experienced reefer loosing some tissue on acros.could it be from using biopellets/gfo

B

bridun22ajl

New member
Hey guys,
Im loosing a little bit of tissue on a few acros in my tank. not on the base and not on the tip, but in the middle or random spots.

the only think i can really think of is that its from the biopellets and gfo at the same time.

I have been using biopellets(npx) for atleast 3 months but maybe longer. and i havent really reduced the amount of gfo that im using.

most of my acros look good but a few are loosing tissue and i dont want it to keep spreading as i have grown the colonies from small frags.

they are getting plenty of flow and light. water quality is good and stable alk/cal.

2mp40 on a 90 gallon for flow.

thanks in advance
 
I've been using biopellets for six months now and everything looks great ,but I discontinued GFO after first month.Maybe this is the problem.
 
bridun22ajl said:
Hey guys,
Im loosing a little bit of tissue on a few acros in my tank. not on the base and not on the tip, but in the middle or random spots.

the only think i can really think of is that its from the biopellets and gfo at the same time.

I have been using biopellets(npx) for atleast 3 months but maybe longer. and i havent really reduced the amount of gfo that im using.

most of my acros look good but a few are loosing tissue and i dont want it to keep spreading as i have grown the colonies from small frags.

they are getting plenty of flow and light. water quality is good and stable alk/cal.

2mp40 on a 90 gallon for flow.

thanks in advance
Click to expand...

I think it is from the combo of using the pellets and GFO at the same time. When Vodka dosing the first time, I had the same problem. You need to make sure that alk is low and that you dont drop the nutrients too fast or else the SPS start to STN in random places.

I would take the GFO out right away. Let the pellets work slowly.
 
Any random tissue loss in the middle of the coral is a red flag for AEFW especially if the remaining polyps do not open. JMO.
 
I wouldn't put the blame on the pellet/gfo combo either. If anything they will work together, but i've never heard of the two causing problems together. As sahin mentioned...I have noticed that if my alk creeps up past about 10 or so i'll start to notice my SPS getting these bubbles and losing skin in certain places. Fortunately this usually doesn't mean the end of the coral as long as you correct the problem. Maybe test your alk and let us know where its at.
 
sedor said:
I wouldn't put the blame on the pellet/gfo combo either. If anything they will work together, but i've never heard of the two causing problems together. As sahin mentioned...I have noticed that if my alk creeps up past about 10 or so i'll start to notice my SPS getting these bubbles and losing skin in certain places. Fortunately this usually doesn't mean the end of the coral as long as you correct the problem. Maybe test your alk and let us know where its at.
Click to expand...

I didnt explain myself fully. Its not that the pellets are being used in a combo that is the problem in the literal sense, its rather that both are working to pull phosphates out of the water. I think it a combo of phosphate being pulled out too fast by two methods-ie the phosphate removal is too intense/fast, and maybe your alk is too high for such intense nutrient removal.

By all means look out for pests too. But do post your water parameters.
 
If you had an Ultra Low Nutrient System and then had a alk spike you would lose tissue from the base up.

The random loss of tissue tells me it is probably some kind of pest. Please inspect your corals closely with a magnifying glass and take pics if you can.
 
not a pest. I have seen a all pest before and these are not bite marks. I will recheck Alk today.

and also, one of the acros is a milli, i thought aefw dont eat milli?
 
bridun22ajl said:
not a pest. I have seen a all pest before and these are not bite marks. I will recheck Alk today.

and also, one of the acros is a milli, i thought aefw dont eat milli?
Click to expand...

Like I said in my first post, I believe this is due to the an Alk issue becuase of ULNS - here you are using both pellets and GFO in order to achieve ULNS and I feel your alk is too high for ULNS. For some unknown reason, corals can grow and even do very well with alk higher than NSW, but when we try and run ULNS's we need to decrease alk.

I had this same problem before, and I am certain you are facing the same problem.

Have you measured your alk? Can you post some photos of your corals?
 
FWIW...I had a similar problem. White spots on random SPS...even my big orange monti and a couple STN'ing. Particularly my Bali Tricolor.

But mine seemed to be a grab bag of issues...My CARx got clogged and once unclogged my alk took a swing and went to 11 over a week or two period, I was using BRS pellets in a BRS reactor which worked WELL (wondered if TOO well), and I was using more than the recommended dosage of BRS high cap GFO all at the same time. My numbers at the time of all this were Alk-11, CA 500, PH 8.25 (also dosed Kalk in topoff), Mg 1500, P04-.11 (Hannah), and N03 5 (started out at 35ish).

I took my pellets offline...scaled back the 02 on my reactor, lowered the Kalk from 4 Tbs/5gal to 2, dumped out half the GFO I was using (from 3/4 TLF canister to 1/3), ran new carbon, and waited. Now my corals are looking MUCH better and things are coming back. STN stopped as well on a couple that were starting to go.

Now my N03 is starting to climb back up and my glass has to be scraped about every couple days vs. every couple weeks...but my tank is much happier.

Now whether or not you can pull anything useful out of all that I dont know. At the very least you can know you are not alone...:beer:

I do plan on trying the pellets again at some point but maybe with a bit more caution next time. Like I said...in my case I think it was a mix of factors...but I dont think the pellets were completely void of fault.
 
My tank looks great and most corals have never looked better before. Water is crystal clear. Im not having swings in alk.

my alk was low, around 7. i have worked on getting it back up to 8-9. could it have dropped too low and cause this recession? I see a little recession aroudn the base of one of the acros.

But like i said before, my tank has never looked better( although, it never looks bad!)

po4 and no3 are 0. (hanna/salfert) and i have been running GFO for a a long time now, and only 100 grams(BRS pellet size GFO) and i have been running NPX bio pellets for approx 6 months.

Could htis just be my Alk went too low?
 
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