SPS noob needs some help!
- Thread starter PDR
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Hemmdog
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Dose into your sump before the return
Red spots are sponges I believe
Red spots are sponges I believe
I really appreciate the time you took to reply! Thank you!
I am in the process of adding new powerheads (today). After they are added, my turnover should be in the 50x-60x range. It's about 30-40x now.
For reference, the SPS are placed 9" under the water line directly under the center fixture. Ideally, I would have more light, but I tried to choose some SPS that others have had luck with in lower par. I have also done quite a bit more research on these lights (a lot of which I had already read when I was setting them up) and my approximations are right in line with what others have found with a par meter.
As of today, the red planet seems about the same, but the Joe the Coral is looking worse. There is more tissue recession on the tips and it is starting to grow some brown algae on the tips. Should I go ahead and frag the tips?
I don't doubt the flame angel may occasionally nip some of them, but no more than I have seem my tangs "nip" at them. That may explain the polyp extension issue, and otherwise, my red cap and digitata seem healthy. The stylo also seems more or less ok.
Here are some pictures I took after lights out, hopefully you can see the condition a little better.
I went ahead and changed my carbon out a few days early. I have not done any water changes or dosed anything in the last few days. I plan to start dosing 2 part again today as the levels should be right where I want them now.
Also worth pointing out, when I would dose my alk at night, the powerheads would blow the "white alk cloud" directly over all the sps before dissolving fully. Any way that could have caused issues?
Yes I do have a sump, but it is pretty low flow. Side problem, but I am having issues with my sicce return pumps (two different pumps in different tanks), even after thoroughly cleaning them, they are producing far less flow than they should be according to the sicce chart. So my sump only has about a 2x turnover.
Once my dosers come in, I will be dosing them to the sump, and as of today, I will have a spare powerhead I can use in the sump.
Once my dosers come in, I will be dosing them to the sump, and as of today, I will have a spare powerhead I can use in the sump.
Hi PDR, your most recent coral photos reveal quite the brown coloring. Is this just the photo or would you agree. I am not expert and I am definitely a noob but from my understanding when a coral begins to brown it is producing more algae, this can be from too high of intensity lighting or too high nutrients. I recently have the same problem with a tri color and spoke to my local fish store about it, he was adamant on these two causes of browning coral. Just food for thought as I know time is of the essence. Your tank looks great btw, I hope you figure this out.
Thanks @Daniel 123. The coral is nowhere near that brown under my Kessils, it was just the really white/yellow flashlight I was using.
Are you carbon dosing or using gfo? Burnt tips usually is caused by high alk and low nutrients or the water is being stripped. I keep my alk from 7.5-6.7 and my acros grow very fast. My Joe the Coral is under 400 par for 4.5 hours with 4 hour ramps up and down, so it can handle a lot of light. I’ve actually fragged it twice in the last month and the cuts healed in a matter of days.
Yes. Those tips are dead. The rest will follow if you keep your above alk 8I’m working in the tank right now and need to know if I should cut off the tips? You can see the algae growing on them...
If the tips of your coral all had algae grow on them that fast I would be suspect to assume the tank has high nutrients in the water column I always found the corals happiest upon a water change and a nutrient export. On another note lowering alkalinity will only reduce the buffer zone keeping his ph stable, meaning if he lowers the alk he lowers the ability of neutralizing an acid or change in base, please correct me if im wrong.
No carbon dosing or gfo, I have a hefty bio load and feed a lot so I don’t think the water is being stripped. I am in the process of lowering my alk.
It is my understanding that burnt tips happens when the coral skeleton grows faster than the tissue due to not enough nutrients to grow the tissue. The problem is this happened over a matter of days (only have had the coral for about 10-12 days), and none of my other sps are really showing growth, so I don’t think it’s from growth.
What else would cause it? I mainly hear of STN starting at the base.
@PDR I think your corals look okay for the most part. You definitely have experienced some burnt tips on some and have algae growing on those ends, but this isn't like you have RTN goung on with your sps. Honestly, I don't know what the protocol is with burnt tips. I've had some pieces I've trimmed the tips off and just let them regrow, and I've had other times I just kind of ignore it (but I might brush the algae off). Some corals are just fast growers and the tissue doesn't quite seem to keep up with the skeleton growth or you might have had a combination of factors that led to the tips getting burnt. I was at a buddy's house the other day and he had a large tabling acro and you could see white tips all on the outer part of the coral, but in his case it was definitely growth.
As far as coloration, I'm not sure I can offer much help there. I'm not nearly experienced enough with sps to feel that adept at offering suggestions regarding getting optimal cokoration. I do know that frags sometimes can take a long time to really color up when introduced to a tank. Also, I've had small frags that didn't really start to color up until they got much larger. Obviously, nutrients and light can play a factor. I have a Christmas Mirabilis acro in my tank that I made a frag of and gave to a buddy a few weeks ago. I was over at his house and didn't even recognize the coral. It looked very different in his tank than it does mine. I guess I don't worry about the corals colors as long as the coral looks healthy. In general, pale colors make me think there is too much light and / or not enough nutrients. Brown corals I tend to think there is too much phosphate (this assumes you have a known coral that isn't just an ugly brown coral). But I am not that experienced with trying to fine tune corals colors, so I would not rely on my experience in this area!
As far as dosing, how much alk are you dosing at once? My tank uses almost 1 dkh of alk a day and used to use as much as double that. I can't imagine dumping alk all in at once if you are using similar amounts. I doubt think the alk white cloud passing over the coral is ideal but as you have a lot of flow, I'm sure it disperses it quickly (still best to dose in your sump), but I'm more concerned about the overall alk spike amount.
As far as coloration, I'm not sure I can offer much help there. I'm not nearly experienced enough with sps to feel that adept at offering suggestions regarding getting optimal cokoration. I do know that frags sometimes can take a long time to really color up when introduced to a tank. Also, I've had small frags that didn't really start to color up until they got much larger. Obviously, nutrients and light can play a factor. I have a Christmas Mirabilis acro in my tank that I made a frag of and gave to a buddy a few weeks ago. I was over at his house and didn't even recognize the coral. It looked very different in his tank than it does mine. I guess I don't worry about the corals colors as long as the coral looks healthy. In general, pale colors make me think there is too much light and / or not enough nutrients. Brown corals I tend to think there is too much phosphate (this assumes you have a known coral that isn't just an ugly brown coral). But I am not that experienced with trying to fine tune corals colors, so I would not rely on my experience in this area!
As far as dosing, how much alk are you dosing at once? My tank uses almost 1 dkh of alk a day and used to use as much as double that. I can't imagine dumping alk all in at once if you are using similar amounts. I doubt think the alk white cloud passing over the coral is ideal but as you have a lot of flow, I'm sure it disperses it quickly (still best to dose in your sump), but I'm more concerned about the overall alk spike amount.
Stn and rtn is usually a bacterial infection that acros can catch while stressed. Every acro I bought last from sept of 2017 to July of 2018 would look good for a couple weeks then the polyps would retract, followed by a brown dried out look, then stn on the base and brownish algae on the tips would be the final nail in the coffin. I discovered that I had much much lower par than I estimated from all the BRS videos, YouTube, mfg graphs etc. I was also trying to get my nutrients as low as possible with gfo and nopox, which neither really worked. As soon as tripled my light intensity, ditched the gfo and nopox, and brought my alk down close to 7, my acros started thriving. I let my alk fall from 9 to 7 over a couple days and never heard/worried about that ph/buffer/acid problem, whatever it means. In fact I haven’t tested my ph in almost a year.
Hopefully clipping the ends has done the trick in anycase...
PDR I did some research for us..
As Chaswood said it is very possible a bacteria known as vibrio has become a pathogenic in your tank, typically due to environmental stress or change. This bacteria can prove to cause cases RTN and STN. Some profilatic approaches to this as there is no way to test for this bacteria are as follows. Lower the temperature of your tank, dim light intensity, perform 20% water change everyday, dip in lugols iodine solution, and more here is a link to some reading material that may be beneficial to you: https://www.nano-reef.com/forums/topic/376843-rtn-and-stn-possible-causes-and-treatments/
https://reefnation.com/coral-tissue-necrosis-stnrtn/
PDR I did some research for us..
As Chaswood said it is very possible a bacteria known as vibrio has become a pathogenic in your tank, typically due to environmental stress or change. This bacteria can prove to cause cases RTN and STN. Some profilatic approaches to this as there is no way to test for this bacteria are as follows. Lower the temperature of your tank, dim light intensity, perform 20% water change everyday, dip in lugols iodine solution, and more here is a link to some reading material that may be beneficial to you: https://www.nano-reef.com/forums/topic/376843-rtn-and-stn-possible-causes-and-treatments/
https://reefnation.com/coral-tissue-necrosis-stnrtn/
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So I just looked up the specs of your light and it’s only produces 40 watts at max power. I can almost guarantee you that your acros are starving from a lack of photo synthesis. I bet they are receiving less than 100 par 9” below the surface.
Vibrio is already in all of our tanks. It’s similar to the bacteria we have all over our bodies. When an acro is stressed, starved in the OP’s case, vibrio has an opportunity to dig its stn/rtn claws in. Acros need atleast 200-250 par to thrive. 150 par won’t kill them over night but they will eventually perish from starvation.
