Acro RTN - Please Help

[chatyak]

I've had an acro frag in my tank for a few weeks now (coral QT) and just in the past 2 days it lost all of its tissue. I have other SPS in my display that are doing fine and growing. I don't understand why it died so suddenly.

I use Reef Crystals salt, and coral QT temp is around 80-81 degrees. There is no sump (just a 10 gallon) so when I add top off water - it drops down about 1 degree. Water changes of about 1 gallon at a time. The tank also has a few snails and 2 blood shrimps in it - so I feed a few pellets each day.

Lighting with a Orphek PR-25 pendant, so PAR is not an issue. I also have a clam in there, pulsing xenia, montipora, and a plating coral... all seem ok....

Acro was in the 200+ PAR range.

Why did this happen? I keep reading that high ALK causes this. Is this true? Reef Crystals has high alk to begin with... It doesn't make sense though - I use the same salt for the display and all is well...

I noticed the base was white yesterday, and it also ran upwards in a streak behind the coral about an inch or two (where there was little light on that side).... I inspected closely and found this crab. I don't know if it was an acro crab or not so I placed it in a cup for now. It is about the size of a pencil eraser - tiny. What kind of crab is it?

Then I dipped the coral for 20 minutes in Coral Revive with QT water - then rinsed from fresh display water and put back in QT - now today, almost all of the tissue is gone - not just the base.

At first I thought maybe the crab was slowly eating it over the few weeks.

$60 gone.... :headwally:


Why did this happen and how do I stop it from happening again?

 

[jadette]

20 minutes in Revive is too long for SPS. Directions say up to 15 minutes. Personally, I dip for 10 minutes. For smooth skin acros, I only dip for 5 min.

 

[Mikey122687]

Yea Revive is very strong, and 20 mins is a lot. I usually dip all my corals for 5-10 minutes only. Never more than that

 

[slapshot]

Or it could be nothing you did, it's just life in the sticks.

 

[reefsahoy]

There is an article in coral magazine that talks about frags and the percent success rate of them surviving. Simply stating that frags that are smaller than i think 1 inch is mor likely to die that larger frags over 1 inch. It states that if you do go below 1 inch to make sure that the frag was cut and glued under water and never exposed to air. That will give you a much better chance of survival. I dont know if that was your issue but i figured id share that info i read in the mag.