Help my war coral is dying

[reefbrian88]

I got this war coral from the LFS. I told the guy that I was new to keeping corals but he said that it was easy to care for. Then I heard from someone else that war corals are difficult to care for and that the guy should have never sold a beginner, like me, a war coral. Now I think its dead but I dont want to give up if I can help it. Is it dead or do I still have a chance? if I still have a chance what do I do? Where do I place it in my tank?
I have a 14g Oceanic biocube with a 24w 10K daylight and a 24w actinic. I run the daylight from 12:00pm to 8:00pm and then the actinic runs from 8:00PM to 12:00PM...aka 8hrs of daylight and 16hrs of actinic light. Right now I moved the war coral from the bottom of the tank up toward the top becasue I thoyught he was not getting enough light.

 

[betamed]

Its dead and it is easy an easy coral. you run lights for 24hrs? Do you test your water for SG, pH, Alk, CA Nitrates etc.

 

[kurt_n]

Yup. Dead. Sorry. Even though there's something red there that *might* be tissue, if it is tissue it's too far gone.

The bigger issue is your lighting, as betamed brought up. Am I correct in assuming that you run daylight ONLY from noon to 8pm, and then your actinic ONLY from 8pm to noon the next day? If so, that's not quite what you want to be doing.

24W of Power Compact daylight alone isn't enough light for most coral. Same goes with 24W of actinic alone - just not enough light. And your coral doesn't want light 24 hours a day. It wants darkness for some time period, just like in the ocean. You really want to run both daylight and actinic together so the corals can get the correct wavelengths of light it needs to survive.

If you want a sunrise/sunset type of schedule, maybe try something like this:

9am-10am: Actinic only
10am - 8pm: Actinic and Daylight, together
8pm - 9pm: Actinic only
9pm - 9am: no lights

Adjust times as needed, but keep general time lengths.

 

[Spyderturbo007]

8hrs of daylight and 16hrs of actinic light.

If I'm reading this right, you're running your lights for 24 hours? That's definitely not the way you want to do things. I wouldn't go anymore than a total of 12 hours a day.

Mine runs for a total of about 10 hours.

10am - 1 Actinic & Purple come on
1pm - 10k and 2nd Actinic come on (All 4 bulbs are running at this point)
5pm - 10k and 2nd Actinic turn off (only 2 bulbs running)
8pm - Other Actinic and Purple turn off & Blue moonlight LEDs turn on
6am - LEDs turn off and tank is pitch black
10am - cycle resumes

 

[reefbrian88]

Do you test your water for SG, pH, Alk, CA Nitrates etc.

Yes I do test. the last testing came out as follows

SG:1.024
pH:8.0
Alk:9dKH
Cal:440ppm
Ammonia:0ppm
Nitrite:0ppm
Nitrate:5ppm (will be doing a 10% water change today)

 

[reefbrian88]

I have also changed my lighting I now run both my actinic and 10k from 12:00pm to 9:00pm. the rest of the time they are off. I need to go to the store to pick up an additional timer to put the actinic to run on so I can have them on longer for 2 hrs longer.

 

[Spyderturbo007]

The drop in photo period and allowing the corals to rest at night will most likely solve all your problems. If you want a nice effect, look into some retrofit blue LEDs to simulate moonlight. It give some of the corals an awesome glow. Some of mine fluoresce actually. It only takes a few to do the job. My T5 fixture has 4 of them and it's 4' long. I wish I could take a picture for you, but my stupid iPhone can't handle the excessive blue and takes a worthless picture.

If you want to try again, another LPS coral would be your best bet with the elevated Nitrates. I would suggest something like a Hammer coral or perhaps a Frogspawn. But any of the LPS corals that you like should be just fine. You'll probably have to play with placement a little to find the correct depth only having a 2 x 24w fixture, but that depends on your tank depth.