Why don't my corals grow or use major elements?

[Charlie’s Frags]

Sounds like your corals are starving from not enough light. Your story reminds me of my sps issues last year. My acros would survive a couple weeks to a couple months but they would slowly wither away and then stn/rtn. I had a single hydra 52 hd over my 50 gallon cube at 50-60% power, and many told me that was too much light. I was also chasing low nutrients with nopox and gfo because ppl said 20 no3 is too high, get it down below 5 or 0.15 po4 is too high get below 0.03. I bought a par meter and found out that my settings were producing less than 200 par at the top. Now I have 2 hydra 52 HD’s delivering 600 par at top and 350 on the sandbed, no gfo, no nopox, no skimmer and a 40 acros growing everyday.
Sounds like you need waaaaay more light, but don’t do it over night or even a week. You should raise them a watt or 2 per week. How many watts are they set to now?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Lack of adequate water flow and lights too bright or bulbs losing useful life and lack of uv colors for growth

 

[rockskimmerflow]

To the OP, if you had a really low iodine reading with ATI - dose some iodine. I had an incident after I switched to ATI Essentials from Triton and my iodine bottomed out and nearly killed a few large colonies before I caught it. That said, as others have mentioned LEDs do grow coral fine, but they aren't the most plug and play if you're having issues with a tank. I like to limit variables if someone is having issues. It's pretty established that a 4 or 6 bulb T5HO unit with quality reflectors and lamps will grow almost anything. It might not hurt to throw some T5 over the tank for a bit and see what happens. Would at least let you know there's something up with the water beyond what your testing shows. On the other hand, if stuff starts taking off with growth that's a pretty favorable outcome. Best of luck!

 

[Tamberav]

Just want to mention you can rent a full spectrum par meter from nextlight for 30 bucks for 30 days.

I used them and was very happy with the service.

 

[kevin_e]

Wouldn't his coral brown out if lighting wasn't intense enough? Pale is usually starving or too intense of light, ime.

 

[MaiReef]

Chasing low Nitrates is not necessary imo. My tank is loaded with coralline(careful what you ask for)and my Nitrates never fall below 5 and are often at 10. I had the most growth with them at 20. There are different species of coralline algae. They have different requirements. My friends tank has the same lights as I do and lower nutrients and he cannot grow it either. Some coral flourish in his tank and some do better in mine. He has a longer lighting schedule. I have a ramping 10 hour(higher percentages) one that reduced algae on the glass and his is 14 hours. I cannot explain it all, but flow seems to be a factor as well. My flow is 47x tank volume. The coralline grows quickest on the powerheads.

 

[Aquatic Bobs]

I didn't finish reading all of the comments because most people are saying the same thing, could you try upgrading to an AI Hydra 26 or Hydra 52? I had the basic Black Box when I first started which grew the corals a little bit but after doing a ton of research on full color spectrum I was convinced that UV, Violet, royal blue, light blue and even a little red and green makes a huge difference with the symbiotic relationship of zooxanthelle and the coral itself. Could you sell your kessil light fixtures and maybe buy one AI Hydra 52?

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Wouldn't his coral brown out if lighting wasn't intense enough? Pale is usually starving or too intense of light, ime.

I have zoas receiving 400 parand some many of my acros are at 500 par and they look fantastic. It’s unlikely that his kessil at 50-60% power would be producing too much light

 

[kevin_e]

I have zoas receiving 400 parand some many of my acros are at 500 par and they look fantastic. It’s unlikely that his kessil at 50-60% power would be producing too much light

Which then must mean it's a nutrient issue. Beczuse coral typically brown from too little light.

 

[ReefSlice]

Which then must mean it's a nutrient issue. Beczuse coral typically brown from too little light.

Right, it's like they're starving with high nitrates, decent po4 and algae present.

 

[jpas]

What do you use for nutrient control: fuge with macro algae, dose carbon, gfo?

Also do you use ROX carbon in the tank?

Coralline actually grows very well in low to medium lighting. If the lights were too bright, you would still get coralline growing in shaded areas.

In all of my tanks, I found that if coralline wasn’t growing, there was no way I could keep healthy SPS alive.

 

[jpas]

Also, have you ever used Vibrant, Ruby Rally or any other meds in the tank?

 

[ReefSlice]

I know coralline grows in lower light fine, my first tank was a biocube (PC bulbs) and that thing grew coralline like crazy! It's almost like something is impeding calcification that I can't test for.
I use nopox when I want to knock nutrients down, not always though and never much. Carbon once in a while not always. Never used vibrant, used fluconazole once but the problem had already been persistent.

 

[jpas]

Also salinity & water temp?

 

[ReefSlice]

Also salinity & water temp?

1.026 and 79.

 

[jpas]

Try stopping the Nopox, I used it for a period of time and had terrible coral growth.

Do you have a fuge?

Also if you are doing weekly water changes, stop the carbon for a while.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Which then must mean it's a nutrient issue. Beczuse coral typically brown from too little light.

Typically yes. Pictures would be very helpful in this case.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I know coralline grows in lower light fine, my first tank was a biocube (PC bulbs) and that thing grew coralline like crazy! It's almost like something is impeding calcification that I can't test for.
I use nopox when I want to knock nutrients down, not always though and never much. Carbon once in a while not always. Never used vibrant, used fluconazole once but the problem had already been persistent.

Stop the nopox, turn your skimmer off, and stop testing no3 and po4 for 2 weeks. I bet your corals will start looking better.

 

[ReefSlice]

I didn't use nopox for years and haven't for about 9 months so I highly doubt nopox is my problem and it is a great product if used correctly guys. And I don't see a need to turn my skimmer off with elevated nutrients and algae, cyano.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I didn't use nopox for years and haven't for about 9 months so I highly doubt nopox is my problem and it is a great product if used correctly guys. And I don't see a need to turn my skimmer off with elevated nutrients and algae, cyano.

My nutrients were way higher using a skimmer and nopox and gfo than they are now with no skimmer, no gfo and no nopox. I also haven’t had any cyano since I turned my skimmer off.