Zoa's are dying and don't know why

[MixedFruitBasket]

the tank is 36" the T5 light bar is 30" and it is 8-10" above the water so and I don't know what the actual par is. I want to rent a par meter from LFS to find out. I just started dosing .15 ml of vodka every night that started on Wednesday to get nitrate under control and doing a water change tonight. is calcium being that high an issue?

What type of light bulbs are in your T5 fixture?

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

Granted, this photo is really pixilated so I can't see it very well, but I am wondering if there in the center of the main clump of zoas if there might be a nudibranch. I'm still curious about your type of light bulb as well.

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

Always keep this in mind: If a solution/substance is supposed to kill something then it is 100% toxic. It's just a question as to whether or not the range of toxicity to other animals.

 

[Griepp06]

What type of light bulbs are in your T5 fixture?

I have 2 30" T5 standard bulbs made by coralife. 1 is the blue/purple Actinic and the other is the white 10,000K daylight. they are under the canopy about 9" above the water.

 

[MaxTremors]

I have 2 30" T5 standard bulbs made by coralife. 1 is the blue/purple Actinic and the other is the white 10,000K daylight. they are under the canopy about 9" above the water.

This is likely inadequate for all but the lowest light softies. Zoas need fairly intense lighting. This is not the cause of your problem, but it’s something you’ll need to sort out down the line.

 

[thatmanMIKEson]

Calcium is slightly high. I would wait till you get parameters in check. Corals like stability, most success stories wait longer for a new tank. Before adding coral.

Good to test with some free frags. I'd wait 3-6 months before adding coral. Some may disagree.

I concur sir'

 

[Griepp06]

IMO, there is no such thing a reef safe medication for fish parasites, you never want to use any of these medications in your display tank. If you want to treat a fish, put them in quarantine. It might be a good idea to quarantine all fish going forward. I think your course of action should still be a 100% water change, and if that doesn’t clear things up (try a cheap frag after the WC), then order an ICP test.

i have already with 16% weekly for 2 months after that medication was added doing well over 100% at this point is there any way to know what is toxic in that medication and then just try to treat for that? there shouldn't be any of that original water in the tank at this point and a 100% water change taking the fish out would be very difficult.

 

[Griepp06]

This is likely inadequate for all but the lowest light softies. Zoas need fairly intense lighting. This is not the cause of your problem, but it’s something you’ll need to sort out down the line.

what would be the minimum for somone on a budget as most of these LED set ups are in the $100's? like could I swap my 2 standard 30" T5's for 2 24" T5 HO's?

 

[MaxTremors]

i have already with 16% weekly for 2 months after that medication was added doing well over 100% at this point is there any way to know what is toxic in that medication and then just try to treat for that? there shouldn't be any of that original water in the tank at this point and a 100% water change taking the fish out would be very difficult.

If you’re doing a 16% water change every week for two months, there is a absolutely still some of the original water in there. Let’s say, for example, that there was 100ml of toxin in your water. You do a 16% water change, that leaves 84ml in the tank. The next week you do another 16%WC, that leaves 70.56ml. Another WC, down to 59.2, then 49.7, 41.7, 35.1, 29.4, and finally 24.8ml at 8 weeks (8 16% water changes). Even if you’ve cumulatively done well over a 100% water change (128% - 16%x8), by doing lots of small water changes instead of one big one you just keep diluting the toxin. It would take ten more 16% water changes (a total of 18 WC) to get the toxin down to below 5% it’s original strength, and twenty more (28 WC) to get it down to below 1%. So by changing the water 16% at a time, you end up doing a 450% water change to get it down to less than 1% of the original toxin amount. It’s also important to note that depending on how much toxin was originally introduced, it could still be toxic to corals at 5% or even 1% of the original amount.

This is why it makes more sense to do one large water. It’s more efficient, gets more of the total amount toxin out, and costs much less (ie if your tank is 100g, its 100g worth of salt vs 450g worth of salt to get the toxin under 1%). I would recommend you search here for ‘rip clean’ and follow the instructions for doing a full rip clean of your tank. I realize that doing a 100% water change is not easy, but it may be the only option if you want to be able to keep corals and other inverts.

As far as lighting, reef lighting is unfortunately not cheap, but there are some less expensive options. If your tank is 30” wide, you’d generally need either a strip light or two ‘puck’ style lights. If your budget is limited, the cheapest and most effective option, that would probably cover most of the width of your tank, would be a 165w viparspectra LED ($139 on Amazon, but can be found for cheaper). It’s not the best light and it doesn’t have a lot of bells and whistles, but it will grow pretty much anything.

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

This is likely inadequate for all but the lowest light softies. Zoas need fairly intense lighting. This is not the cause of your problem, but it’s something you’ll need to sort out down the line.

Without adequate light the corals will slowly "melt", die and disappear. So it very well could be the light. @Griepp06 I'm not sure how deep your tank is but, I have a 48 inch x 24 inch that's 15.5 inches deep and I have three T-5 lights with 2 bulbs each. I use the 15K coral plus lights in all of them. I also have 2 kessel lights (360) tuna blues just to make the water "pretty" and add some actinic if I want it. That's just for looks (at least for me) My light are set about 16 inches off the water.

Personally, I get the best growth from T-5 and I've tried a myriad of different high dollar to cheap Chinese box lights.
The deeper your tank the more light you will need because the water will absorb it. The width of your tank will also be a limitation because if you have a really narrow tank. Going by the photo I'm guessing a 40 gallon? or something close? If so I would personally suggest 36 inch T-5 either 3 duel bulb fixtures or 2 triple bulb. You can start with two of course as well to see how that does. I have a single 36 inch actinic with one actinic and one 10K bulb over my sump and it can grow just about anything. Also your bulbs are a factor. T-5 can go bad or come out of the box bad (I recently had this happen just never worked from the get go). Changing the bulbs should considered. I buy cheap t-5 fixtures off of eBay from a seller called TopDogSellers. They have always had very affordable light fixtures with bulbs. I take the diffusers off the lights (the clear plastic shield covering the light bulbs. Close to your tank that will eventually kill the bulbs. You can take off just the white sticky covering and leave the clear plastic but then you'll have to wipe it down cause it will gather salt. I just replace my fixtures when they die which isn't very often. I think I've had 2 die (they were right on the edge of the tank and salt creep killed them) out of ten I've bought (I have/had) other tanks. I use the bulbs they come with (they are decent just make sure you get the 10k and actinic bulbs with yours not freshwater) then I buy new bulbs from bulkreefsupply.

That's just my 2 cents and where I would start. Finding the cheap generic t-5 really helped me personally, because the ones at the stores are just way too expensive and don't seem to have anymore life in them than the cheap ones.

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

what would be the minimum for somone on a budget as most of these LED set ups are in the $100's? like could I swap my 2 standard 30" T5's for 2 24" T5 HO's?

Like I said, check out TopDogSellers They have a 4 bulb T-5HO fixtures right now for 70.00 and free shipping.

 

[BroccoliFarmer]

Sounds like a love song title