Starting off on a bad note

[jesse_larsen]

Hello, my names jesse and I own a 29 gal biocube. I joined today on an effort to find out what the heck is happening to my fungia. It seems to be receding but all my other corals are doing just fine. It's my first plate coral so I'm quite new to this type of coral and don't really know if I should
Move it to lower light and flow or leave it be....any help would be greatly appreciated and I'm happy to join the family! (Sorry about the dirty sand! any comments on how to fix that would help also!)

 

[Maritimer]

Hi, Jesse - and welcome to Reef2Reef.

I've never kept fungias, but perhaps someone else on the #reefsquad can offer you some assistance with that guy . . . I am given to understand that if it passes on, you should keep the skeleton in the tank, as they often produce babies from the skeleton over the next several months or so.

I use Cerith and tiger conch snails to help out with my sandbed.

~Bruce

 

[jesse_larsen]

Hi, Jesse - and welcome to Reef2Reef.

I've never kept fungias, but perhaps someone else on the #reefsquad can offer you some assistance with that guy . . . I am given to understand that if it passes on, you should keep the skeleton in the tank, as they often produce babies from the skeleton over the next several months or so.

I use Cerith and tiger conch snails to help out with my sandbed.

~Bruce

Thank you for the help! And thats pretty interesting about it growing from the skeleton, at least if all else fails I know there's a little hope left haha! And I'll have to look into conch snails as I hear they are good cleaners. My goby isn't doing crap so I figured it was time for some more help

 

[Katrina71]

Any full tank pics? BioCubes are my favorite.

 

[Tahoe61]

Welcome Jesse,

I do not consider Fungia to be an easy and hardy LPS. They ship poorly, if for some reason there is any tissue injury they succumb easily. They are sensitive to swings in alkalinity. I imagine that the growth in the sand bed is probably an issue.
How long is your lighting period?

 

[jesse_larsen]

Welcome Jesse,

I do not consider Fungia to be an easy and hardy LPS. They ship poorly, if for some reason there is any tissue injury they succumb easily. They are sensitive to swings in alkalinity. I imagine that the growth in the sand bed is probably an issue.
How long is your lighting period?

My light period is about 12 hours. with 6 hours of blue and 6 hours of full spectrum. I have a mars aqua 165w LED. But I'm just only coming up to a year in this hobby. I'm told algae is hard to control in younger thanks but it's only growing on my sand so I'm confused as to why this is.

 

[melypr1985]

Welcome to R2R! Sorry about the fungia. I agree with Tahoe ^^^

 

[jesse_larsen]

Any full tank pics? BioCubes are my favorite.

I'd love to show you but I'm more embarrassed than I should be about my dirty sand at the moment haha I'll be sure to send you some pics once it's all clean!

 

[Tahoe61]

I would cut back the photo-period to 8-10 hours. Post a day light image so we can see what the growth in the sand bed is.
Get nitrate and phos values if you can.
How often do you do water changes? How deep is the sand bed and do you ever clean it?

 

[Katrina71]

I'd love to show you but I'm more embarrassed than I should be about my dirty sand at the moment haha I'll be sure to send you some pics once it's all clean!

Pristine sand is just showing off

 

[jesse_larsen]

I would cut back the photo-period to 8-10 hours. Post a day light image so we can see what the growth in the sand bed is.
Get nitrate and phos values if you can.
How often do you do water changes? How deep is the sand bed and do you ever clean it?

I'll be sure to change the lighting tomorrow! And post a picture. As for the testing, my nitrates are at 5.0 and phos are at 0 when tested 2 days ago. I do about a 5 gallon WC every week and clean the sand during the WC. And the thickness of the sand ranges all over the tank from an inch to about a half an inch in some spots

 

[jesse_larsen]

Pristine sand is just showing off

Haha that's what I like to hear! I'll be sure to post a pic tomorrow ))

 

[Tahoe61]

Are you dosing any amino acid products or reefroids, acropower anything product that is advertised to specifically feed corals?

 

[jesse_larsen]

Are you dosing any amino acid products or reefroids, acropower anything product that is advertised to specifically feed corals?

I am not no. That may be sacrilegious but At the moment I'm really only growing hardy corals like GSP, hammer heads, Red discoma mushroom and one sturdy candy cane. So I never really thought I needed them

 

[ladynavyvet]

I had 2 fungia corals, key being had. My question is are you target feeding them? Finely minced shrimp, squid, plankton that's been thawed or rehydrated and chopped finely? I didn't like the narrow openings on the baster style feeders, so I used a bulb style irrigator, check your local home health stores. Then using avery sharp knife remove the narrow tip, smoothing any rough, or sharp edges. Add enough tank water to minced food to make it loose enough to suck into you new feeder and then apply to the top of the fungia. In the beginning I'd not feed over a 1/2 tsp. at a time. Also, make sure your blower is turned off, so the food stays in place long enough to be eaten. Step back,

 

[ladynavyvet]

I am not no. That may be sacrilegious but At the moment I'm really only growing hardy corals like GSP, hammer heads, Red discoma mushroom and one sturdy candy cane. So I never really thought I needed them

I dose my corals with "Flue" twice a week.

 

[ladynavyvet]

FYI, I lost mine due to my tank crashed, it was my fault because I forgot to turn my pump/filter back on following a feeding.

 

[KJ]

Welcome to R2R!

 

[Maritimer]

...My goby isn't doing crap so I figured it was time for some more help

The shrimp-gobies like the yellow watchman aren't really sand-sifters, and sadly, a biocube is probably too small for any of the ones that are. Sand dwelling snails are probably going to work better for you - but slowly.

They're snails.

~Bruce

 

[4FordFamily]

Welcome home, you will love it here!

Great advice given already, and I'm no expert in this subject matter