War Coral Struggling

HumuhumuFan · Nov 9, 2022

Good evening. At one point my war coral was the pride of my tank. I bought a single frag and managed to get that to not only thrive, but also a bunch of the pieces I was able to scrape off the milk crate it was growing on that the store gave me. This was my tank the last time I updated my build page in May 2021 here. At that time it was 1.5 years old. This February, the tank will have been up for 3 years.

Since that time, my hammer died, and my war coral has been looking deflated, for lack of a better word and it has been dying back.

Here's a spinoff frag I cultivated that had been doing great.

Here's the original frag plug:

The tank is a 20g long, I do 5g water changes once a week.
Temp is 80f,
Hardness is 8
Calcium is 480 (I started dosing calcium a few months ago) This is around the time I pruned the plating Monti WAY back. I thought maybe the Monti was starving everything else out.

Lighting is a CurrentUSA Orbit Marine. I added an internal fuge with chaeto but all it seems to be growing is GHA.

This war coral was my absolute favorite, and my first frag. I'd hate to lose it, but I don't know what could be killing it. Any ideas?

E:
Total Stocking List:
War Coral
Plating Orange Monti
2 Black and White Clowns
2 big hermits
1 Turbo Snail
? Nassarius Snails

ekandler · Nov 9, 2022

So many questions. I can’t help you without some more information. I’m going to assume flow and lighting isn’t an issue as I assume they are unchanged from your successful period.

from the parameters you listed everything looks fine except temp being 80 is pretty high, but again if it’s always been 80 then I guess it’s not that. I’d set it to 77-78.

25% weekly water changes is a lot. Stability of parameters through water changes isn’t ideal, as it also depletes nutrients. With only 2 fish I’m sure you’re not feeding much. What are your nutrient levels (nitrate and phosphate) and are they consistent?

what’s your magnesium?

HumuhumuFan · Nov 9, 2022

You are correct, lighting, flow, feeding, maintenance schedule all unchanged from when my tank looked as it did on the last happy update to my build thread.

Phosphate is at the lowest level on the API kit (0.25), and Nitrates are 20ppm. Historically NO3 has floated between 5 and 20 ppm, Phosphate always reads at the lowest level on the kit above 0. I don't have a Mg test kit at the moment.

ekandler · Nov 9, 2022

I’d get a better phosphate test kit. 0 is bad, 0.25 is huge for a reef aquarium. I keep mine between 0.02-0.05. Highly recommend Hanna’s ULR phosphate tester. That could be your issue, fluctuations in phosphate 0-0.25 is massive in a reef tank, so if you’ve been bottoming your phosphate they are starving, and high phosphate is poisonous to corals unless they’re acclimated properly.

HumuhumuFan · Nov 9, 2022

Thanks. I will up that Hanna, and an Mg kit. I just find it weird that the war coral thrived in the tank for 2.5 years, and now is slipping away with no major changes to anything. Ditto for the hammer, except that totally died, and in a matter of weeks from when it started staying retracted.

ekandler · Nov 9, 2022

HumuhumuFan said:
Thanks. I will up that Hanna, and an Mg kit. I just find it weird that the war coral thrived in the tank for 2.5 years, and now is slipping away with no major changes to anything. Ditto for the hammer, except that totally died, and in a matter of weeks from when it started staying retracted.

Yeah that is odd. All I can say is consistency is key and without knowing exactly what your phosphate is it’s hard to say if it matters or not.

I know it’s expensive, but having Hanna checkers for nitrate (the HR one) and phosphate (the ULR one) and an apex with Trident, it makes a world of difference. my reef has thrived with it and I have had no seemingly unexplainable corals dying.

HumuhumuFan · Nov 9, 2022

Even stranger that the monti is doing so well that I had to setup a frag tank just to deal with all of it. Anything I can do to try to help the war coral other trying to maximize stability?

ekandler · Nov 9, 2022

Honestly not that I can think of. Maybe someone else has an idea. Good luck!

HumuhumuFan · Nov 10, 2022

I.AM.MR.MIKE · Nov 10, 2022

Try some Aminos asap. AB plus or other. Double check readings and get new test kits to do it.

Tired · Nov 10, 2022

Do you feed it?

But yeah, you want to make sure you have reasonably stable phosphates in a non-zero amount. Exactly what that amount is doesn't matter too much, as long as it doesn't change suddenly. Some people have thriving reef tanks with a good 0.5-1ppm phosphate, some people barely keep it at the minimum. Aim for at least 0.03ppm, and stable.

HumuhumuFan · Nov 18, 2022

Tired said:
Do you feed it?

But yeah, you want to make sure you have reasonably stable phosphates in a non-zero amount. Exactly what that amount is doesn't matter too much, as long as it doesn't change suddenly. Some people have thriving reef tanks with a good 0.5-1ppm phosphate, some people barely keep it at the minimum. Aim for at least 0.03ppm, and stable.

Good news. I fed it and it looks much better. In growing my tank from 3 small frags to this:

I never fed. I guess I was just lucky? For 2 years everything just kept growing. Then my hammer died, then my war coral started fading. The Monti continued to grow like crazy and I ended up breaking it while cleaning the tank. I turned the broken pieces into new frags and gave them to my LFS.

At any rate, I dug out some Reef Roids I'd forgotten about and the next day it had plumped up again for the first time in a long time.

I.AM.MR.MIKE · Nov 18, 2022

I have the same coral and it is a favorite of mine cause it is so neat looking.

Tired · Nov 18, 2022

Whether a LPS coral needs to be fed to thrive or not depends on a wide variety of factors, including whether it's managing to catch food on its own. Plenty of LPS in plenty of tanks do just fine without feeding, but feeding can often help to boost them, so it's worth a shot.

For LPS, you either want chunky foods (mysis, pellets, etc), or a thick slurry of Reef Roids that settles on top of the coral where it can easily eat.

HumuhumuFan · Nov 18, 2022

Tired said:
Whether a LPS coral needs to be fed to thrive or not depends on a wide variety of factors, including whether it's managing to catch food on its own. Plenty of LPS in plenty of tanks do just fine without feeding, but feeding can often help to boost them, so it's worth a shot.

For LPS, you either want chunky foods (mysis, pellets, etc), or a thick slurry of Reef Roids that settles on top of the coral where it can easily eat.

Yes, I think I might relocate my big hermits to another tank because they tend to raid the war coral when I've fed them in the past. I have little plastic covers I made out of soda bottles which keep the snails at bay, but the hermits not so much. Thank you for the reply and information.