Please help, zoa and softie issue

[cardiffgiant]

Maybe you guys can help me, I’m running out of ideas here. My SPS are doing great, my LPS are fine, but my zoas, rics, and GSP are not doing well.

About an hour after the days kick on my zoas partially and even fully close. My most established zoas reopen before the days come off, but a lot of my smaller colonies and frags don’t fully open at any point. This happens to zoas that are up high, in more shaded areas, down low, and on the sand bed.

My GSP hasn’t fully extended in months, and my orange rics have shrunken a lot. This has been going on for more than 2 weeks. I also get a lot of cyano on my sand bed throughout the day.

Parameters as of 11/8 and consistent over the past month:
Ca – 420ppm
Alk – 8.6dkh
Mg – 1260
Sg - 35ppm
Ph - 8.2
NO3 – 0. Tested with an old API kit and a new Salifert
PO4 – 0 with an old Salifert kit
Temp - 78

My Alk is down from 10dkh over the past 5 days. I’ve upped my 2 part to get it back to 10.

System:
My system had a 75 for a display from April to July. The 75 leaked and I switched to a 90. I reused the 1-2” sand bed. I have a 29g sump with a refugium with chaeto under a 24 hr lighting period in 1/3 of it. I’ve got probably 100lbs of LR.

Flow:
I’ve got 2 tunze 6025’s on one side, a MP40W on the other, and about 80% of the flow from my eheim 1262 comes back to the display (a small line is teed to the refugium).

Supplements:
I saturate 16tsps of kalk into 10g of ATO. My system evaporates about 2g per day. I dose two part (100ml of Alk, and 70ml of Ca).

Lighting:
6 54w T5 bulbs. 2 ATI actinic blue are 1 month old and on for 10 hours a day. 2 geissman actinic blue are 7 months old and on for 8 hrs. A UVL actinic white and a Fiji purple are 4 months old and on for 8 hrs.

Maintenance:
I do a weekly 10g water change, and test the params of the fresh mix and make any necessary adjustments. I use RODI and my TDS is 0-1, and my filters aren't over due. I stir the sand bed at least twice a week. I change the filter sock every 3-4 days. I use a baster in my sump, fuge, and on my LR weekly.

Inhabitants:
I have a yellow tang, kole tang, 12 line wrasse, dragonette, royal gamma, thread fin hawk. CUC = Asteria snails, turbo snails, red leg hermits, blue leg hermits, tiger tail cucumber, huge paddle back brittle star. I have lots of the general beneficial hitchhikers. When I observe the tank under different photoperiods I never see anything on the zoas.

Any suggestion as to what could be going on?

 

[puter]

Did this just start happening or have the zoas/rics/GSP not done well since you moved to the 90?

How often do you dose the two-part? Have you checked your Alk before and about 15-30 minutes after to see what sort of daily swing you have?

Any idea what your PH is and if it changes much after your lights come on?

 

[cardiffgiant]

The zoas, rics, GSP started going downhill after I switched to the 90, but I thought they might have been under some kind of shock from the transition. I've just kind of realized that this has been going on for too long.

I dose 2 part (recipe 1) once a day. I usually do it in the evening, pretty close to lights out. I slowly pour it between the baffles in my sump.

The Ph is consistently 8.2 (on a daily basis). I haven't checked it before and after lights on. Tomorrow I'll try checking it before the actinics fire, and then before and after the days fire.

 

[Paradiddle7]

Make sure you don't adjust your alk too quickly. I just had a wild swing due to several factors and lost some LPS very quickly, within 3 days they were completely dead. I think part of the problem was bringing the Alk level back so quick too.

Everything seems normal in your tank except for the Alk swing.

Do you vacuum your sand?

After a move, my tank was in the basement for over a year and completely neglected. I had stopped my mechanical filtration because of a pump seizure and add my emergency pump took up the space where my filter material was sitting. This caused my tank to really get dirty. I had tons of red slime algae.

I vacuumed my sand twice in a 3 day period, just vacuuming from the display into the sump through a filter sock. so much crap came out, it was amazing. I also blasted all my rocks with a baster and used my hand to displace water.

My tank was so clean afterwards. No slime came back at all. It was mentioned to me and it could make sense that sometimes when the cyanobacteria is feeding off of NO3 or PO4 that it consumes it directly off the sand or rocks and when you test for it, you get artifically low levels of PO4 and NO3 because the cyano is converting it before it gets into your water column.

 

[Paradiddle7]

Oh, you posted while I was posting. I would NOT recommend dosing your 2 part all at once like that, even in a high flow area. 2-part dosing needs to be done slowly throughout the day and night, using some sort of dosing pump. You can dose more at night, but I would never recommend adding more than about 10ml at a time of either part.

Also, you might want to bump up your Mg levels. 1300-1500 is normal.

 

[tmz]

Numbers look ok. I know you meant 35ppt sg;not 35ppm.

Are you certain of your testing? Are you observing any abiotic precipitation . Cloudy water ,particulates on the substrate , rocks or corals.

Did you use old sand in the new tank?

The corals you are having trouble with zoanthids, and briareum tend to feed little and absorb some nutrition from dissolved carbon, phosphorous and nitrogen in the water. Extremely low levels might effect them or they may be reacting to some form of toxin or predator.
Perhaps , if old sand was used something was stirred up and released.
If it's not the sand then I'd try a fresh water dip for the zonathids and a revive dip for the zonathids, ricordea and briareum.

 

[cardiffgiant]

LOL, that would be 35ppt. I'm pretty certain of my tests. All of my kits are less than 4 months old Salifert kits, and I always do the full test (as opposed to the low resolution).

I used new sand when I set up the 75 in April. I then reused that sand when I switched to the 90 3 months later. I regretted that, because of the cyano outbreak, but issues with that layer of sand should be resolved by now, right? Then again, when I look at the water change calculator, it looks like I'd be at about 65% "pure water" and 35% "non pure" water, when I index to the time of the change over.

I haven't noticed precipitation regularly. I did notice it once about 3 weeks ago in my sump, and some areas of my sand bed clumped together in a over the course of a couple of days. I broke it up and have not noticed it since.

I do run 1/2 cup of carbon, and change it every 4 weeks. I need to take my water in to have the PO4 tested. My NO3 reads 0, but the presense of the cyano should means that levels in the system are above 0 at some point in the day, right? I also feed reef chili every other week (usually before a water change). THey oculnd't bestarving, right?

 

[Bluephish13]

do you run rowaphos/gfo in a reactor.?

 

[cardiffgiant]

No, I don't. I never got a reading from my Salifert P04 test, so I never went the GFO route.

 

[Paradiddle7]

I just make it a habit now to always run GFO and Carbon. I'm waiting for my new BRS media reactors, so I can run them seperately on 2 separate pumps because the flow on the carbon slows down as it gets dirty.

I have a Hanna low range PO4 Colorimeter I use to check my phosphates too. It was expensive but it's very tough to test for, so I think it was worth it.

Have you tried a massive water change to see if your corals respond happily? Make sure to match your Alk on a massive change. I like to match Alk, Ca using 2-part while I do a large change.

If you want to bring me a water sample, I can test it for PO4.

 

[puter]

...Have you checked your Alk before and about 15-30 minutes after (dosing) to see what sort of daily swing you have?

Some zoas, in particular, are very susceptible to Alk swings. Were you doing two-part dosing the same way in your old system?

 

[toddmh]

Hi ben ,hope you figure this out..I can not offer any ideas,but just to let you know the zoas I got from you are doing great..well all the frags really

 

[cardiffgiant]

I've tested my Ph three times. It was 8.0 early morning before lights on, 8.2 after the actinics fired, and 8.2 with the days on. The days have only been on for an hour, and my established zoas are completely open. I'm going to check it again once I observe them to be closed.

I've been adding the 2 part in the evenings near the end of the photoperiod since I switched to the 90 July. Prior to that, I never used 2 part. I had only kept softies and LPS before April, and water changes and saturated kalk kept up with demand.

I had neglected to replace my test kits when they ran out, and went probably 3 months without testing anything. When I tested the water just before moving over to the 90 back in July, it turned out that my Ca had dropped to 350ppm, and my Alk was around 6dkh. That's when I started up the two part.

I've added 2 part in 10ml increments a couple of times, and will keep that up for the rest of the week. That'll at least give me some time to research dosing pumps and timers.

I kept a lot of these zoas and softies in my old 55 system, which had measurable NO3 and PO4. Is it likely that I have a harmful, but low level of PO4 in my system that would bother soft corals, but not my SPS or LPS?

I'm going to bring the water up for testing this week and pickup some revive. I'll think about the GFO after I get that tested. I have to travel next week, so I probably wouldn't start GFO until a week that I'd be working out of the house.

My next water change is Friday. I could delay a bit and plan to do a larger change on Sunday if I don't see any change based on dosing the 2 part differently.

 

[tmz]

It could be high alk follwed by precipitation a drop and so on butthat would likely hit your stonies hard.Might want to reduce the dosing a bit and monitor daily.

PO4 is a likely suspect if you're not confident in your test. If you happen by some day, I can test it with the meter, I'll check your other stuff too.
Cyano is a resilient beast. PO4 usually contributes to it's growth but if need be it can produce it's own nutrient's by fixing nitrogen.
Water changes and siphoning should help reduce anything bad from the older sand and the cyano as well..BTW any ammonia or hydrogen sulfide evident?
I don't think the corals are starving are and you could even cut back on the feeding until you get a handle on what's going on,in my opinion..
Toxins may be part of the problem. How is your ro/di?
Total; organic carbon buildup may also be an issue. Is your skimmer working well?Is the gac fresh. Could try a polypad for toxins.
Sorry for the shotgun approach but it justs give a few things to look at.

 

[Gary Majchrzak]

re: zoa, ric and GPS trouble

re: zoa, ric and GPS trouble

not to dissuade other's from their theories but I'd re-examine lighting (too bright?), water flow (too heavy?) and alkalinty issues.
IME the corals involved here thrive in relatively high levels of phosphates but heavy water flow will definitely affect them.

Is there a new pump/powerhead in the system or is there new directional water flow around these corals?

 

[museumguy]

Tagging along because I am having some of the same issues in my mini reef tank. LPS and SPS thriving but many of my zoas basically disappeared over the course of a week (though Pallys are doing fine) and I had a clump of GSP the size of a deck of cards that has wasted away to about half a dozen sad polyps (this took a couple months). I didn't even know it was possible to kill GSP

 

[Gary Majchrzak]

if anything... perhaps it's phosphates (and/or DOC's) are too low in these systems. That's my impression. I realize it's contrary to what other's have suggested here.

 

[cardiffgiant]

The zoas are closed now and the Ph is 8.4.

Flow wise, everything seemed to be ok with two 6025's in my 75. Stuff was waiving, there was a bit of chaos, but nothing was getting overpowered. But the 6025's didn't seem to make a dent in the 90, and I added the MP40W to one side and moved the 6025's to the other side in August. Last week I shifted the MP40W to lagoon mode, thinking that the more steady transition between the speeds would make the flow less chaotic for the softies.

I've got these things all over the tank, in different lighting levels, and different flow areas. If it was lighting, there should be zoas in the more shaded areas that would open?

If it was flow or alk, would zoas open fully, become irritated, and then close back up?

The points about the water quality are interesting. I've had some of these corals for 3 years, and they thrived in a system with measurable PO4 and NO3 for 2 of those years. My hulk zoas grew from a handful of polyps to fully covering large rocks within a few months, ricordeas and GSP also bordered on invasive growth. I almost wonder if their not getting enough nutrient, yet I have the cyano on the sand bed... so there must be nutrient in the water.

I'm not ruling out any one of these things as possibilities (or a combination of them) as causing irritation. I just want to try to really think out each likelihood before I act, and make sure that I don't act too quickly (and introduce new complications).

 

[tmz]

There are different points of view based on different experiences and perspectives which is what discussions are for.

My zonathids,ricordea florida , pachyclavularia(gsp) and briareum
(encrusting gorgonian resembling pachyclavularia) do very well in relatively low nutrient water(PO4 @.05ppm and NO3 @2 to 5ppm) with brisk turbulent / alternating flow. While some are more tolerant of lower lighting than others ,they all like relatively high light.My zoanthus do best 6 to 12 inches down under 250 14k mh .Most zoanthus in particular are high reef animals which thrive in very low nutrient water, (PO4 in ppb and NO3 of .2ppm) If you are feeding fish it is unlikely you are near let alone below these levels.
Some palythoa might enjoy more turbid conditions. Mine are down a bit lower 12 inches to 24 inches. Although I have a large colorful thriving colony of grandis about 3 inches down under 20k 175 mh.
Getting a solid look in which you can be confident at PO4 and NO3 levels is a good first step before we can speculate on high or low with any precision.
Stable alk within range would also be a good thing in any case.

 

[cardiffgiant]

Tom, I'll definitely be testing the PO4. Just to know if it's truly non-existant in the system.

Is my assumption that the cyano = excess nutrient correct? Or is this a resilient algae that may be robbing corals of food? I could try "harassing" it out of the sand bed for a couple of days with consistent stirring.

-I'll have to see if my ammonia test is still any good. I don't have a sulfate test. I'll have that tested when I bring my water in.
-In my RODI, I changed my carbon and sediment filters (6 months old) and my membrane (3 years old) last week. I changed my DI (18 months old) in September.
-Skimmer seems to be rocking and rolling. Collection cup is a consistent color and output level when I clean it (every 3-4 days).
-GAC (1/2 cup of ROX 0.8) was last changed 10/23 and I had planned ot change it again at the end of next week.
-What's a polypad?

Guys, I really appreciate all of the great input. Trying to fix it on my own has been driving me crazy.