Need some help trouble shooting

[Duc1098]

I have an issue to two of my corals, one being a Forest Fire Montipora Digitata and the other being my Leng Sy Montipora Cap. My Leng Sy was one of my best looking corals up until about 3 months ago and my Forest Fire never really looked right.

So a little background. The Leng Sy Cap I have had for over a year and was doing great both color and growth, then three months ago the green just browned out on two seperate pieces on each side of the tank both are in the top thrid of the tank. The Forest Fire Digi just browned out shortly after putting it in my tank and never really recovered. It has had moderate growth in that time and the polyps are a little red but mostly retracted with the base of the coral browned out. This is my first digi so I played with it a little as far as position to change the amount of light and flow it was getting. I initially put it in mid level in the tank with a lot of flow then moved it near the top of the tank for about 6 weeks and have now moved it back to the middle with good flow about a week ago.

A little more background on things I have been doing with the tank. About two months ago I started dosing Red Sea Reef Energy A/B do to pale corals of all my SPS. Turns out I had an ULNS and was not feeding my corals enough. I had a pretty good response from that over the past few months. I also about a month ago changed my lighting out going from a Marineland Proseries 72" fixture with 8x T5's and 3x150w MH and went with three Lumen Bright Large Pendants with 12k Reeflux 250w MH's. I acclimated the new lighting starting at 4hrs a day photoperiod and over the past month I am now up to 6hrs. So that is what I have done and I am looking for what I am missing. I have been looking for pest and have not identified any as of yet.

My tank Parameters:
180g DT / 60g Fuge with Chaeto
PO4 - .04ppm
Nitrates and Nitrites - Undetectable
ph - 8.2
alk - 8.4
Ca - 400
Mg - 1410ppm
temp - 75.5F night / 76.5 day
salinity - 1.025
Currently use GAC and GFO along with 4ml of vodka a day.
I dose ESV 2 part and Mg daily
Also have a ton of flow in the tank with 2x MP40's and 1x MP10 at about 75%

Forest Fire Montipora Digitata
<a href="https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/pho...z4g4Gf1CP3Xb8wBzlo2XE?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-_tkUA-4MAvU/UPIaG7yoQDI/AAAAAAAAAHY/PBXSqa9IreI/s800/DSC_5820.JPG" height="531" width="800" /></a>
Leng Sy Montipora Cap
<a href="https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/pho...z4g4Gf1CP3Xb8wBzlo2XE?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Di0Dtr3Mkls/UPIaODlcB-I/AAAAAAAAAHg/EJA-qCGQOZg/s800/DSC_5822.JPG" height="531" width="800" /></a>

 

[Duc1098]

Sorry, haven't figured out how to post pics yet here on R2R. Not the same as that other... extremely slow sight! Also, the purple rim on the Leng Sy is still purple, only the green went brown.

 

[mc-cro]

Have you checked for montipora eating nudi's?

 

[Duc1098]

I have looked and will keep looking but as of yet I had not identified any type of pest.

 

[outerspace]

I have looked and will keep looking but as of yet I had not identified any type of pest.

i think you should increase your photoperiod up to 8 hours. How long is the MH lamp used?

 

[rajkovich207]

I wouldn't do a thing brown is a good sign. The corals are building up their photosynthetic algae. Give it a few more months and they will come around. Also brown is a sign of nutrients in the tank (a good thing from what I gather from your post). Like I said brown is healthy and adapting, its white you want to watch out for

 

[rajkovich207]

This is an awesome article I found explaining this guys findings with sps colors. Hth
Guide of SPS coral coloration (make them more vivid, bright)

 

[Duc1098]

i think you should increase your photoperiod up to 8 hours. How long is the MH lamp used?

I will eventually, but I am still acclimating my tank to the new lights. I have a lot mor PAR out of these new lights and already at six hours I am having some corals showing signs of stress. I have since had to place all the coral that are getting stressed on the sand bed. My target is going to be 7hrs and possibly 8hrs but I have also noticed a vast improvement at a shorter photoperiod. Case in point, prior to switching to the new light, I use to run my old lighting at 9hrs MH and 10hrs T5. I had reduced that photo period to 6hrs MH and 8hrs T5 and so much better results. Also, talking with the owner of my LFS, a guy with 20yrs experience and one whom I highly respect told me that photosysthesis of corals shuts down after 6hrs and anything longer is strictly for enjoyment.

I wouldn't do a thing brown is a good sign. The corals are building up their photosynthetic algae. Give it a few more months and they will come around. Also brown is a sign of nutrients in the tank (a good thing from what I gather from your post). Like I said brown is healthy and adapting, its white you want to watch out for

This was my thought as well but two months seems like a long time with no signs of change. I will keep with the current regime for a few more months and see the results. I'm hoping this is the case and there is nothing that i will need to do differently.

This is an awesome article I found explaining this guys findings with sps colors. Hth
Guide of SPS coral coloration (make them more vivid, bright)

I have read this in the past and attempted to do this very thing and I really was not impressed. However, this was before I learned about ULNS and was trying to dose strontium, boron, iron and postassium with no noticeable effects over a two month period. I had stopped dosing all of these once I started to add Red Sea Reef Energy A/B since it's easier to troubleshoot when you're only affecting a few things at a time.

Thanks for all the advice everyone, I really appreciate it. Let me know if there is something I might be missing.