Neptune Aquatics

help with acros

Orion

Orion

Guest
BARcard
Hi, I need help to figure out why LPS/SPS coral are not doing good in my tank.
Here are the details: I have a 40 gallon reef I have mainly done soft corals. The tank has been running for about 8 months now. last water parameters as of 1/25/2009
Temp 79
PH 8.3
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Alkalinity 13
Phosphate 0
Calcium 460
Spec Gravity 1.022

with that been siad all the soft corals and clam I have are doing great (Healthy and growing).

I do have a bird nest, and a blue acro they both were doing great for the first 3 weeks but then they started to loose the color (bleach).

I use the Brightwell Aquatic line of products. Reef Code A and B, Koralcolor, Microvore, liquid reef, Replenish, Restor, Phytogold-s, Phytogree-s, Zooplanktos-s.
Kent Marine: Coral Accel
Reef Nutrition: Artic Pods, Oyster Feast, Roti Feast.
Frozen Food: Brine Shrimp, Coral Food Mix

I also have a diamond back goby and a pair of perculas.

The light system is a combo fixture of 1x 250W DE HQI, 2x 96W actinic blue Compact Fluorescent, and 4x Dual Bluemoon LED
I have a Prism protein skimmer and a 15 gal sump/refugium

What can I do to help the birdnest and blue acro get the color back and to avoid in the future hard coral to bleach.
I want to start getting some LPS and SPS but I am afraid that I am not going to be as succesfull as I have been with my softies.
Any ideas, feedback and help will be appreciated.

Thanks

Orion
 
I'm by no means an expert, but the things that jumped out at me are the SG (seems a little low - I think 1.026 is closer to NSW?), Alk (high) and CA (a bit high). Might want to check Mg as well.
 
you should post pics of them so we can see where they are at in relation to your lighting and what the color looks like. Some birdsnest require more of a medium light intensity so if it's at a really intense lighting part of your tank it could cause that. Another consideration is how steady are your perameters. How steady is your temp, salinity, etc. Using auto-topoff or anything else to keep levels as steady as possible?
 
Agree with Natterjak. Increase salt to 1.025-1.026. Inverts like it salty. :D

If, after all the water parameters are in order, then there might be some allelopathy going on. I am thinking that my 28 gal. is experiencing this. I probably have too many softies with too many LPS in a too small of a tank. Everytime I replace chemical absorbers, I notice an improvement in the hard corals and zoas which leads me to believe that there is a chemical warfare going on. When my tank was less populated, I did not have this problem. Also, could be that nutrients are being used up faster, or a combo of both in my situation.
 
Ditto on what Bonnie said. Be careful increasing your salinity as your KH and calcium will increase as well. Currently your KH is high (8-10 is ideal) and calcium is a little high (420-450 ideal). Your Mg should be more like 1350.
 
I think your alk is high. Be careful with what test kits you're using because some will be off quite a bit. For example, Salifert had a bad batch that was reading way off. Best thing to do is to check against a fellow reefers or get a standard solution to check the accuracy. What kind of flow do you have
 
Let's not forget about water flow!

I have very few sps in my tank. I have one BROWN acro that is freaking huge! I have 2 Seio (ie; gentle flowing pumps) that I aimed at the acro...after a while the growth tips, and the parts that were whitish all turned purple! I attribute this entirely to the water flow as I didn't change anything other than reditect the Seios directly at the acro!

I was always squeamish about aiming water flow directly at corals, but one day I noticed at Aquatic Gallery that one of thie stunning tanks had humongous amounts of flow... so I tried it (I added an extra pump) and things seem to like the extra flow a lot more!

Seriously, I can't believe how big this acro is...if it weren't brown, it would be awesome, but the new purple highlights are nice!

I DO have a lot of softies though, two very large devils hands, one large toadstool, several small toadstools. A few mushrooms, a crapload of green ricordias, zoos and then a bunch of LPS as well.

I'm sure there is a constant chemical battle going on in there!

V
 
For water testing I use Aquatic Pharmaceutical Reef Master test Kit and Salwater Master Test Kit.
I have a Odyssea EX 250 Powerhead (250 gph flow rate) and a Koralia nano (240 gph flow rate)
 
You need a lot more flow than that.. I had about 800GPH in my old 12G tank. Take your water to a reliable LFS and have them test it for you. You can compare the resolve with your test kit.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top