Montipora Capricornis, bleached overnight after trauma, will survive?

[ReeferKimberly]

Yesterday I had a major tank re-do after dropping a M. Setosa inside a rock. I took everything out and had a hard time getting everything back in right, knocked a lot of corals off rocks and generally stressed everything out. I stirred up a lot of detritus in the process. I have a Montipora Capricornis that was bright orange yesterday, perfectly healthy. Today after the trauma it's very very pale orange under the light, almost white-orange....just 24 hours later.

Do they ever bounce back?

(I changed a lot of water after stirring up everything)

 

[bob1968]

It should come back with time.

 

[ReeferKimberly]

(out of the water it is a brownish-light orange)

And I just changed another 30% of the water.

Anyone know how it bleached so fast? I am still pretty new. Did it release something that held it's color? Is it temporary? I can still see the polyps and they are still bright orange...it's just the rest of it is 5 times lighter than yesterday

(oh thanks Bob I just saw ur reply)

 

[Allmost]

perhaps the large water change had that effect, either way keep things stable and see how it goes in next couple of days, it should make it back no problem

 

[Reef Bass]

Monti caps are generally tough and resilient (for a coral). Don't upset it more and it will likely recover. That said, that is a very rapid change in coloration which could be a sign of a severe, acute stress.

 

[ReeferKimberly]

Monti caps are generally tough and resilient (for a coral). Don't upset it more and it will likely recover. That said, that is a very rapid change in coloration which could be a sign of a severe, acute stress.

I'm pretty sure everything in the tank was under severe acute stress

Everything looked majorly "word I can't use on this forum" up yesterday.

I have three birdsnest corals and 2 of 3 are just now showing a bit of polyp distention after a day of none....and one has also changed color, for the worst.

When I say I stirred up detritus...I mean it was so bad you could not see through the water...for an hour :/

I didn't write about the birdsnest because they don't look quite as bad as the M. Cap. I guess all there is to do now is wait.

Oh and of course my lovely aptasia looks perfect :headwally:

 

[ReeferKimberly]

arrrgg should not have trusted the reef stores water without testing!

I usually mix my own but didn't yesterday as I was feeling lazy...so I bought some. The tank was at 1.019 overnight!......I was told their water for sale was between 1.025-26 which is where I keep it. The first time I don't test it myself and of course it's waaay off. Well, I am bringing it back up slowly now. Whaddya think? Think that's my problem? Because I do now!

 

[Reef Bass]

Yes, a rapid change in salinity could cause issues. You may also be experiencing an ammonia spike if your tank was as stirred up as you say.

 

[ReeferKimberly]

Yes, a rapid change in salinity could cause issues. You may also be experiencing an ammonia spike if your tank was as stirred up as you say.

Yes that has crossed my mind as well.....I really stirred things up. That's why I changed it before and after the re-do...and again today. Hopefully all should be ok after that. It's a nano and since I have no skimmer or fuge I do a 10% WC every 3 days and feed just what I need to, never going overboard. So I have maintained excellet params until yesterday when I did expect a spike due to detritus being freed into the water. My levels are good now, zero, zero and about 7ppm nitrate, 2 over what is normal but still acceptable. Think it's time to wait it out and stop looking at it for now. My palys, shrooms, buttons, a few SPS, my torch and the Montipora Setosa who started this whole mess look OK. Three birdsnest and the M. Cap look pretty bad. Will just have to see :/

I called the LFS to give them a heads-up to check their Salinity levels. This is a solid place, he would not have sold it to me if he knew it was wrong...maybe there was just an accident. He was on the phone when I was in there and still is...think he is talking to wherever he gets stuff from. Will see if I get a call-back

The only other thing that changed I can think of is I use Red Sea Coral Pro and they use Reef Crystals. I am raising my salinity slowly with my own RSCP as we speak.

There were probly some ph swings through all of this. I will just have to wait and then cut my losses :/

Thanks for all replies, much appreciated. It just helps to get it out!

 

[power boat jim]

If this tank has been up for ony a year and had so much detritus in it you couldnt see through it, you may have some issues you need to take care of. This indicates you may be overfeeding,or it indicates there is not enough flow for this stuff to get swept up into a skimmer or some sort of mechanical filtration. Just some quick observations from reading your posts hope it all works out for you.