Heat Spike: Corals bleaching and"melting" tissue loss.

[NJS7x7]

I'm rather new to corals. My tank is approx a year old and finally got my first set of corals.

I have Mushrooms, Yellow leather, Birdsnest, Trumpet, starburst polyp, plate and pineapple brain coal.

I usually held my tank temp at 82/80 at day/night. Everything was doing fine until I noticed my birdsnets coral starting to bleach. I didn't know the cause so for the next two days I tried adjusting its flow, and positioning it for better lighting.

Then on the third day I noticed my pineapple brain coral starting to bleach and lose tissue and my plate coral losing tissue at the edges and my starbrust began to "melt".

I did a full water check and noticed my temp had spiked up to 89F. I realized that the day before my birdsnet showed signs of bleaching my sister moved her computer into the room and with 2 comps running full blast and summer on the way it was getting hot, we have no air conditioner.

Since then I brought the temp down to 80 by leaving all the doors and windows open and have held it there it will drop to 79 at night. I ordered a chiller, but it wont arrive until wed.

Even though I have been keeping the temp stable, everything is still getting worse. Is there anything I can do to save my corals? Can they recover from this? I guess it was the high temp and the rapid shock to high then back down to low.

Again every thing else is fine
sal: 1.025,
amm 0,
ph 8.2
alk 3.6
nitrite 0
nitrate ~30

but my nitrates are a little high ~30 I am adding Red Sea NO3O4-X Biological Nitrate and Phosphate Reducer per instructions to get that back down.

Thanks in advance for the help!

 

[BrianKC]

The good news is that bleaching doesn't mean dying. If the temp was the only issue, they'll probably recover fine. Are you measuring your alk in meq/L or dKH? Hopefully meq/L!


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[NJS7x7]

My alk is 10 dKH and 3.6 meq/L

Tissue loss seems to have slowed but has not stopped on the plate coral, looks like braincoral is still gradually losing tissue, and my starbrust is quickly losing massive amounts of tissue.

I can watch large sections of the starbrust melt away by the hour. I am not sure what to do, some other colonies of the starbrust seem to be ok however.

Hermit crabs, this weird little brown fuzzy crab, some sort of gray sea slug thing i never noticed before have invested the birdsnest. Also there appears to be 2 worms burrowed into one of the branches that I couldn't see before the bleaching.

The trumpet and my soft corals seem to be just fine however. The Yellow leather isnt closed up, but that is all.

Edit: I will see if I can get some decent pics of the corals and the critters on the birdsnest.

 

[NJS7x7]

Here are some pics :

 

[NJS7x7]

Anyone have any further advice? Also is that small brown crab good or bad?

 

[BrianKC]

Heat Spike: Corals bleaching and"melting" tissue loss.

I would just provide the best conditions you can and hope for recovery. For the branching SPS, you might want to frag off a piece that's doing well just in case...the colony could regrow from a happy frag.

In my experience, any hairy crab is a bad guy and should probably be relocated to your sump


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[bevans116]

If you aren't going to get a chiller at least run a fan across the surface of the water.

 

[NJS7x7]

I purchased a chiller, it won't arrive until Wed. Been keeping the temp stable at 80, still no improvement on any of the corals.

 

[anbosu]

The chiller might help, but it's going to add even more heat to the room. I'd see if you can move the computer out of the room.

 

[MikeyAl]

Did you acclimate them to your lights? What lights are you using?


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[sde1500]

I purchased a chiller, it won't arrive until Wed. Been keeping the temp stable at 80, still no improvement on any of the corals.

It is going to take time now for them to recover. Unfortunately damage can be caused quickly, but repairing the damage is a slow process.

 

[MikeyAl]

Did you acclimate them to your lights? What lights are you using?


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Disregard. It would have helped if I read the entire message.


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[Lsufan]

It's hard to tell for sure but I don't think that's a crab it looks like a nudi. I would look up nudibranch & if that's what it is get it out why u see it

 

[NJS7x7]

Chiller is in and hooked up. I did a water change, and my phosphate test kit just arrived. My phosphates is at .08ppm and lots green algae has been growing for the last couple of weeks.

My birdsnest coral is completely dead, no tissue is left. I have 2 small colonies of the starburst left, but who knows if they will pull through. My plate coral is continuing to slowly lose tissue around the edges.

Mushrooms seem fine, soft yellow fiji leather coral seems ok... although it doesn't spread and is darker brown than I would like, but no signs of declining health but doesn't look 100% happy.

My candycane coral is a pasty white, but not bleached and no tissue loss. It still fills with water, but it also doesn't seem happy.

Can a 2-3 day heat spike really cause this? Is there something else going on? Can high phosphates do this to corals? I had my mushrooms, plate, and candycanes for over a month and they were happy and growing before all of this happened.