Closed Zoas Coral

[andreasch]

hello guys,

as am new to reef, i would love some help on the above topic. i have a zoas coral in my tank for a month now. It was looking good until last sunday. Since Sunday my zoas is closed and wont open at all. My params are as follows:
Ph - 8,2
KH - 7,3
Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Phosphate - 0,2
Nitrate - 10ppm
Ca - 480
Mg - 1500
Temperature - 25-26 celcium degrees

My tank is 670 liters. I made 100 liters water change on Monday night but nothing changed.
I know my Phosphate and Nitrates are a bit high, but is this a reason to make zoas close?

Is there any other reason it could be this happening?

Thanks in advance

 

[mcgyvr]

Parameters are totally fine..
What were they before this happened though?
Corals like stability in parameters and not necessarily a specific number (as long as its in the accepted range)

If I had to be ultra picky about your parameters.. mag and cal are a bit high and alk is on the lower end.. Why? What salt mix are you using?

Thats unlikely to be a real problem or the cause for the corals to be closed up..

Do you always run such heavy blue light like that?
Maybe they want more natural/fuller spectrum light to be happy..
Maybe they aren't rave goers
What else changed?

 

[Uncle99]

Just the water change, may have affected your parameters somewhat, any change especially Alk, salinity and temp will make almost any coral unhappy.

Bit hard to see much with the blues cranked up.

I would not be concerned. If it does not return to normal in a couple of days or so, check parameters, run some carbon, but Zoa usually very undemanding....

 

[andreasch]

About parameters, the only one that had change was KH. It was on 6,4 and raised it with dosing pump to 7,3 in 2 weeks period. During that period the zoas was ok. Only the last 3 days is closed. So i guess is not that. All rest params are stable.

About lights, i run blue/uv to control the algae i had. But this situation is almost for a month and still zoas was fine all this time.

I found out something that is may be the answer to the problem? I had the opinion that pests will make part of the zoas closed and not the full coral. BUT i found these on the glass during night so i guess maybe is the reason for closed zoas?

 

[nereefpat]

There could be a number of reasons, and we're just guessing. I agree that the parameters are within normal spec.

Zoas are famous for having pests.

Could something, like algae or vermitid snails irritating it? Do you have a fish or invert that might be picking on it?

 

[jlmawp]

About parameters, the only one that had change was KH. It was on 6,4 and raised it with dosing pump to 7,3 in 2 weeks period. During that period the zoas was ok. Only the last 3 days is closed. So i guess is not that. All rest params are stable.

About lights, i run blue/uv to control the algae i had. But this situation is almost for a month and still zoas was fine all this time.

I found out something that is may be the answer to the problem? I had the opinion that pests will make part of the zoas closed and not the full coral. BUT i found these on the glass during night so i guess maybe is the reason for closed zoas?

Those are nudibranches. Looks like you found your culprit. They can be sleeper pests, and suddenly pop up in large numbers out of nowhere, in my experience. My zoas also reacted like this. If one was being munched on, a bunch in the area would also close up, likely in anticipated defense. Not all nudis eat zoas, but it's likely these are, considering your sudden problem.

There are people on here that can recommend livestock that will help eliminate them, but I got rid of mine by being vigilant and manually removing them. I checked multiple times a day and just extracted them on sight. After a few weeks of that, I haven't seen any in some time and my zoas are back to happy/healthy.

 

[andreasch]

I guess we found the reason yes. Yesterday when i got home from work i got 10 of these out of the tank which i found crawling on the glass... i cant imagine how many they are in there. I took out my zoas and dipped again, but i guess these nubis are everywhere now in the tank not only on zoas.

I will try to get out as many as i see, but i would love some suggestions for reef safe live stock that can eliminate them please. Do you know if "Orange back fairy wrasse" is eating these nubis? I ordered one already and am gonna add it on Monday