Main Cause of SPS Browning

[FSOL]

Hey guys, I recently bought two very nice SPS (not sure of the type) corals. The branches were white and had nice blue/purple tips.

What I am noticing is that the white part of the branches is slowly losing its whiteness and slowly getting brown.

I have lots of flow in the tank. I have three Tunze stream 6100's on a multicontroller (plus all the flow from the closed loop and return pumps) in a 180g tank.

There is polyp extension, too. I have placed them in an area of nice flow. I'm not sure whether it's not enough flow that's causing browning or if it's too much flow that's causing this? How can I tell?

PO4 =0, nitrates were zero but are now at 5 because of a dead angel I can't find in the tank.
all other levels are excellent and stable.

I'd like to save these guys from getting brown.

Thanks

 

[REEF-DADDY]

What do you have for lighting? Are these wild caught corals?

 

[FSOL]

These are not wild caught. I have 3x250W of 14K Ushio's plus 2x165W VHO actinics. The MH's are about 8 months old. Not sure if it's about time to replace them, and if that would be the cause of browning.

 

[Kip]

just because your po4 tests 0, doesnt mean there isnt any po4 in your tank.... it can be sequestered as fast as it is being produced. test kits only read free phosphate, if the corals are immediately absorbing po4... the phosphate isnt free to test.

on top of that... all but high end po4 tests like the merck or the colorimeter arent very dependable.

 

[fishdoc11]

I would vote for elevated nutrients (possibly from the dead angel) or stress from moving/shipping etc..........or both as either can cause browning.
hth, Chris

 

[NuclearReefs]

Im with Fishdoc on Moving stress.

Could also be to rapid acclimation and ALK difference fro what they were in before. We never truelly replicate where they came from even from tank to tank....

Where is it in the tank? Where was it before? Kelvin difference in the tank they came from as opposed to yours ?

Nathan

 

[jaefei]

I have same problem too. I check my phospate and nitrate with salifert and the result is 0 ppm. but my SPS still browning

 

[pk1]

I also agree with the moving aspect. I have several corals that constantly turn brown if I move them, most of them are either corals with blue pigments and A. Nana's. A few weeks after they have been stable, they regain most of the color, but it takes a few month's to get it all back. 1 piece in particular turned all brown, and stayed that way, and only the new growth is the original purple/blue.
On the PO4 aspect...I'm starting to think every tank should be run with Phosban or the equivalent. PO4 is just too hard to test for.

Patrick

 

[jt_redmist]

Don't mean to hijack this thread, but where can one buy Merck or colorimeter?

JT

 

[FSOL]

I don't know exactly where these corals came from to know the tank setup. In mine they are setup midlevel or about 1/4 from the top of the tank.

The strange thing is that my old corals are growing like crazy and I don't see brown on them (but then again the old ones don't have white branches w/ purple/blue tips).
Another thing is that when I look deep into the branches, where they all meet at the base, it's very white, and as they branch out and come up, they get browner. If you guys think it's a PO4 issue, why wouldn't the lower parts of branches go brown also?

I'll take pics of the two corals and post it once my lights come on.

Thanks

 

[FSOL]

OK, the first 3 pics are of the two corals going brown. The 4th pic is of one of those corals the first day I brought it home. You can see it's very white w/ blue/purple tips. Now it's brownish.