Coral declining, any ideas?

[mwalker29]

First official post here on reef central, although I have been a lurker for a long time.

I have been keeping SPS for over 3 years now and have recently started another tank, 30 gallon shallow with a 20 gallon sump.

Lights. Radion XR30w g4 pro
Flow. MP10 running at 100% random
Filtration. RO BH50
Titanium heater

Alk. 7.8
Cal. 420
Mag 1300
Nitrates 2ppm

No dosing, just weekly 10% water changes. No additives.

I have 10 frags/mini colonies in this tank. They all look great other than this one. It started off great with PE and color. After about 3 weeks in the tank it started to get really dark and PE started to lessen. Now it is dark with light spots and no PE at all. I am unsure what this is as nothing in the tank has changed since it has been in the tank. Same placement, lighting, feeding, etc.

Any ideas?


Apologies for the bad pic, I will take another tonight. The coral is darker than pictured with white areas, mostly on base but not consistent.

 

[swhobbie1]

I had a bright orange monti turn very dark rust (no white spots though ) color when I moved it from under a AI-52 to a Radion XR30w g4. Both LEDs over the same tank . A couple corals became slightly darker under the Radion but not like this monti which is drastically darker . Perhaps it is similar cause

 

[Reefer40b]

You know if everything else is looking good, I would just keep it stable as possible and observe. Sometimes you can just have a real finicky one that just does not like your tank..
Do you know your phosphate level by chance?

 

[Pife]

Do you dip your coral and remove frag plugs before you put them in your tank?

 

[mwalker29]

Phosphates are undetectable and yes dipped coral and re plugged.

 

[Tripod1404]

The fact that your alk doenst drop in a week is worrying. It means there is no uptake by corals or coraline algae.

Do you use GFO or other types of phosphate absorbing media?

 

[DivingTheWorld]

Are we talking about a tank that is 3 years old, or brand new? If you're putting these acros in your brand new tank, I would stop. It needs to get seasoned for a while before you introduce something difficult like acros.

Phosphate undetectable is also an issue. Acros need some phosphates.

 

[Deahttub]

You check the impeller on your mp10? Had one split and it caused sps to fade...

 

[rvareef]

did you quarantine for parasites?

 

[davemc1234]

Check your titanium heater pull back the rubber top and check for rust these are notorious for rusting

 

[Piper27]

That frag looks like it could have two or three red bugs on it. That would definitely. Ake it look like that.