Montipora Digitata Turning White At Base!

Rosie · Mar 8, 2019

So today I was having a good look around the tank and I noticed one of my Montis had turned white. The polyps have completely disappeared around the base and on a couple of the branches.

I have quite a few variations of Montipora and none of the others have this issue. I’ve had this Montipora Digitata coming up to two months now. It’s in the highest part of my tank and is in a high flow area.

I’ve looked around online and discovered there’s pests such as nudibranch which can cause this…… I’m really hoping that’s not the problem! So I’ve ran as many tests as I can and I’m also checking the tank quite often whilst all the lights are out to see if I can spot any nudibranch pests.

Most Recent Parameters:
All test kits are Salifert apart from the TMC Refractometer

Temp: 25 Degrees C / 77 Degrees F
Salinity: 1.026
PH: 8.3
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 1 (a little lower than I’d like)
Phosphate: 0.03
Alkalinity: 8.3 DKH
Calcium: 430 ppm
Magnesium: 1470 ppm (I’m currently trying to lower this to 1350, I’m still making adjustments to my auto dosers)

Strontium: 16ppm (I’m also auto dosing this and have just decreased the dosage so it hovers around 10ppm)
Iodine: 0.06ppm (I use 1 drop of Lugols Iodine a day)

Any help would be greatly appreciated, I have so many montis in my tank and I’d be gutted if this is going to happen to them all.

Flippers4pups · Mar 8, 2019

Looks like RTN. Do you dip your corals?

Rosie · Mar 8, 2019

Flippers4pups said:
Looks like RTN. Do you dip your corals?

Yeah I use Seachem Reef Dip and then I also dip them in RO.

Hmmm I didn’t think about RTN and STN. There are a few chunks of healthy coral left on it so I could frag it and just hope for the best.

Flippers4pups · Mar 8, 2019

Rosie said:
Yeah I use Seachem Reef Dip and then I also dip them in RO.

Hmmm I didn’t think about RTN and STN. There are a few chunks of healthy coral left on it so I could frag it and just hope for the best.

I would frag it above the tissue loss. Discard the damaged and dead skeleton.

Rosie · Mar 8, 2019

Flippers4pups said:
I would frag it above the tissue loss. Discard the damaged and dead skeleton.

I will do, thanks for the help Flippers!

kevin_e · Mar 8, 2019

Dont think that's a montipora.

SeaDweller · Mar 8, 2019

kevin_e said:
Dont think that's a montipora.

Yep. Looks like BN to me.

ZachR32 · Mar 8, 2019

thats a birdsnest, but it looks like the dead part is shaded. I wouldnt necessarily worry about it just yet unless it spreads upwards more. ive seen bigger colonies survive with bleached "legs" before

Rosie · Mar 9, 2019

TitanCi said:
Yep. Looks like BN to me.

ZachR32 said:
thats a birdsnest, but it looks like the dead part is shaded. I wouldnt necessarily worry about it just yet unless it spreads upwards more. ive seen bigger colonies survive with bleached "legs" before

It’s funny you should say that, it was sold to me as a Montipora but just before I created this post I had a quick google (just to double check) and I couldn’t really find a similar looking one. Thanks for the clarification!

Ok, well I might just take a smaller frag off it then (just in case) and I’ll just keep an eye on the affected coral for now.

Thank you all for your help!

Rando · Mar 9, 2019

a Montipora is not. it is a Seriatopora caliendrum

LobsterOfJustice · Mar 9, 2019

What kind of lighting do you have? I agree it looks shaded.

McFly · Mar 9, 2019

I have one of those, the base always seems to die as the coral grows and blocks the flow and light. I let it get huge then frag/restart the colony every 2 years.

Rando · Mar 9, 2019

salifert is not always believable .. especially the alkalinity
a little more no3 would be better ..

MrObscura · Mar 9, 2019

I was about to say, that looks like a birdsnest.

Anyway, they're pretty hardy but can be the first to react to an Alk swing. As your Alk been stable?

SUS · Mar 9, 2019

AEFW? You see any eggs at the base on the dead part?

Rosie · Mar 9, 2019

LobsterOfJustice said:
What kind of lighting do you have? I agree it looks shaded.

I have LEDs (TMC V2 ilumenair 600), both blue and white settings are around 70 to 80%.

McFly said:
I have one of those, the base always seems to die as the coral grows and blocks the flow and light. I let it get huge then frag/restart the colony every 2 years.

That’s interesting, I never knew a coral could shade itself! If that’s the case this also links to previous comments about it looking shaded as well. It’s in the highest part of my tank as well so its getting blasted by light.

Rosie · Mar 9, 2019

Rando said:
salifert is not always believable .. especially the alkalinity
a little more no3 would be better ..

I agree on the No3, i’m Decreasing my lighting hours on the chaeto in my sump and upping feeding a little so hopefully this will slowly increase it. I am on the other hand also battling GHA so i’m trying not to go too wild with No3.

I always though Salifert were one of the better ones, could you recommend a better Alk test?

MrObscura said:
I was about to say, that looks like a birdsnest.

Anyway, they're pretty hardy but can be the first to react to an Alk swing. As your Alk been stable?

Tbh it's probably been as stable in the last couple of months than it has ever been. I’m also automatically dosing Alk over 24hrs as well. I must admit I am still making small adjustments to how much I dose but the changes that take place are usually around 0.1 or 0.2dKh at a time.