Why can’t I keep hammers?

Nicklepickle · Mar 3, 2022

I have a successful 80 ltr modified AIO. I seem to be able to grow everything except hammers/euphyllias. I am at near ULN parameters with good colour and growth. I use ab+, phyto, lobster eggs, reef roids etc. all the good stuff. I use all for reef and dose any shortfalls like vanadium, manganese and iodine. I have a theory that because the afr isn’t dosed and just added in small increments this is causing some flux in parameters. I have been told that hammers don’t like fluctuations in dkh. I would really appreciate any input and suggestions or knowledge on what hammers are sensitive to or if their poor health indicates anything.

Spare time · Mar 3, 2022

ULN may be the reason (but your are feeding heavily do maybe not). I use all for reef with no issue keeping euphyllia.

fish farmer · Mar 3, 2022

How's your lighting? Too high where you place them?

Flow?

I'm in the camp where my hammers seem to be bullet proof....although I've had polyp bailout on new frags, but the survivors adapt. My frammer thrived pretty much in high nutrient and swinging params when I was bringing my tank to where it is now.

I feel high light and too much flow is where I see troubles. I even have salinity swings occasionally and not seen issues. I dose kalk and do WC's and rarely check params when doing them.

My tank isn't spotless, I have algae in the DT and the fuge, my nutrient numbers are very low, but I feed what I consider heavy.

Nicklepickle · Mar 4, 2022

Tanks for the replies . I think my gut says too much lighting. I have been v slowly ramping up the lighting. I may have gone too far. I’ll turn all the leds down 5-10 % for 5 days and see if It improves?

Spare time · Mar 4, 2022

Nicklepickle said:
Tanks for the replies . I think my gut says too much lighting. I have been v slowly ramping up the lighting. I may have gone too far. I’ll turn all the leds down 5-10 % for 5 days and see if It improves?

Any clue or guess as to the par?

gbroadbridge · Mar 4, 2022

Nicklepickle said:
I have a successful 80 ltr modified AIO. I seem to be able to grow everything except hammers/euphyllias. I am at near ULN parameters with good colour and growth. I use ab+, phyto, lobster eggs, reef roids etc. all the good stuff. I use all for reef and dose any shortfalls like vanadium, manganese and iodine. I have a theory that because the afr isn’t dosed and just added in small increments this is causing some flux in parameters. I have been told that hammers don’t like fluctuations in dkh. I would really appreciate any input and suggestions or knowledge on what hammers are sensitive to or if their poor health indicates anything.

Hammers need at least 5-10 ppm nitrate and PAR around 100

clhardy5 · Mar 4, 2022

gbroadbridge said:
Hammers need at least 5-10 ppm nitrate and PAR around 100

This might be spot on. My hammers do great....and my nitrate is around 5-15 ppm (usually more on the high end)....and they are thriving in about 100 par.

Nicklepickle · Mar 5, 2022

Thanks for the advice everyone. I don’t have a par meter but I would bet it’s getting way more than 100 I will put it in a more sheltered place. I don’t know what I can do about my nitrates. My tank gets lots of nutrition but has low nutrients. 0.015 or less phosphate and 0.2 nitrate.

hsosa · Mar 5, 2022

I brought a small hammer last year and it has grown into a large hammer . things that I found lower light I have him at the bottom . lower flow. I also found that mag above 1400 . right now my last no3 was 6.8 and p04 .243 I feed bene pets about twice a week.

i cant think · Mar 5, 2022

Maybe you have BJD in the tank? Although I’m not sure if that can stay in the tank if the old frag that could’ve had it was taken out. Just my 2 cents.