acro going brown :(....why?

[mortis13]

hello all,
i have been trying to grow a beautiful dark purple acro and slowly over the last 4 months and its grown a little but in the last couple of weeks its started to go brown (from the bottom up). its in a 6'x2'x2' with 3x 250w 20k (cheap brand) mh's and 4x 4' t5's. the bulbs are 12mths old now and have been on around 6-8hrs a day, is it time for a change? do brands count? or is it something else?

 

[jenny1979]

usually corals turn brown when you water parameters are too high. Check nitates and phophates

 

[Norwood IND]

usually corals turn brown when you water parameters are too high. Check nitates and phophates

Agree. Probably high nitrates and phosphates. What are your parameters?

 

[MikeandNicole]

Also check your ALK, when I get lazy on my alk dosing I can get a brown out. Where is the coral located in the tank? How much light is it getting? I have our purple bonsai at the very top under T5s and they keep their purple color pretty well.

 

[Acrotrdco]

First, like what the folks said, check your water parameter, usually it's with the water.

If your water is in perfect condition, then it could be lighting. Purple / dark purple acro's usually require the most light to sustain the purple. Check and see the PAR where you position your purple acro, see if you can move it up a little higher where it'll receive more light.

With proper water + light, my a.nana went from this brown stick:

To this in about 6 months' time.

 

[mortis13]

ok thanks people, i have just changed over to np pellets and things have gone all slimy. i was running rowaphos (1kg) in a phosban reactor and i also had a deltec 509 denitratfilter, these didnt work out so i tried the pellets. my nitrate was 7.5 and phos was 0.25 last time i checked, with api test kits. the coral is halfway up the tank right under a mh re pic.

 

[mortis13]

First, like what the folks said, check your water parameter, usually it's with the water.

If your water is in perfect condition, then it could be lighting. Purple / dark purple acro's usually require the most light to sustain the purple. Check and see the PAR where you position your purple acro, see if you can move it up a little higher where it'll receive more light.

With proper water + light, my a.nana went from this brown stick:

To this in about 6 months' time.

dude your killing me, thts like mine but in reverse!!!

 

[Felixc395]

7.5 nitrate and 0.25 phosphate seems to be the culprit to me. Makes perfect sense, those aren't absolutely sky high, but still enough to cause detriment to the coral's health and color. Hopefully the biopellets will provide a remedy.

 

[mortis13]

i think i may run the rowaphos again and hope the pellets can deal with the nitrates. i have just read somewhere that different colors like different light levels. this is my first marine aquarium and acro, it seems i have lots more reading to do

 

[turbosek]

what didn't you like about your Deltec 509? I just bought one...have not received it yet. Any input from you would be great.

 

[SPSEMPIRE]

i think i may run the rowaphos again and hope the pellets can deal with the nitrates. i have just read somewhere that different colors like different light levels. this is my first marine aquarium and acro, it seems i have lots more reading to do

personally, I have bounced around with different brands of GFO and rowaphos just doesn't do the trick for me. My preference is the run the GFO pellets so you can allow the tank water to touch more surface area of the GFO.

 

[adambirk]

phosphates of .25 is very high. the recomended amount of phosphates for an sps reef tank is less than .03ppm.

i know from my personal experiance that if i get phosphate readings over .08 i wil get browning.

nitrates of 7 really isnt that bad imo. i would concentrate on your phosphates


and yes it is time to change bulbs too. that is at the end of like for t5 tubes and when i used to run halides i had better results using name brand bulbs over ebay ones. if you have the coin radiums are the way to go if you have the right ballast.