Green slimer not growing

[johnnytmc]

Hi,

I need help identifying issues with my green slimer not growing. I know this one is supposedly a faster grower, but it hardly grows in my tank at all. In fact, most of my other acro's are not growing much as well. The only exceptions are my Gatorade acro and brown/purple tip stag; both of them doubled in size over the last 10 months. My other SPS corals are growing fairly fast as well. Most of birdsnests and digitata doubled/tripled in size over the last 10 months, so things are growing, but not my green slimer.

My water parameters are all within the recommended range: Ca 440, Alk 10, Mag 1350, Nitrate 0, Phosphate 0.04. I wonder if this is a lighting issue. I use 14K 150W MH with two 24W T5. My tank is 12in deep and the fixture is suspended 6 inches above. I figure some of my acro's are more light demanding, and they are not receiving enough light with 150W MH? My Gatorade acro and brown stag are brown in nature so can do well with lower light? I do have a 250W MH fixture that I can swap out. Is this a correct diagnosis?

 

[chrishayes]

ive seen similar results. I tend to lean towards needing more food. My slimer grew VERY fast in my 28gal that was over 3 years old and had its share of organics. Now in my new system its struggling a little. Its PE has decreased along with some color loss and growth has slowed to nearly a halt. Its got plenty of light, top of the tank under 250w radium so thats not the issue. Ive started feeding heavily and upped the flow in its area and have seen improvement. Its strange when the hardier beginner sps' suffer in ones system for sure. I have a birdnest and this slimer along with a yellow acro that have all not done well in the new tank for some reason. They are all in the same far left side of the tank on the same wall as my vortech so there could be a link between them. All other corals are flourishing. its possible they are just not getting enough direct flow since its all undertow thats hitting them. since I pointed my return line towards the slimer as I said ive seen improvement. so ill letcha know if this is the ticket or not.

Is yours in good flow? like polyps whippin around? I think this is needed for the slimer.

 

[jbanks]

Johnny, are you carbon dosing??? If so, you will notice stunted growth on your slimer with your Alk @ 10dkh(I've witnessed this myself in my own tank when ALK started rising too high). Either way, I would allow the Alk to fall to between 8 and 9 and monitor for a few weeks.. Aside from that, I would try feeding a bit more and upping the flow as suggested by Chris above.. With only 12" of depth, my guess is that lighting is not your issue.. Your 150 should do fine.

 

[gon08]

Sometimes corals get "Lazy" at least thats what I call it. If everything is within proper levels and other corals look good and are growing then I would frag it. You don't have to hack it up just cut off a tip or 2 and this often stimulates the coral to put out new growth.

 

[lolgranny]

Im with you on this, my slimer is by far my slowest grower. I even tries to frag it to try and spark some new growth. Still humming along, but very slowly.

 

[johnnytmc]

Johnny, are you carbon dosing??? If so, you will notice stunted growth on your slimer with your Alk @ 10dkh(I've witnessed this myself in my own tank when ALK started rising too high). Either way, I would allow the Alk to fall to between 8 and 9 and monitor for a few weeks.. Aside from that, I would try feeding a bit more and upping the flow as suggested by Chris above.. With only 12" of depth, my guess is that lighting is not your issue.. Your 150 should do fine.

I just have a bag of carbon in my sump that I replenish every month. My Alk has been on the high side, most of the the time @ 10. I dose Kalk with my ATO and sometimes depending on the temperature and evaporation, it will rise to 11, 12. I will let it go down a little bit and see what happens.

 

[johnnytmc]

ive seen similar results. I tend to lean towards needing more food. My slimer grew VERY fast in my 28gal that was over 3 years old and had its share of organics. Now in my new system its struggling a little. Its PE has decreased along with some color loss and growth has slowed to nearly a halt. Its got plenty of light, top of the tank under 250w radium so thats not the issue. Ive started feeding heavily and upped the flow in its area and have seen improvement. Its strange when the hardier beginner sps' suffer in ones system for sure. I have a birdnest and this slimer along with a yellow acro that have all not done well in the new tank for some reason. They are all in the same far left side of the tank on the same wall as my vortech so there could be a link between them. All other corals are flourishing. its possible they are just not getting enough direct flow since its all undertow thats hitting them. since I pointed my return line towards the slimer as I said ive seen improvement. so ill letcha know if this is the ticket or not.

Is yours in good flow? like polyps whippin around? I think this is needed for the slimer.

The slimer is not in the prime real estate of my tank, so the flow is on the low side for the location of the slimer. It doesn't have much polyps extension.

I have been feeding more in the last month and I noticed significant color improvement on some of my corals. I would characterize my system as a low nutrient before, but after I upped my feeding, it's doing better, but the green slimer seems to not grow much yet. It's still bright green though, but no growth. I will move it to a higher flow area to see if it helps.