Flesh falling off all my sps!

[Cyberdude]

Ahhh and just when everything was going well. I recently started dosing for stability. And I think I hit it.


90dt and 25 sump with cheato and skimmer
No carbon, gfo etc. Just filter floss

Alk 7.7
Ca 420
Mg 1359
Nitrate 2
Phosphate 0.06
Ph 8.28 (mid day)
Temp steady 78.2
Salinity steady 1.026

All tested with salferit
Lighting 2 x hydra 52


The only thing I can think of is the alk swing. Last week it was as high as 11 and today it has been stead at 7.5-7.7 for about a week. I've had some of these corals for over a year.

Dose acropower
Reef roids

All Lps (a lot of it) growing very well
About 12 fish.

Purple bonsai

Rainbow monti

Unknown


Birds nest 2 weeks old came from Lfs with alk at 7.5. No signs of weakness. Encrusting a little.



I did notice a very large blue legged hermit crab last night. Don't know if he has an appetite go coral. Very large claws.

And guidance is appreciated.

 

[Cyberdude]

Haven't done a water change in 2 months.

 

[nemodan]

The Alk peak is the cause.

No WC ?

How do you replace what the corals are using ?

 

[NaturalReef]

Been there, done that cyber! Lost some beautiful SPS frags. 99% alkalinity swing issue. Some will show it right away, others will take a week or two to show the effects. The smaller the frag, the harder for it to recover. Make sure you change alk slowly. If it's too high, turn off doser and allow it naturally to come down. If it's too low, dose in small amounts to bring it back up.

 

[Cyberdude]

Natural reef. That's what I did. I noticed a spike 11+ and turnover off dosing... Everyday for a week I watched it come down. Which gave me the chance to calculate the tanks alk consumption. About 0.6 a day. When alk reached 7ish I started to dose (been 5 days) and measuring daily to keep it at 7.5-7.7. Which I am happy to say it has not moved. At all. Except you might be right in terms of the damage done. Not sure they will recover. They are still showing signs of daily degradation. Except the new birds nest.

 

[NaturalReef]

The damage is done for sure cyber....now is the time to try and salvage what you can. Keep monitoring daily and see if the necrosis Is slow or fast. If it is going downhill fast, you will need to frag to stop it. Only problem with fragging is, you weaken the coral even more after it is already stressed. If it is slow tissue necrosis, I would keep everything stable and it will stop on its own and recover. This is all from my experience with a swing and what I would do differently. I had a prized miyagi tort and pink lemonade that if I wouldn't have fragged, may have made it.

 

[Cyberdude]

Good advice thanks