STN overnight need help diagnosing

[Zoajohn]

So two days ago I made a few changes to my 30G reef. I dosed some 5ml of MEcorals nitrate to bring up nitrates from ~1 to 2. Tested nitrate today and it seems close to 10 per salifert low range test which is very concerning.

I also replaced the screen in my top from stock IM screen to very thin clear screen. I had also used hand sanitizer on my hands but washed thoroughly before removing some algae by hand.

Last night i noticed messentarial filaments coming from many of my sps frags, and some had no polyp extension and some were browning. Around 12:30 today I noticed my green anacropora had some bleaching on a tip and saw some brown filaments which I’d assume are zooxanthelle being expelled. I am also running fluconazole for asparagopsis (1 week today), but this had posed no issues before. Because of the fluc I removed purigen and carbon.

When I get home from work I plan on throwing carbon in, performing a 15% water change, and hoping for the best. I also reduced lighting heavily to mostly just blues in case the extra PAR coming through the new top is irritating them too. I’d appreciate any feedback or suggestions to what I should do. I just got two very nice acros in as well and it would kill me to lose those on top of the dozen others I have in there.

 

[SeaDweller]

It's probably the algae treatment, haven't heard many good stories using that stuff; the increase in NO3 may be from the algae dying off.

 

[motortrendz]

I can tell you its not coming from the fluconazole... I have a mostly sps tank and have used it religiously whenever I have an outbreak. And I've even accidentally overdosed by double one day just not paying attention and still has no adverse effects.

What are you using to dose nitrates? Sodium nitrate or potassium nitrate? Sounds like a combo of a few things. One being raised too high too fast, that would make sense with the browning.

What are your po4 levels? I've learned real quick with dosing nitrates that your po4 will drop super fast and you need to maintain doing that as well. So make sure that didnt bottom out...

With that being said, alkalinity and nutrient balance is key, where do you keep your alk levels and are they stable?

And light intensity change on top of all this will upset the balance and just flat out irritate everything. I'd set them on a acclimation timer for the next 2 weeks and allow everything to settle.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

Sounds like the nitrate bump could have been too much too fast? Or the product has something in it that isn’t supposed to be dosed that quick. Was this your first time using the product?

 

[jda]

Probably too much at once, but just a guess. None of those things look like a problem in isolation, but all together it might have been death by a thousand cuts.

 

[Zoajohn]

I can tell you its not coming from the fluconazole... I have a mostly sps tank and have used it religiously whenever I have an outbreak. And I've even accidentally overdosed by double one day just not paying attention and still has no adverse effects.

What are you using to dose nitrates? Sodium nitrate or potassium nitrate? Sounds like a combo of a few things. One being raised too high too fast, that would make sense with the browning.

What are your po4 levels? I've learned real quick with dosing nitrates that your po4 will drop super fast and you need to maintain doing that as well. So make sure that didnt bottom out...

With that being said, alkalinity and nutrient balance is key, where do you keep your alk levels and are they stable?

And light intensity change on top of all this will upset the balance and just flat out irritate everything. I'd set them on a acclimation timer for the next 2 weeks and allow everything to settle.

You’re right on phosphates. They were zero. I dosed up to .01 with neophos.

It appears that I’m having a Dino outbreak as well. Seems they took the algae’s place once they died off. I’ll be maintaining po4 and nitrate levels to fight them back since it hasn’t gotten too bad yet. Everything is ticked off. Even my pocillopora isn’t extending polyps. That’s when you know its bad haha

 

[motortrendz]

You’re right on phosphates. They were zero. I dosed up to .01 with neophos.

It appears that I’m having a Dino outbreak as well. Seems they took the algae’s place once they died off. I’ll be maintaining po4 and nitrate levels to fight them back since it hasn’t gotten too bad yet. Everything is ****** off. Even my pocillopora isn’t extending polyps. That’s when you know its bad haha

Just lower your light intensity for a bit while you get it straight. And they should come back as it evens back out. The dinos are from your nutrients bottoming out. I've found that nitrates about 4-8and po4 about .10 seem to be the sweet spot. For me anyway.

 

[Zoajohn]

How fast could i raise po4 to .1? I brought it up to .02 an hour ago.

Just lower your light intensity for a bit while you get it straight. And they should come back as it evens back out. The dinos are from your nutrients bottoming out. I've found that nitrates about 4-8and po4 about .10 seem to be the sweet spot. For me anyway.

 

[motortrendz]

Slowly over the next few days. 0.1 is not that high

 

[ScottB]

.02 is still within testing error range of zero. Before dosing more nitrate get PO4 to .05 which you might be surprised how much you have to dose to reach. If the Dino’s get hold they will soak it out as fast as u can dump it in.
I had a weak solution, took a full liter over the month to raise and keep it elevated.

 

[Fishfinder]

Fluconazole will destroy SPS

 

[motortrendz]

Fluconazole will destroy SPS

Not sure where you.got that from. I've never had any issues with my sps and fluconazole. Is this a personal experience?? I'd think there's more to it than just the fluc

 

[SeaDweller]

Not sure where you.got that from. I've never had any issues with my sps and fluconazole. Is this a personal experience?? I'd think there's more to it than just the fluc

we have a few mutual friends that haven't had good experiences with it.

Also, in the fluc treatment thread, there are people who haven't had success either.

 

[motortrendz]

Very interesting. I've never had a bad experience with it..

 

[SeaDweller]

Very interesting. I've never had a bad experience with it..

I've never used it myself, not sure if fishfinder did or not (assuming he did), but a few people that I'm close to have had issues with their acros and it. Not sure about "other" sps.

 

[motortrendz]

I have a predominantly acropora reef and have used it multiple times personally. Once I even overdosed by double bc I was not paying attention and I put it down on the counter and thought it got knocked into the sink so I made another batch and dosed it. my buddy who was over said oh I saw it on the counter and put it in the tank for you. so needless to say I was a little worried, But nothing happened. That's y i question the fluc causing issues by itself

I can also tell you with 100% certainty, vibrant never worked for me, every time I tried it all my acros faded. But I know tank stuff has worked wonders for others. So I really think it's the total setup your working with that makes the difference.

 

[Fishfinder]

I haven’t used it. But a few people and a few trusted stores have had big problems from dosing it. In systems that grew amazing coral. It might not cause negative reactions every time. But not worth the risk if you have thousands in SPS

 

[ScottB]

I'd always been afraid of fluconazole after seeing a post or two here there. But I do part time stuff at my LFS, and the service guys will use it on client systems that are in bad shape with no major problems.

Some bryopsis made it into the store frag display That stuff just takes off when happy. Took the risk and performed beautifully. No casualties.

Then one service guy dosed an old, fairly dirty mixed reef tank with bryopsis and something went really really wrong. I went to see it myself and it was bad. There was nothing super special in there, all no name SPS and old LPS but everything was bleached or retracted. Only flesh that was shaded did not bleach. I tested the water (after) and there was nothing much out of range. Left us scratching our heads. I can only guess it killed some kind of fungus that was loaded in the tank and not in any of the others. Then the dying fungus released some nasties into the water.

Somebody mentioned "the fluconazole thread" so I might go looking around there.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I dosed reflux by blue life USA this past July and within a week I had several Tenuis Stn/die within a week. All of them seemed happy before. But I had 30 other Tenuis and many other acros that were not phased at all.

 

[ScottB]

I dosed reflux by blue life USA this past July and within a week I had several Tenuis Stn/die within a week. All of them seemed happy before. But I had 30 other Tenuis and many other acros that were not phased at all.

Thanks Chaswood. Same brand we use.
Well I spent another hour+ going through the big thread on it. Ballpark it 10:1 for good/OK outcomes. Bad outcomes concentrated on acropora, but still vast majority SPS outcomes OK.
I am thinking about crafting a poll, just for stick people dosing fluc. I'll start jotting down some potential parameter, species, PAR, additives, GFO, timeline, band dosed... type questions to see if there is any pattern discernable at all.

Bryopsis is just so tough to beat with fluc. Got to figure a way to make it safe to use for stick lovers. Or at least discover who should not.