodine level? From what I've read somewhere, long term deficiency of iodine can lead to the host coral expelling their zooxanthellae. Monti seems to the most susceptable to this....I think.

 

[Reefltx]

Actually have never thought about testing for Iodine since I don't dose it. Guess I'll pick up a test kit next time I'm at the lfs. Thanks for the tip!

 

[Aquaph8]

Keep an eye out for Monti eating nudis. They're really hard to spot at first. Watch around the bases at night. Also watch the bottoms of your caps, they'll start turning white from the bottom. I hope Im wrong but that would explain why your acro's are doing fine. Goodluck.

 

[xcorallusx]

If its a new tank I wouldn't worry about iodine deficiency, do a water change. I would recommend moving it to a lower lighted spot with moderate flow and see if it responds. Have you tried dipping it to see if you have any pests?

 

[Reefltx]

The monti's were moved from my old tank with LEDs. I dip everything in revive before moving them in the new tank. As for nudis, I did have them in the beginning, but got rid of them a long time ago. I do 5g water change once a week with red sea coral pro, Which I just started using 3 months ago, switched from instant ocean. I will move them to the edge and see if they respond better.