Crazy RTN

[CoralKingdom]

Ok, so I posted about a week ago about possible Montipora nudibranches eating my coral. I never spotted any but now I have a HUGE SPS problem.

Tank stats
20 gallon sps/frag tank + 30 gallon sump/fuge/extra frag space
130 watt 2 bulb PC light
~800GPH flow
Fish: two small clownfish

Water temp 79-81F
PH 8.2-8.4
Alk 7.5
Calcium 470
Magnesium 1400
Salinity 1.025-1.026
Can't find my ammonia, nitrate, or phosphate test kits at the moment. Nitrates are usually low, but I have been dealing with phosphates from egg crate recently.

Also, everything has been growing like crazy until this past week.


Two days ago I noticed a few corals near the surface had a few lighter spots, polyp extension wasn't as good as normal and my sour apple birds nest colony (and it's frags placed in various spots of the tank) had a lot of closed polyps and possible bleached spots. I assumed it was due to having recently removed the glass top and I replaced the glass top and cut the light period from 8 hours to 4 hours and used only one bulb (2 bulb PC, 130 watts)
After two days some of the corals still looked slightly bleached in parts so I only had the light on for several hours today.

Just before I went to bed I decided to check and see how the corals were doing, turned on the light and I was shocked to find the bleaching problem had gone on steroids. LOTS of tissue loss on many SPS, strangely mostly Montipora (couldn't see any nudi's still) and one or two polyps on one my micromusa's had bleached as well. Some of the zoas seemed a bit upset and the polyps on my garf bonsai were closed.
The birdsnest seemed to be doing better as most of the polyps began to open up with the light and a new sps (WWC Toxic Acro) has fine polyp extension so it really seems hit or miss.

Here's a few pictures (under 10k bulb minus the last one), The first picture shows the Toxic Acro with decent polyp extension so not every single sps is effected as bad and the last picture I took on Saturday of one of the Montipora that is now rapidly bleaching to show what it looked like just before.
http://imgur.com/a/11jnF

 

[Daimyo68]

First thought is Stray Voltage. Get a volt meter and test for it.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2182599

 

[CoralKingdom]

First thought is Stray Voltage. Get a volt meter and test for it.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2182599

Actually I just fixed a stray voltage problem. Had a cut and whenever the tip of my finger touched the water it would sting from stray voltage. My lights were plugged into a 2 prong timer and they weren't able to ground themselves. Turning them on manual for now and no more stray voltage problem.

 

[bogg]

My first thought is that in 20g of water there might well be fluctuations happening quickly stress equaling rtn stn etc

Second thought is that you might want to double check the corals for pests
Even dip them just to see if you may have them
Also never hurts to do a nice water change in the meantime

 

[CoralKingdom]

My first thought is that in 20g of water there might well be fluctuations happening quickly stress equaling rtn stn etc

Second thought is that you might want to double check the corals for pests
Even dip them just to see if you may have them
Also never hurts to do a nice water change in the meantime

Running the RO unit to get some fresh water for a water change as we speak.


And as far as fluctuations it should be less now that I have nearly doubled the water volume with the new sump.

 

[dowtish]

Are you just maintaining your levels thru WC's? This could possibly be from an Alkalinity swing. Do you know how much your alk is from one day to the next?

 

[CoralKingdom]

Are you just maintaining your levels thru WC's? This could possibly be from an Alkalinity swing. Do you know how much your alk is from one day to the next?

I was doing weekly water changes but about two weeks ago I got calcium, magnesium, and alk test kits and while calcium and magnesium were fine/)slightly above normal alk was low (around 5.5-6) so after raising it over three days with baking soda to 7ish I began to drip kalk. I have a lot of evaporation (one and a half to two gallons a day) so I was just slowly dripping kalk (started at 1 teaspoon per gallon) at night and dripping regular RO water in the day. Kalk seemed to be pretty stable around 7.3-7.5 from dripping and growth was going from ok to great.

Here's a picture of some of the damage done in the last day (besides a tiny bit that was already bleached at the base of the coral)
http://i.imgur.com/awQeW0r.jpg

luckily not all of the corals continued to rtn all night or at least slowed down. It' just so strange that it would effect mostly my Montipora species and NOT be nudibranchs. That monti cap in the picture survived for over a year and a half in my brother's care with just several water changes, no skimmer, temps daily hitting 83, and only topping off water every 3-4 days before I got back into the hobby.

 

[dkeller_nc]

You mentioned that you took a glass top off of the tank. Glass absorbs UV radiation fairly efficiently, fluorescent bulbs put out a significant amount of it, and you went from "glass cover" to "no glass cover" in a very short period.

It is at least possible that you "sun burned" your corals, and it will take a few days for the effects to become obvious.

 

[CoralKingdom]

Well the orange cap is completely white now and tissue has blown off. At least the cheapest coral went first. Not sure if more tissue is coming off "dead" spots on the other corals or if the rtn/stn is still going on but I'm gonna do a few more slow water changes (take out 10-15% and then drip it back in along with top off water) Also took out the few pieces of the montipora I had in the fuge so I can leave the metal halide on over the cheato a bit longer each day to balance the lack of oxygen being produced in the main tank from less lighting.

 

[CoralKingdom]

Anddd stuff keeps dying, even things that were doing ok the past two days have some die off on the edges. Losing my mystic sunset and tequila sunrise colonies soon, here's a small piece off the tequila sunrise on a frag plug.
http://i.imgur.com/AQDZiza.jpg?1

Can't find any pests still but I just don't think it could ALL be from the light increase, some of the frags I had just moved to lower areas a few days before this happened...

 

[hedgedrew]

Welcome to sps keeping. It seems that any change. Ie lighting or alk swings starts these things and it spreads. I have stopped these things with water changes or things like kent toxic metal sponge or cuprasorb. Sometimes new carbon. Sometimes it makes it worse.

 

[Jurg]

I had the same problem happen a few months ago. My Issue was my PH and Alk were both to low. Make sure all of your test kits are not expired and maybe re check. I would even cut some pieces or glue areas to prevent losing the entire coral. I saved at least 4 they started RTN.

 

[jg93]

I've been having a similar problem. I narrowed down a couple of culprits -

1) My Alk was low, and my Ca was high (which you have)
2) I changed my Alk/Ca drip from once/day to smaller drips over the entire day, which effectively and swiftly changed parameters
3) Just discovered my GFO/Carbon reactor was stagnate

The above poster is right... "welcome to SPS keeping," I've lost some stuff, others are stressed, but I think I've stopped the worst of the damage.

I swear I'm going back to LPS/Zoa's if i ever have a tank crash. I really like SPSs but they're so much more labor intensive.

 

[CoralKingdom]

Update.

Most of the pieces I fragged off my colonies didn't make it through the night (made sure some of the frags were of completely live sections) Note to self: always have back up pieces somewhere else!

Garf Bonsai hasn't gotten any worse, and all the birdsnest are back to normal.


Found the rest of my carbon and put it in overnight. I don't have a reactor but I put it in a filter sock on the end of the intake to the sump. Must not have washed it out as good as I should of and the aquarium was a bit cloudy. Went to the LFS to check their tests against mine and ammonia/nitrate/phosphates were 0, alk was 8, ph was 8.3, but calcium was 280. They had the cheap generic brand of test kits so I really doubt the calcium was 280, my Red Sea tests show way higher and I've been doing a lot of water changes so it should definitely not be that low.

Lastly, some good news. I think the majority of my mystic sunset and rainbow monti will make it, the bleaching appears to have stopped on those pieces as well as a few others, some of the polyps have come back out on the rainbow too. I really like SPS and I'm definitely not giving up the battle, just going to take things slower from here on out and have back up frags in my other tank.