Need help from advanced reefers...

[dahenley]

POP,
do you have a frag tank, or more then 1 tank in your house?

i ask, because your frag tank will allow you to adapt it, and you can do water changes by using your main tank water, which will prevent too much of a shock, and you might have more of a survival rate.

if you have other tanks in your house, if you take frags from others and place them in your other tanks, will they survive?
if you take a frag from your other tanks and put it in your main tank, do they survive?
if yes to both, you might have to transition from someone else, to your 2econdary tank, then after some time, transition to your main tank. kind of like a stepping process.

it might suck that it takes too long, but it might allow a better survival rate and the option of having new things make it to your tank.......

just some other ideas.

 

[dahenley]

no treatment or dip - these are clean corals from established tanks. It is possible they could have some ailment but I can't find any, there's no sign of disease or bugs etc. on any coral in any tank.

Putting my frags into the other systems is interesting - they usually get duller in colour, but have 100% survival rate.

when you place your frags in someone elses tanks, they might have a higher or "actual" nutrients, which is hard on them, and causes color to alter. but it allows them to survive. when you take one from nutrients, and put it in a tank that is void of nutrients (like yours), the corals probably die from starvation, because they haven't had to transition from consuming food, to making their own through light and what not. (i cant think of that word that reefers and SpS people say when the corals produce their own food through lights. like a plants with photosynthesis)

its just a thought.

 

[Sk8r]

^ good thought. If the zooxanthellae aren't adequate, it might have some trouble, like a baby set out in the Texas sun at noon; and there is often, too, a period of shutdown when a coral is moved. Have you tried actually shading the new arrivals, maybe starting them with the lights shut down, then bringing the light cycle up as if you were breaking in new bulbs, maybe as short as 2 hours a day. The reef naturally gets these kind of conditions in bad storm, and it might help protect the new guys.

 

[popsock]

I'm tending to believe that the light is damaging the new corals, although my PAR meter doesn't show anything, it could simply be another form of light that's penetrating deeply and causing some kind of panic reaction in the corals.

7 out of 8 of the new corals survived and are fine and this I believe is because they're on the sand. Strange really because all of them except one were right up under the lights in their previous tanks. It's probably not chance that the one that died came from a shadier part of those systems. My tank is bright as hell, it's an odd one. Although the lights of this tank are the same as the other 3 systems, this tank is always "brighter". Vague but true.

I think the water is too pure, I can look through the tank end-on, through 6ft of water, and it's really clear. I'm guessing I've overdone it with the water polishing and it's all too clean.

I will halve the amount of artifical filtration and see what happens. Actually I've been tempted to turn the skimmer and ozone off permanently and observe what happens. i.e. make it an eco-system system (algae is already in place - I didn't mention that before)

 

[dahenley]

if your water is that clear, then even with the same lights, it will allow better light penetration, so that could most defiantly have a lot to do also.

if those corals survive, then that might be a clue.

if you place a coral in the corner of your tank, where it gets light, but not direct, it may help also.

(its hard to tell someone whats wrong, when 99% of people just think they understand life of SPS.... but we are a lot of good guessers!!!

 

[jimsplace]

I would leave the skimmer on, it is one of the most important to the overall health of the tank. Maybe turn the ozone off and cut back on some of your other additives. You could also feed a little heavier to increase bio load.

 

[mahogue]

I would not turn your filtration down, I would up your feeding.

I am guessing the new corals have 2 problems. 1) The have not built up enough proteins to protect against the UV in your very clear water and bright tank, 2) the very low NO3 PO4 is a shock to their zooxanthellae. Although ULNS steady state conditions like that are acceptable the shocking stress initiates the RTN. Your current high color corals indicate they have low levels of zooxanthellae and in turn have low reserves for stress, however going from ULNS into normal nutrient tanks only feed the zooxanthellae more and turn them brown. Going the other way causes stress and starvation at the same time. With your new corals you can compensate by shading the corals/keeping them in lower light for a slower transition, and feeding so they get the nutrients they need from amino acids, fatty acids, vitamins and carbohydrates. A good zooplankton and phytoplankton feeding would help with those.

 

[popsock]

Good answer, thanks. The new corals that were left on the sand for a week are now in proper place and are all doing perfectly well. Cheers!

 

[dahenley]

Do you think we can have pictures of these survivers? (maybe some pictures of others, including a few sump pictures)

PLEASE!!!

 

[popsock]

Hi, sump pictures won't help, it's tight as hell in there, all you'd see is algae, tons of it. I've just taken this pic, but didn't have time to clean the tank up (guilty!!!!)...

Anything big has been around for the 18 months age of the tank. The small SPS colonies dotted around the middle of the tank are the new ones. All doing perfectly fine.

Light shock was the problem.

I'll try and get a decent photo up there soon, I'm just busy as hell recently.

Cheers! :spin2: