Can anyone help me solve my mystery??

[Brazengrrl]

Ok, so everything was doing great. The other morning I got up and one of my hard corals was sliming out of it skeleton
The brown one at the top.

I did a 5 gal water change and that didnt help, by yesterday it was almost all white.
The yellow toadstool is wilted and peeling brown layers off and my carnation coral that was hanging upside down in a cave on the pagoda cups side of the tank has melted away. (It was getting very big)
I replaced my carbon and still no relief.
There is the big candy cane/ trumpet coral on the side that the kenya is on and the kenya is huge now.
All the other corals are doing great and the fish are fat and sassy.
I swear I saw my Midas nipping at that brown coral, but I dont think that would cause it to slime away.
I think there is some kind of chemical warfare giong on. I have read that the kenya can send off poision and should not be placed in a tank with hard corals, but the other 2 smaller HCs are fine (for now) . The kenya and the candy cane were touching. Could those two distroy the other two corals and make the toadstool sick?
I hope someone can decipher this and help me out.

 

[Sk8r]

mixing softies and stonies is always risky. Even mushrooms can kill coral.

But make one more check: run your basic nitrate, nitrite, ammonia test strips and be sure you don't have a problem with that. That can sneak up on you so fast.

 

[chrisstie]

I wonder if this isn't some form of separate events happening at once?

As far as the pagoda goes- there are just some LPS I don't seem to have a knack to keep. If they get one little tiny scratch on them they can get infected and get really slimey- if it turns to brown slime thats bad. You want to try to frag off the healthy from infected- sometimes I will just end up with tissue recession too.

Also do you test for Mg, alk, Ca?

The toadstool- if it hasn't melted away- sometimes goes through a process where it will retract its tentacles for a week or so and then sluff off dead skin off the top - Usually a sign of growth in which the molting skin allows for new to develop and the thing becomes larger. Could this be what is going on at the same time?

and carnations? either the slime maybe poked it from the lps or .. well from what I understand they are just touchy (profanity here) things so I can't really venture a guess on that one

There's my $.02

 

[cristhiam]

how about temp?

 

[Me No Nemo]

Great point Cristhiam! Temp is very important. Everytime we see the outside temps drop, we also see lots of problems. I think one of the issues is that people don't always realize they need a heater because 1) Hey, this if Florida! and 2) The lights, pumps, etc. keep the tank warm and why take the chance of a heater going bad when there are so few times they are needed?

For the most part, that's true. But, later at night, when we have 40 degree weather, the temps often drop significantly in our homes and therefore our tanks and cause stress. This could be especially true in only 24 gallons of water. I try to avoid no more than a 2 degree temp swing in my 90. I've had a Pagoda in there for years! Also, Val, didn't you just switch to the new tank and HQI? Do you have a fan on the back? My 24 with the HQI was getting up to 86 degrees during the day before I added a fan on the back. Now it stays about 80. But, if you are having a high water temp during the day, then the temp is plumetting at night, that could very well be the problem.

 

[cschweitzer]

Aren't carnations the dendronepthia? These have been tested over and over and noone seems to be able to keep them. Non-photosynthetic but very unaccepting of foods in the aquarium. They still haven't found anything that the dendronepthias will eat in captivity. Don't know how bad they crap out a system when they perish(haven't read on it yet) and I've never owned one, but that might be the cause to problems. Do a search on WWM or try to find out about them on RC.

 

[Brazengrrl]

Ok, I had my water tested today and everything was ok, a little high on Nitrates .10 and the PH was a little low, I think because the lights had just come on when I took the water sample.
They said that there was nothing in my water that could cause my problems.
I am guessing temp or chemical warfare.
I dont use a heater because of all of the horror stories I have read.
I am going to downsize and move the Kenya and see if that helps.
Thanks for all your suggestions!

 

[chrisstie]

Using a heater responsibly and with a good controller and accurate thermometer I think help weed out a lot of problems...

I have some friends who have lost livestock with large temperature swings- during most of the day everything can run fine but at night like Marcye and a few others have said your temp can drop more than a few degrees if its chilly out like the cold fronts we've been having.

I am still going to bet on it being separate events of the toadstool versus everything else (or just it closing up due to stress) and probably some chemicals going into the water .. and maybe the LPS got damaged slightly like a snail or crab shell scathed the surface? From there who knows what could happen

 

[Me No Nemo]

A controller will certainly offset most heater problems. It can be programmed to turn off the the heater if the temp raises above a certain temp.

 

[cschweitzer]

Unless the controller probe is off or gets stuck...

 

[Sk8r]

I've used a heater of some sort for 40 years in some tank or other and never had a problem. Just don't get the cheapest and replace the heater if there's a suspicion of a problem.