Zoa frags slowly dieing

[Funston07]

Okay my tank is about 3 months old, just starting to get coraline growing on the rocks. All my other coral are doing good besides my zoas, and its only been one frag at a time having issues. First victim was a mary janes zoa, only had 2 polyps to start with. One polyp quit opening then the second one shortly after and it just melted. Now my scrambled egg zoa frag is all closing up but it has maybe 10 polyps or so. I tried moving it to a lower light seeing if that was the issue and it seemed to open up a little but still not fully. Just before lights went out i noticed my troll zoa was half closed. But the kicker is my blue hornets and vamp in drag have been right next to all of these others and have showed no signs of stress like these other have. Are these just hard zoas to keep or am I missing something that I could be looking for? I thought all zoas were easy lol.
Parameters:
Temp 77.5
Sal. 1.026
Alk. 8.0
Cal. 430
Mag. 1350
No3 10
Po4 .15

 

[vessxpress1]

Sometimes they need to be taken out and given a dip in coral cleaner and rinsed. I have some that need it right now. My others are fine.

 

[Funston07]

Sometimes they need to be taken out and given a dip in coral cleaner and rinsed. I have some that need it right now. My others are fine.

Coral cleaner? Like as in coral rx or what? Never heard of that besides people doing iodine dips but I've never researched why they do that either.

 

[vessxpress1]

Yeah, coral RX or Revive or I've got an Aquaforest dip. Just follow the directions. Zoas are tough. Read an article one time where the guy recommend scrubbing them in the dip with a brush to remove any unseen bacteria or fungus which may be irritating them. I think it works. At the very least it'll allow you to rule out an infection.

 

[Funston07]

Yeah, coral RX or Revive or I've got an Aquaforest dip. Just follow the directions. Zoas are tough. Read an article one time where the guy recommend scrubbing them in the dip with a brush to remove any unseen bacteria or fungus which may be irritating them. I think it works. At the very least it'll allow you to rule out an infection.

I got some coral Rx, I'll have to give it a try tomorrow to the scrambled egg frag and see what happens.

 

[WIReefer]

is anything picking at them?

 

[vessxpress1]

I've dipped zoas in pure hydrogen peroxide for several minutes while the disks were still open, to kill off some algae on the plug. I wasn't very careful. I thought I lost the entire frag. They closed up for weeks. Lost color. Then slowly but surely started opening again. Now they're wide open and look great again. Be careful with pure hydro peroxide if you're looking to clean up frags. don't get it on the coral. I know this is a different matter but giving an example of resilience. They weren't even closed up.

 

[Wiwiako]

are there any other corals in the area that could irritate them? chem warfare perhaps. also the flow. I believe that's a kenya tree on the 1st photo. leather corals constantly secrete toxins to ensure its survival over the rest. if your flow blows downstream toward your zoas that might be the culprit

 

[Funston07]

is anything picking at them?

No I only have 2 clowns, diamond goby, mandarin, and a cleaner shrimp

 

[amazongb]

You have hermits that might be picking at algae on the plug? This won't irritate the zoas, but they will close up while hermits are in the neighborhood..normal. What type of light do you have?

 

[Funston07]

are there any other corals in the area that could irritate them? chem warfare perhaps. also the flow. I believe that's a kenya tree on the 1st photo. leather corals constantly secrete toxins to ensure its survival over the rest. if your flow blows downstream toward your zoas that might be the culprit

The kenya is on the opposite side of the tank usually, only reason it is so close in the one picture is cause thats where I moved the frag temporarily to see if it was a light issue

 

[Funston07]

You have hermits that might be picking at algae on the plug? This won't irritate the zoas, but they will close up while hermits are in the neighborhood..normal. What type of light do you have?

No hermits only snails and a cleaner shrimp for inverts well and my BTA. Im using 2 AI prime 16 hds. Its a 65gal tank. Most of my par measurements are anywhere from 80-145 throughout anywhere in the tank.

 

[ge4rhead]

Just out of curiosity. Do you feed any of your corals?

 

[Funston07]

Just out of curiosity. Do you feed any of your corals?

Usually just broadcast feed reef chili and Red Sea Reef nutrition AB+. Every once in awhile I'll directly feed but not often and I only directly feed my acans, blastos, bowerbanki, and my BTA. But the zoas, lepto, leptastria, brain, and kenya is strctly just broadcast feeding.

 

[Funston07]

Well I dipped the scrambled egg frag today and a small worm did come off. Might have to post in the hitchhiker ID thread unless somebody here can positively ID it.

 

[Funston07]

Still stumped on whats going on with my zoas. I dipped the scrambled egg frag on Sunday. The smaller polyps seem to be opening but not the larger polyps. Two of the polyps also look like the centers of them are turning black. My troll frag and my mary jane frag melted. My blue hornets and vamp in drag are still doing fine though.

 

[zoaprince]

I wish I knew why certain zoas in a tank die. I currently have a salted agave which has been closed for a couple weeks now. Everything else is doing fine.

 

[Funston07]

I wish I knew why certain zoas in a tank die. I currently have a salted agave which has been closed for a couple weeks now. Everything else is doing fine.

Yeah im like 90% sure its not water chemistry. If it was my BTA would be more ticked off than anything else or even my goni at the very least. Don't think it's a parasite either because the whole frag on the scrambled egg closed up at once out of nowhere. Bummer, i thought if i were to have any problems it wouldn't of been the zoas. Figured they would of been the only ones to survive whatever learning curves I go through but I was wrong.

 

[d_frag]

Just something to think about, perhaps iodine might be a little low?

 

[Miller535]

I do not know if you run carbon or not, sometimes corals just get really P.O with coral warfare and carbon helps to mitigate this. I have a froot loop zoa that I could not figure out what was going on with it, and it stayed close for weeks, then barely opened and looked brown and ugly, then all of a sudden it started fully opening and color looks great. Really don't know why, I didn't move it or do ANYTHING different.