Issues With Corals Questions...A Few

[BigEZ77]

I've just started to notice a few issues with my corals...

-I have 4 scoly's, I've seen very small chunks of my green one around it once in awhile and thought nothing of it. Tonight I come home and find some stringy grey stuff on the mouth area piled on it...I blow it off and see there are tears in that area. Who could be the culprit? Beyond my stocking list in my signature, I also have a skunk cleaner shrimp, a blood red fire shrimp and fighting conch. I have noticed when I started feeding LPS Grow + Color that the shrimp and my 6line took it right off the scoly.

-My two torch frags have lost heads. One is only a two head and one has completely calcified with no tips anymore. The other one which is larger has lost two. I have them above mid height in a fair amount of flow. Could that have caused this? I have since lowered them and put them in less flow.

-My Dragon Soul Favia has a fair amount of green showing thru the purple areas now...Does this mean it is receiving too much light?

Strange that alll this is happening in close time to each other. Levels seem fine...My cal, mag and alk is a little high which is likely due to my Reelreef rock.

Thanks,

 

[fcmatt]

Are you having any big swings in pH, salinity, or alk?

I have to say the biggest reason people have trouble with coral is a lack of consistency in those 3 things.

 

[BigEZ77]

I'm also noticing some dark fuzzy stuff on my pavona corals in the areas where they don't get as much light (under the overhanging portion of the coral).

No swings in salinity or alk. Not sure about pH since I don't really test for that. I did leave my windows open (all screened) a couple nights ago since it was so nice out, perhaps that did something?

Update - I just fed the damaged scoly and it appeared to produce more if this grey stringy stuff perhaps to feed? Never seen a scoly feed like that, my others almost turn into giant mouths, not small rips/slits that emit this grey stuff.

 

[BigEZ77]

Photos

 

[Sk8r]

A fighting conch can accidentally wound a sand-sitting coral, ripping its tissue with its spine. They're lethal to plate coral. For the rest, shrimp will fight a coral for food. Any of the 3 could be a culprit. I trust alk is around 8.3 thereabouts?

 

[BigEZ77]

Really worried here, please see all info I can provide below.

Pic comments...

-Tank is a mess, a lot of those corals on the sand will be glued up on the rocks soon. The rear plate will be given away.

-You can see in one of the pics that this is now happening to one of my hammer corals. Just started yesterday.

-The scoly tears are the grey areas in the middle. Tough to tell in the photo.

-The Pavona issue is circled. Its a dark fuzzy thing, happening on my other one as well. Couldn't get a better photo.

-The torch is pretty much dead, sad since it was an expensive ultra yellow with blue tip. Painful on the pocketbook.

Further comments, trying to give as much info as possible...

-For flow, Gyre comes from top left and circles the tank from there with only about 25-30% power.

-For lighting, the A160WE is centered over the tank and running 60% at max for 3 hours with a 4 hour ramp up, 4 hour ramp down and one hour at the lowest setting in the evening.

-Only the warpaint scoly on the left is fleshy. The other three are currently not inflating much and are pretty hard.

-Last time I changed my filtering products (see list in signature) was 3 weeks ago, but I noticed the torch issue starting a couple weeks ago so I don't think that would be it.

Recent changes...

-Started dosing Seachem Reef Trace and Reef Plus to the tank last week on opposite days. Seachem rep said it would not overdose or do any damage. Dosed each manually twice last week direct to display as per manufacturer instructions.

-Added a bag of Seachem Matrix rubble to rear sump about 3 weeks ago.


Hoping to get to the bottom of this.

Thanks,

 

[BigEZ77]

Forgot to mention that I'm seeing some white/grey stringy stuff here and there stuck on rocks in different areas of my tank. Also saw it on my open brain and had to blow it off.

A fighting conch can accidentally wound a sand-sitting coral, ripping its tissue with its spine. They're lethal to plate coral. For the rest, shrimp will fight a coral for food. Any of the 3 could be a culprit. I trust alk is around 8.3 thereabouts?

The conch hasn't moved in days and likely would have torn the rim of the scoly as opposed to the mouth area. The torch's are recently on the sand so it wouldn't have got them. But I am gonna give it away due to the amount of corals I now have on or close to the sand.

My Alk runs high around 10, as do my cal and mag. Months ago we sorted out that the Realreef rock I used is likely the cause. After a year or so it should stop leeching cal and mag.

 

[BigEZ77]

Bump for anyone else willing to read and offer suggestions?

 

[NeilFox]

What are your tank parameters? Could be an Alk issue, the white stringy stuff may be bacteria. Your sand also looks very clean. Maybe your nutrients are too low if you are running gfo. This will exacerbate alkalinity issues with SPS (Low nutrients require lower Alk). Post some more info about your readings.

 

[BigEZ77]

Here's my parameters as of 7:30...Hate these color kits, some are so hard to read. All is done with Red Sea, except Phos and Mg which are done with Salifert.

Sal - 1.025
pH - Seems low at 7.6-7.8
Nitrate - 5-10
Phos - under .1
Cal - 470 (high as usual)
Mg - 1470 (again, high as usual)
Alk - 9.8-10 (and again, high as usual)

Hope this helps shed some light on what might be going on here.

Thanks,

 

[Sapelo]

Maybe I missed it, but how long has your tank been running? How long have you had these corals?

 

[BigEZ77]

It's been up about 8 months. The torch that didn't make it was in my tank for about two months. The other torch that is still going and the hammer that is starting to have the same issue are just over two weeks. All are from the same online coral distributor.

 

[BigEZ77]

Ps. I think the scoly was damaged by a PITA resident of the tank. I moved that one and moved another one to its location and that one now has a small tear. I'm thinking it might be the fire shrimp since its fairly close to its spot. Could be the scarlett hermits since they're all over everything all the time.