Random SPS bleaching

BlueWorldJeff · Mar 17, 2018

Wondering what is causing this bleaching or tissue necrosis to my pink prostrata. I've had high alk and higher phosphate lately, but it's been stable for a week now. Alk went from 8.5 to 9.5, but is back to 8.5 for a week. PO4 was as high as. 20, but GFO got it down to. 05. It's been around .10 to .15 the past week since GFO was off.

I'm seeing some tissue necrosis on my setosa tips and stylophora underneath branches, as well.

Could it be unstable / high nutrient water or pests?

Supurderek · Mar 17, 2018

I would think the sudden fluctuations throwing the sps for a spin. Pests usually eat sections away and leave it patchy.

jda · Mar 18, 2018

It could be all of that. Swings are not good, especially if the coral are not thriving. One week is a blink-of-the-eye in SPS stability. They need months of stability to overcome a swing or parameter issues. Keep up the solid parameters and they should get better. Always go SLOW with the GFO.

Do you have LEDs only? Dying from the bottom is not normal and typically happens to focused, point source directional lights. If so, put some T5s on there... it will help. Anecdotally, it seems that tanks with better quality light have healthier corals that can brush aside swings and higher nutrients.

Check hard for pests. They can do a lot of damage from the inside/out or from the bottom.

Ashish Patel · Mar 18, 2018

Did you change your salt, lighting, or anything else in particular? Sometimes certain corals react badly to change that happened 2 weeks prior so look into what you changed 2 weeks ago. I would replace carbon, do a waterchange, and check for pest. If the tank is back to being stable just let it runs its course without tinkering too much. good luck

BlueWorldJeff · Mar 18, 2018

I've had a large millipora colony and valida colony bleach out the same way from teh inside out in my old 120. Not sure if its the Alk swing, the high PO4 or maybe from me vacuuming the sand bed and causing a mini cycle? I have had cyano all over my sand bed and have been trying to get it out every water change. Unfortuantely the setosa was pretty bleached over, so I clipped off what I could and will mount it, hoping no more bleaching.

The GFO I was using was only 1/2 a cup in a 200g system. It slowly decreased, which is what I wanted. I am scared of stripping the nutrients too fast, but once it got down to .05, I turned off the GFO and it rose slowly over a week or two. I try to keep PO4 out of the tank by feeding frozen food through a net, but my wife feeds the fish during the week and pours the RODI water the food thaws in as well. I probably overfeed my livestock, but if GFO helps I will use it. I just dont want 0.0 PO4

I do use LED lights, so that is why the underneath branches of the stylo are losing polyps and color. The tops look good and healthy. Eventualy, I'd like to go with a LED, T5 retro kit, but thousands of dollars on fish equipment isnt in the budget as of now.

Not sure what pests I would have. I put a flashlight on the prostrata when the lights went out and saw some pods swimming around. I did see some worm looking thing disappearing in the coralites so not sure what that is or could do. i do have a leopard wrasse and a checkerboard wrasse, so maybe I should get the turkey baster out before they go to bed and see if they will grab anything I can blow off of the corals

My goal for parameters are 8-8.5 dKH, 420 Ca, 1280-1350 Mg ( I dont dose this unless it needs to be), .05-.08 PO4 and 5-10 NO3. I use Hanna for both Alk and PO4, so I bought the calibration kit to make sure I'm reading what I'm reading. My PO4 reagents just expired, so new ones are coming soon for total accuracy.

Some corals that are doing well: Oregon Tort, Blue Stag, Ponape Birdsnest, Favia, Turaki (I think)

I am open to any and all comments about this. Thank you all for your help.

jda · Mar 19, 2018

It is one of my theories that SPS lit by LED only need otherwise perfect conditions to thrive... they are not healthy enough to resist any swings or mini-cycles. I only developed this on some personal experience and browsing the message boards... so hardly scientific. I light with MH, which is still the gold standard and my CaRx media went out a few weeks ago and the alk got down to 4.X before I caught it. 20 minutes later and I was back up to 7 ish and nothing missed a beat either from being low or me putting tablespoons of baking soda into the tank in a few minutes. I feel that this is probably death in a LED lit tank. Others will disagree. I also have no dead undersides on any of my colonies. I would prioritize some T5s retros to help your LEDs.

High P is not good. There are some outlier tanks that have high PO4, but the majority will suffer when it gets too high... no immediate deaths, but less hardy and resistent to change/swings. .2 is not the end of the world with PO4, so a little bit of GFO might be OK, but go slow and keep it above .01 for sure.

Your goals are fine.

I vacuum sand as well, but I do like 20-25% of the tank every year... really slowly.

Sounds like you might have just had a perfect storm of one-too-many-things happening at once. Has the death arrested?

BlueWorldJeff · Mar 23, 2018

jda said:
It is one of my theories that SPS lit by LED only need otherwise perfect conditions to thrive... they are not healthy enough to resist any swings or mini-cycles. I only developed this on some personal experience and browsing the message boards... so hardly scientific. I light with MH, which is still the gold standard and my CaRx media went out a few weeks ago and the alk got down to 4.X before I caught it. 20 minutes later and I was back up to 7 ish and nothing missed a beat either from being low or me putting tablespoons of baking soda into the tank in a few minutes. I feel that this is probably death in a LED lit tank. Others will disagree. I also have no dead undersides on any of my colonies. I would prioritize some T5s retros to help your LEDs.

High P is not good. There are some outlier tanks that have high PO4, but the majority will suffer when it gets too high... no immediate deaths, but less hardy and resistent to change/swings. .2 is not the end of the world with PO4, so a little bit of GFO might be OK, but go slow and keep it above .01 for sure.

Your goals are fine.

I vacuum sand as well, but I do like 20-25% of the tank every year... really slowly.

Sounds like you might have just had a perfect storm of one-too-many-things happening at once. Has the death arrested?

Still trying to get my PO4 down. All had been within .5 dkh for a couple weeks now. GFO isn't decreasing PO4 so im going to replace it this weekend. A couple more prostrata corallites have STN'd but very slow. My stylo has tissue necrosis from the under side so not sure if lighting in addition to high nutrients. Once PO4 is under control, I'm hoping tissue necrosis subsides. Other acros look great.