<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9865458#post9865458 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by All Delight
Randy -
I've had that happen to a few of my micros. To me it happened so quickly. In a matter of a couple days. Bam the colony was gone. It was like peeling off a sticker. They were established pieces that I've had for nearly a year. And it wasn't happening in a particular part of the tank. It just dumb founded me. Thankfully it stopped, but I lost about 4 different ones. I just don't know. I've asked other people too and no one had a clue.
I hope your situation gets better.
What are your trying to do to fix it?
I only noticed one Micro starting to peel. It was on it's side on the egg crate, so I thought it was just irritation from sitting on live flesh. I put it in a cup with some Tropic Marin Pro Coral Cure and I started to blast it with a turkey baster. The flesh kept peeling away. I started to think I would lose the whole piece, so I cut it up. I threw out the worst piece and kept the two better pieces. Neither made it.
The next day, I noticed 5 more colonies infected. The flesh was very loose. With a strong blow of the baster, I probably could have blown the flesh right off the skeleton. So this time I skipped the dip and just moved them to a new system, putting them in low flow.
So far, 2 more have been cleaned of flesh. A couple others still have flesh, but it might just be a slow death.
I've encountered flesh bail out on LPS before. In almost every case, the lps didn't make it when it stayed in the same water.
A few years ago a friend brought me a pink Echinophyllia that was showing signs of flesh bail out. The flesh was only connected at the very ends of the coral. The whole body of the coral was just flapping in the flow.
I put it in low flow in my 55 gallon tank, under some VHO's. I left it alone for a few months. It slowly started to recover and reattach to the skeleton.
I gave it back to him after 3-4 months and he still has it today.
He never knew why this coral started to do this, and was the only one out of 100's of corals in his system.
With my water parameters seeming OK(Mag was at 1100, a little low) I have to assume there is some other chemical factor affecting my corals. The thing that has me scratching my head is that the older, established corals were affected. None of the newer introduced corals seem stressed.
After typing this, a light bulb went off in my head. I read an article today about Caribbean Staghorn. It said these corals were one of the fastest growing coral, and also were the fastest to die when something goes wrong.
I have many Duncanopsammia in the system, and the only one that took a hit was my home grown Duncan.
I'm starting to think that it's fast growth and increased metabolic rate contributed to it's fall, and maybe was a warning sign of other things to come.
Time for a big water change.
On another note, I have the privilege of talking to Anthony Calfo a few weeks back, and he was talking about monoculture.(growing only one specific type of coral in a system) and how the animals do much better. For mixed reefs, he recommend one type/piece of coral per 10 gallons of water because of the competition and chemical warfare that takes place in our tanks.
The large variety in my tanks could be my downfall.
So I'll add that to the 100's of things it could be.
HTH!!!!!!!
