Reef nutrition

SPS dieing help!!!!!

Why is my SPS shedding its skin and dieing. my water parameters were great 3 days ago. I'm gunna test my water again today or tomorrow. But please help!! All my other SPS r doing fine this one is dieing all of a sudden. Iv had it for 2 months no problem and the polyps of been out until 2 days ago. It looks like there is some very tiny black bug of the dead part of the coral. Almost like baby copepods.
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I put brand new t5s in like a week ago. And nitrate and ammonia were 0, alk was like 10 and calcium was a little high at like 580 I think calcium is supposed to be at 440. I did but a few more dry rock in my tank 2 days ago. So maybe that made my nitrates spike?? But all my other SPS r fine and all other corls r fine in an hr or two I'll go rest my tank for parameters again.

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But I just spook all the Shadid skin off and I think it may already be to far gone. Bummer that was one I really liked :(


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SPS i.e, acropora are literally the hardest corals to keep alive. Generally speaking they like high light, medium to high flow, and stability. Most people dont start doing acropora until theyve been keeping corals succesfully for at least 6 months.

Two reasons
  1. Your tank stabilizes
  2. You learn how to keep your tank chemistry stable
Dont worry ive bought about 16 sps frags since I started this hobby. I have 10 left.

Your acro has RTN'd (rapid tissue necrosis) aka it died.

Try to test and learn how fast your alkalinity/calcium/magnesium gets used up and figure how to keep it stable (water changes, dosing, calcium reactor, etc).
 
Thanks I need to eat water again. And I know SPS is hard to keep but avuncular of people told me I can do it and gave to free frags. And I understand in a begin her I'm still making beginer mistakes like I did a fresh water dip on my SPS and all my other corals and I almost killed all my SPS they r slowly coming back. U live and learn. Just hoping to learn without killing live things. I does two-part and I do if I hand do you think it's dosing pump would be better?


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Water parameter test results. nitrite zero, ammonia zero, alk 196.9 ppm or 11 dkh, and calcium is still high at 520 ppm any suggestions??? I think it's gata be fryed from the new t5 light bulbs


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I'd keep in mind that you also should be testing phosphates and nitrates. If your tank is fully cycled, it should never have detectable nitrite or ammonia. Phosphate and nitrate are what indicate excess nutrients in a cycled tank.

Also, for SPS you have to keep all parameters stable. The exact levels aren't as important as stability. That includes salinity (so you have to be consistent with top offs or have an auto top off system), temperature, alkalinity, calcium, magnesium, nitrate, and phosphate.

I doubt your T5 light is too strong, but most SPS corals do best if you light acclimate them to a new light. When you get new SPS frags, you should place them lower in the tank first and then slowly move them up to their final placements locations. Once they're acclimated, you want to provide them with high light and high flow. Generally if your light was too strong, that would have just made the coral bleach (or lose color), not undergo rapid tissue necrosis and die.

Another big considerations would be pests, which can kill SPS corals quickly. You shouldn't FW dip your SPS, but you should be dipping new frags in saltwater with a chemical for cleaning corals, such as Revive or Coral RX. This will help prevent pests from being introduced to your system. You might want to keep an eye out for red bugs or acro eating flat worms.
 
Ya I realized I shouldn't dip SPS after I did it and I dip then with iodine I didn't dip the first 6 corals I got but doesn't seem to have any parasites but I can see you only baby copepods by the 1000s. And phosphate/magnesium and nitrate r my next test kits I'm gunna buy. Some one convinced me that nitrite was more important. But what do I know, I was doing fresh water for 4 years easy PEZzy lemon squeezy so I started saltwater around 4 months ago everything is cycled and I have Coraline growing and all coral r happy and healthy other then that one acro which was fine three days ago good polyp extension and everything. But apparently I went wrong somewhere. What ate the water parameters supposed to be just cuz I research doesn't mean I know. Love all the info feed me ur guys's knowledge


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How are you figuring out your dosing requirements? The jump is your Alk/Ca levels is pretty big. Like @FeliciaLynn said, sps need stability not so much a very specific level. You will find sps grown in various levels of Alk n Ca.

I think the rtn could be caused by the fluctuating levels.


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I'm basically going off what people say and testing but I think a dosing pump will be one of my next purchases. And a few more test kits. I'm doing it all by hand and I think that's part of my issue.
I can only regulate how much goes In at once so I'd like to have a system where is shield does it throughout the day. Hopfully once I play with that I'll get my water and a consistent stability.

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things that can change what corals like or are used to

Adding new lights (best to add a small number of bulbs at a time, if you have had the bulbs for awhile, the new ones can shock them)
Adding new rock (depending on if its dry rock or not you can add pests, if its dry it can change Cal, and Alk)
Changing flow (either by new powerheads, re-positioning, or adding hardscape that changes the way it gets hit)
Changing salt mix
Pests


Seems like you did at least 2 of those in a short amount of time. Sometimes when keeping a reef its best to do things very slowly, think of how long it takes for an ocean to make changes....
 
Yeah I agree I think the lighting and live rock probably shocked it. I think it was more of the lighting then anything. Luckily it was only one SPS that was affected and no other calls were affected. Sadly the corals deff died.


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Yeah I agree I think the lighting and live rock probably shocked it. I think it was more of the lighting then anything. Luckily it was only one SPS that was affected and no other calls were affected. Sadly the corals deff died.


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Best reason to get involved early to a DBTC, I lost EVERYTHING in my tank like 4 years ago, and got everything back 2 months later because of my contributions to the DBTC
 
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