problem colt coral

[theROYSKIE]

hi guys
im new to the site so here goes

for the past maybe year i have had a strong healthy colt. about three months ago it started to shrink and began to look shrivled and unhealthy. it was at the top of my tank with good water flow. i have decent lighting-approx 230 w of power compact. in the rest of my tank everyhting is flourishing and growing like crazy.

i just recently moved the colt 2 an established nano reef with the viper 150 w mh. i put it on the botton as to not burn it. but nothing seems to b working. both tanks get dosed with kent essential elements and minerals and r target fed with marine snow and DT's.

what is going on? and how can i fix it?

thanks
- royskie

 

[sir_dudeguy]

Stop dosing. Dont dose without actually testing your water to see if you even NEED to dose anything. If you're doing your water changes, there should be no reason to dose a thing. And i'm guessing you HAVENT been testing since you didnt list any test numbers

So what you need to do now is to post your test numbers for ph, temp, sg, NITRATES!!! Nitrates will likely be your culprit, or your lights are just going bad.

 

[theROYSKIE]

ph- 8.3
temp 77* f ( running chiller)
sg- 1.0255 w/ approx salinity- 34.5
nitrates- approx 10-15 ppm

a twice monthly water change with a good population of calurpas
helps keep the nitrates down

there is a healthy frogspawn, assrt mushrooms, starpolyps etc as well as fish and the usual cleanup team of inverts
the mh bulb is about 7-8 months old
everything is doing great xcept the colt

i figure the frogspawn would croak due to poor water conditions b4 the colt.

 

[theROYSKIE]

does anyone know what a colts lifespan is?
or r there any diseases that affect only colt coral?

 

[sir_dudeguy]

Corals typically dont have a lifespan that i've ever heard of...most are just indefinite, because if you break off piece, its just gonna grow somewhere else. The individual polyps might have a lifespan, i dont know...but the colony itself should last forever from everything i've heard about them...

Its also possible that some other coral is stinging it... Is it close to anything else?

 

[theROYSKIE]

it has its own side of the tank, i have been xtra careful to keep the frogspawn and the colt away from eachother.
i think that it is in the diet. while it was healthy it was being fed the kent coral food regiment. when i switched to marine snow and dt's it didnt instantly take a dive but u never know. i just put the specimen into our 200 gal prop/frag tank that is being fed with a variety of differnt foods. so we'll see what happens.
ill keep u posted and let u know if i find anything out.
thanks 4 all your input
-royskie

 

[GreyHawk1968]

First, check the body of the coral. Look for any white , I mean WHITE , line or spot on it. There is a Nudi that eats soft corals. I found one once on a colt I had. It caused the coral to shrivel up like you describe.If you find one on it just pick it off with tweezers. The damaged area will heal.
I had what once was a 12 inch tall and 8 inch wide colt. I ended up with a stump, but it has recovered. It is a resilent coral as long as you take your time and don't do anything drastic with it.
As far as feeding it. It gets approx 80% of it's food from the Zoo within it, 15% from nutrients in the water colum and approx 5% from the foods we feed them. Mine went unfed by me for about 2 years and did just fine. It's now 10 inches tall again and flourishing. Remember that a Colt is a pretty nasty chemical warfare coral so don't allow it near anything else.