Bet you can't figure this out.

neoalchemist74

neoalchemist74

New member
Three yr. old system 75g total, DSBw/plenum, fuge on 24hr lighting, AE Tech Reef devil skimmer,560watt MH T5 combo,cal reactor,carbon in filter sock, dual phos reactors,wave, lighting and Ph control via controller with a 12 hr light cycle. Predominantly sps, 1 med/large sarc, 1 small/med sarc, a too large (IMO) pachy clav. colony.some indo ricordia,and afew mushrooms.
Normal params are usually:
Ph 8.0 to 8.45
mag 1450
alk 9.5 dkh
cal 430
p04 undetectable
no3 2.5
salifert tests all new.
I top off w/Brightwell kalk+2
dose potassium and iodide
Great growth,great colors.
In december I started vodka dosing and also re-plumbed my return with plans on re-plumbing over flow (used a differant pvc glue).
Then half way through Jan. I sterted to see almost all my montis started sloughing off flesh yet the polyps stayed for along time. Then immediatly (within a day) some acros turned brown. in another day they also slarted losing tissue from the tips, some were not affected at all.within a week I lost a strawberry pocillapora, most of my montis and a multi stylo.
Along with many water changes,and confirming good test results,(also some Ph probe hoopalah). I sopped dosing everything, added temporary uv and continued freq. w/changes. The problem started to clear up. I trimmed up corals removed dead spots. Everone recovered and started rapid growth again.
At that time I ruled out alk burn and was thinking either Ph probe was bad or chem pollutants from the pvc glue.
then early in Apr it started again.I immitiatly, Apr. 12th :stopped dosing, checked Ph probe,added poly filter, charged my Gfo and added a cnnister w/carbon. B-4 my last water change(Apr.25th)water params. were:
Ph 7.9 to 8.3 ( suppressed from so much new media)
mag 1350
alk 8dkh
cal 400
po4 0000
no3 3
I don't know what to think. U.V. again? Maybe alleopathy, move the softies,I'm running alot of fresh carbon that w/alot of w/changes,it should be getting better not worse. is somone sneaking in my house and peeing in my tank or what?:blown:
 
just a shot in the dark but check for stray voltage as you may have something leaking and thus corroding or releasing hazerdous matierals through a crack in a housing . have you changed your cleaning tecqunics within the house and possably getting toxins through the air ? any info on how your cleaning your dsb or if your are not .i would assume that you have looked extensivly for any tiny invaders and kept an eye out on your fish as the later doesn't make sense but always can happen .what are you feeding the effected corals ? could your p04 be to low making your tank excessivly nutrient free as i have run across tanks with this situation and you would have to somewhat over feed to get some nutrient "action" going .
 
I use a grounding probe. and I have also tried prazi and iodine dips on some of the more affected corals no slugs or flat worms.I do have some red bugs on 1 or2 colonies but none of those colonies are affected at least more or less than the others.I would believe the low po4 exept I altermate between 2 GFO reactors and 1 just needed a recharge based of the reoccurance of some cyano. Recharge done a few weeks ago.My orp may not be to good (to many furry pets) but i"m not equipt to check, at least not yet. I have one of the new phos checkers from Hanna on order, due wednesday.
 
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Also why do beers only explode over a nice desk of table never over the sink or counter.
BTW I clean the top 2" of the 2/3 of the sand bed I can reach once a month w/siphon. Every other moth or so I try to stir up under the rock work by hand b4 w/ change but its getting more difficult as corals grow in.
 
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the beer issue is one that has dismayed us for years and there is no accurate answer for it as it is debated every day at some college dorm room in any of the thousands of colleges here in the states .that being said i was just trying to get at some effect that corrosion would create with a cracked housing and you can find out simply by removing the probe and measuring the voltage from the probe to the water . i myself don't believe in stray voltage actually hurting fish and corals so its the pollution effect not the electrical current that i am looking at here so give that a check . do you have any possible fish that could be picking ?it doesn't sound like the results of picking but everything has to be looked at .a nice wrasse would help remove the bugs within the tank if you pick the right one for the job . hmmmmmmmmm, i have been reading up on the vodka dosing and it seems great until something gets out of whack and you may be in that boat . i really am just getting a firm grasp on the concept and use of it but would refrain from trying to diagnose simply out of real world experience which i have little .
 
O.K. I just scraped my grounding probe clean and I do seem to have a surprising amount of stay voltage. So I went ahead and checked each and every appliance by unplugging and plugging them w/grounding probe and water in hand contact and have come to the conclusion that it must be a cumulative affect. nothing clearly worse than any thing else.
as far as fish go that was 1 of the first thigs I looked into and no I'm quite sure its not a.fish problem. I hav'nt vodka dosed since early Jan. but one idea was that the vodka dosing fuelled a bacteria that turned on the corals because the carbon supply dried up when I stopped dosing. This would explain why the U.V. may have helped. If indeed it did.
 
i have pretty much run out of questions and wisdom and hope someone can give you some direction .my only thing with the stray voltage issue would be if you have water in any component then you can get corrosion and start leaching metal into the tank .you could test for copper and see if there's any and if you know anyone that tests water professionally they may be able to help you .
 
how long do you run your gfo ? similar thing happened to me . I was running too much to long . 0n a nano tank . just asuggestion
 
iamwrasseman said:
i have pretty much run out of questions and wisdom and hope someone can give you some direction .my only thing with the stray voltage issue would be if you have water in any component then you can get corrosion and start leaching metal into the tank .you could test for copper and see if there's any and if you know anyone that tests water professionally they may be able to help you .
Click to expand...

I' considering getting lab test after another round of water changes
 
madimod said:
how long do you run your gfo ? similar thing happened to me . I was running too much to long . 0n a nano tank . just asuggestion
Click to expand...
its been nessicary to run GFO 24/7. lately because of extra disolved organics from dying corals I feed my corals accept not lately due to issues. I'm no longer vodka dosing.
 
What are the reasons you're dosing Iodide and Potassium? Prior to the second bout of problems, had you resumed dosing these 2 elements?

Have you noticed any temperature swings at all?

I can't think of any pests, that would cause what you're experiencing, among different species of corals. There are pests that would cause what you're experiencing, but they are typically species specific. Hmmmmm.... I have actually read some information about AEFW possibly effecting Montipora species.
 
You may want to consider the posibility that hydrogen sulfide may be released from the plenum/DSB from time to time.
 
returnofsid said:
What are the reasons you're dosing Iodide and Potassium? Prior to the second bout of problems, had you resumed dosing these 2 elements?

Have you noticed any temperature swings at all?

I can't think of any pests, that would cause what you're experiencing, among different species of corals. There are pests that would cause what you're experiencing, but they are typically species specific. Hmmmmm.... I have actually read some information about AEFW possibly effecting Montipora species.
Click to expand...

I was dosing potassium to try and enhance my blues and with some good results at first. as far as iodide.my seachem test showed a pretty strong difficiancy. but recently I found reason to believe that test was lying and have disposed of it. And yes in between occorances I had resumed dosing.I have been strongly suspecting OD of one of yhe above, but I stopped dosing about two weeks ago and have changed at least 2/3 of my total water volume and it still seems to be getting worse. All corals that are affected are afected in areas exposed to higher light first, its not necissarily the tips burned its just that the tips are usually exposed to higher light.Montis may burn at old growth first because of light exposure
 
if you have macro in a fuge, i would stop running the GFO. sometimes GFO can take too many nutrients out of your tank and can burn tips and cause browning
 
Pulled this guy out yesterday during w/change
 

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