My Zoo Island Lost

T

TONY DELBRIDGE

New member
I have been collecting zoas for nearly 3 years now. For the most part I have been very fortunate and lost only a few isolated zoa frags. I review the RC zoanthid forums daily to accquire knowledge to the varietys and general maintenance or upkeep to keep zoas healthy. I have only a 24 gallon Nano, but it it packed with mostly zoanthids, star polyps, ricordia/yumas, montipora, turbinaria, pipe organ and many varieties of leathers. For the first 2 years, I mainly did weekly water changes and occasionally added 2 part sea balance. Only until recently (past 6-8) months have I been keeping a constant eye on say calcium and KH. Lighting was changed from stock PC's to a 70 watt MH to just this past Dec to a 150 MH (14k) with (2) spectrums of T5's. I recently acquired a 5 frag shipment of zoas off of Ebay (beautiful !) My tank was looking fantastic !! I have been working on it for 3 years and only collected the most colorful pieces I could find. No dull zoas/corals here. I was so proud of my tank. It was so full, I had to place a few frag plugs in the sand. My rock work was totally covered. Not even say a quarter size frag would fit between pieces. I was excited for it to all grow together and soon send my pictures to this forum (still need to learn this procedure) Then all of a sudden CRASH. I first noticed one of my recent frags of Radioactives to die off. I moved it to a different location. It eventually died of and fell behind my rock work. Eventually one by one almost all my precious collection has died off. Only about 4 colonies of my collection remains. Two of which I just received last month. I have noticed some temparature fluctuations due to higher temps in the weather. My PH was slightly low at 78 in which I am slowly bringing up. All other parameters checked out. Am I monitoring my system too closely now and I just should have left it alone? Could it possibly be the temperature change and need a chiller with the new lighting (never went over 82 degrees)? Could the drop in PH caused this die off? I am very disappointed and thinking never to spend money on zoas again and risk this loss. I thought zoas were for the most part was an easy coral. A month ago my zoas were healthy and multipying like crazy. I had the most colorful/beautiful SMALL tank I have ever seen, I was wanting to submit pictures to show all of you...Please advise/help... I only have a few colonies left. One day I will learn to post pictures. The colonies are basically closing up and turning grey. Does not look like pest. Lighting and flow has not changed since tank was healthy. Any suggestions? I am checking water again today...
 
Do you dip the new zoos before putting them in your tank? I had a similar experience with some of my zoos and found zoanthid spiders in my tank. Some of the polyps turned gray and stringy because of the spiders sucking on them.
 
Could be fungus, do they look like they melted away ( SLOTHING ).. check to make sure your pH and Alk and salinity are on PAR as with my zoo's are very sensitive to this than nit or ammonia.
 
OK, Just got back from the LFS. All my parameters looked great except for the PH was still low at 7.8. I have been using a Kent buffer to try to bring PH back up. Not sure this is correct stuff. I've always used sodium bicarbonate to bring up my PH in my freshwater tanks. Is this OK to use in saltwater tanks? I also have the reef builder which I thought was to bring up the KH, but I was told this also brings up the PH as well. Still not sure this is my problem. Could this low PH affect the zoos only? I have never known my tank to get this low on PH. I usually add buffer to my water changes, but have been forgetting lately on my top offs. All my other corals other than zoanthids are doing fine. Leathers, starpolys, ricordia, even pipe organ looks OK. Even have some of my daisey polyps which normally look closed up, are fully open. Yes, I did do a freshwater dip with iodine on my new additions. Not sure if it is a type of fungus or not. In the past, I lost some frags due to possibly the leasion/bump disease. These frags turned a brownish color and the stems constricted and the heads would fall off. My zoos now still look in tack, but closed up and a gray color. After a couple of weeks the small polys look to have melted/dried up. My only other concern is the temperature did get to 82 degrees a few days when the weather hit 90 degrees. I was told temperature fluctuations can cause problems. I disconnected my heater (set at 78-80) during this time. I reconnected it since it is getting cooler now. Without pictures, any other ideas? Do not think it is pest, I closely view my polyps every night. I have found only a few nudis in the past, but I had so many zoos, these few did not make a dent in my collection. I haven't seen any lately. Not sure what spiders look like or what the destruction would be. Again I bet I had 20 or more colonies die within 7-10 days....Help my beautiful tank is ruined...
 
Just read the info on spiders. I have not seen any, but may not have looked closely enough. I am constantly looking for nudis and blowing the polyps off with a turkey baster. Would these guys make the polyps of an entire colony melt or turn gray? I have many colonies in many locations throughout my tank with same problem. If it is fungus, how would you treat colonies which have grown out onto my live rock. I cannot remove these large pieces without breaking down my whole tank. Any threads I can get info on? Would fungus cause the polyps to completely die off, turn brown similar to the pox/leasions? I should have not bragged about my tank, I think I may have jinxed my luck so far...
 
where is search tool at RC? I looked at home page (search), but did not see zoo melting as an option. What is the sticky thread? I see another post asking about zoa fungus. Still learning to use RC. I have mainly viewed the zoanthid forum for the past year or so...
 
Search will not work for us registered users. Not unless there is less than 1700 users online.
Could be fungus. Have you seen white lesions or bumps? Maybe zoo pox. I don't think it is spiders. Some would fall off with the turkey baster. Where's Mucho or Marvin when you need them?

Edit:
You can use google to search RC. I can't find the link but type search reef central in google's search line. That should bring you to it.
 
are you a paying user ? if so then on the top bracket fo your RC where it shows HOME, MYRC, ETc...... there is search...

Just type in zoo melting.. you shouild get something out of it
 
I found some useful info on fungus and dipping methods. In my case, not sure if it is fungus or not. For the past two years I have been glueing my frags to the existing liverock. In most cases the 5-20 poly frag has multiplyed 3 to 5 times over attaching itself to the live rock. It would be difficult to dip my whole base rock at once. The only thing I suspect now which could damage all my colonies within 2 weeks would be the temperature fluctuations (78-82 each night) (wouldn't have had this problem in the winter months), or possibly the PH being at 7.8. I am adding buffer to increase this, but it may be too late. My last 2 colonies which are my biggest and brightest are looking bad now. My tank was looking it's BEST just last month. I just got my LAST zoa shipment say 6-8 weeks ago. (my wife was HAPPY to hear this) I didn't have anymore room in my tank for even 1 more frag. I collected the brightest (but not rarest) zoas for 3 years via internet, LFS, and frag swaps. Now all gone in 2 weeks. I am so disappointed I did not get pictures out prior to this ... DANG ! I am so discouraged. I feel like not taking a chance on zoos again. My leathers, starpolyps, and montipora, turbinara, and yumas still give my tank color, but without my zoas which made it look like July 4th year round, It won't be the same...
 
Last night I began the task of removing as many of my dead zoo frags as possible. I counted 19 frags in all. Some were growing on my liverock and could not been removed. What a shame ! So many bright and beautiful colonies wiped out. Do you think the PH levels dropping to 7.8 due to not buffering my top off water could have caused this sudden die off? I have never had this problem before and I'm sure at some point over the past 3 years I was guilty of this. My leathers and other coals are still looking good. My leathers have retracted before, but have never died off. Could it have been the temperature fluctuations caused by the change in weather lately? I still have only 3 colonies which look healthy. On one of my largest colony, the polyps are still open, but are not as healthy as before. Hopefully these will survive. Still would like advice on possible cause. I would hate to invest this much money in zoas again only for them to be wiped out by fungus or parameter changes. I did find a large worm (more like caterpillar) with a fuzzy exterior when I was removing the rock. This thing must have been 1-2 inches !! I have seen one of these before, but was very small. It's always interesting to find these hitchhikers in corals. I can only assume this was not my problem. Surely pest could not destroy so much within a few days, right? I try to inspect my each and every colony each night for pest. These zoos all died in a matter of days.
 
Not trying to be a jerk, just a friendly suggestion. I'd suggest using paragraphs because you're going to have a lot of people that might be able to help not read your threads if you don't.
 
Just wondering how low have you set your heater too.. ( how low does the tank temp go down before the heater kicks in )

Do you add alk and buffers to your top off to aid in keeping akl and pH at a good level?

If you have a fuge with cheato, do you do reverse photo period to aid in pH swings.
 
Did your zoas look like this? If so, you might want to check your alkalinity. The zoas pictured are a rather plain colony I have that is ultrasensitive to low alk. They will go from normal to like the picture in a matter of a day. Bring the alk up and within a few days they are normal again. After I figured out what was bothering them, I now keep a close watch on them in between alk tests.

unhappy.jpg
 
Thanks for the info !! My heater is set 80 degrees. Only unplugged a few days when the temps hit 90 degrees in our area. As far as my parameters, for the first couple of years I owned zoos, I never even checked checked my Alk and Calcium. I'm sure I was off at some point. Really never had a problem with zoas/leathers. Only until the past 6 months to a year have I tried to increase my lighting, flow, and check parameters. Most of the time I have been pretty close.

As far as the zoa pox, I have read up on this a while back and have possibly lost a frag or so to this, but not my whole tank. I have not seen any spots/lesions on the polyps. Seemed like mine turned brown before and the head popped off (possibly pest). This time they have simply closed up and turned grey. I still have maybe 4-5 colonies that have survived and still look healthy. My prized colony of dragon eyes (mine had a neon pink center with green skirts) I have had for two years, is still open but do not look healthy. My PH is back up to 8.2, I have changed another 4 gallons out of a 24 gallon tank, added new carbon, and cleaned the sponges. I have had the 24 gallon for almost 2 years with no problems. Still cannot pinpoint the problem. Still think heat issue with new light or gradual drop in PH due to not buffering the RO topoff water. You would ahve thought a gradual die off would occur if this was a factor.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9901316#post9901316 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by delsol650
search rc for zoo melting.. could be attributed to unbalanced pH, Alk and salinity swings ????
Click to expand...

This sounds highly likely with your situation. Over heating allso will do this but not likely in your situation.

POX is a possibility allso. It will cause the zoa's within a short time to do the melt away. Pox does not spread like a disease but a whole tank can get it at the same time. Pox is a reaction "sign of sickness or stress" by the zoa's and not like chicken pox that spreads from one to another. I have heard many times people get pox on one frag and then treat every frag in their tank. Not a bad idea but not nessasary. More important is treat the frag and correcting what caused the frag to have pox so that all the frags do not start poxing.

Nudi outbreak is possible but there would have to be an insane amount and you would still see them all over your glass and coral.

Irritants such as spiders is absolutely not it. Actually spiders most of the time in my experience do not even bother the zoa's they are coexsisting with. I found some living on a small rock of zoa's that looked amazing and never once showed any bother by them. Allso just a side note for any body looking for these they are HUGE and slow. They hide between polyps and adults are about the size of a baby aspirin. About the only way to find them is to remove the zoa's outside of the water and when the polyps close you will see the crab like creatures in between. Outside of the water they do not move and will not crawl away.

This is where I get flamed---In a ZOA tank the best thing you can do is stop messing with the water. Keep the PH and salinity in check with regular water changes, use some filtration and leave them alone. Adding this or that is only a grenade with the pin pulled. If you have something other than softies then absolutly use additives. I am speaking of zoa's only.

Just my 2 cents--after seeing all I wrote I guess it is more like my buck fifty.

Tony when you get the nerve to start building up your collection again get ahold of me and we can put together a nice pack.
 
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