Problems keeping LPS in new tank

[BrettDS]

I started with a 75G reef tank and I had a torch and frogspawn in it that did well for more than 6 months. At that point, about 2 months ago I upgraded to a 220G tank and the torch and frogspawn were moved along with everything else. Since then I seem to be having a lot of trouble and I'm not quite sure where to start to look for a problem.

The one LPS success that I have right now is a bubble coral that I got shortly after I upgraded to the 220. That coral has been doing quite well since I put it in there.

The frogspawn is still alive, but has pretty poor PE... Considerably less than I saw in the 75. I tried moving it to several different spots in the new tank and varied the flow, but it has never opened up as much as it did in the 75.

The torch that came over from the 75 died. Within a few weeks of moving to the 220 I noticed that one side of it started to look like it was receding, and within a couple of days it had just disappeared entirely. The side where it started receding was the closest side to the bubble coral, so I suspected that it may have been stung by the bubble, however, it was a good 8 or 9 inches from the bubble, so I have a bit of a hard time believing that it could have been stung from so far. Like the frogspawn, even during the time it was still alive in the 220 the PE was considerably less than what I saw while it was in the 75.

A few weeks ago I purchased another torch and a Duncan coral. The new torch opened up a little the day after I put it in the tank, then it didn't open at all and within 3 days nothing was left but the skeleton. This time it was nearly 2 feet from the bubble, so I know it wasn't stung.

The Duncan is still alive... There is still color in the heads, but it doesn't extend it's polyps at all. Again, I've tried it in several different areas and with different flow, but it doesn't make a difference.

I've got some soft corals in there with no problems at all as well as a few SPS... It just seems to be an issue with LPS, and at this point I'm hesitant to add anything more until I figure out what's going on with the ones that I have.

I keep the salinity at 35ppt, calcium is at 440ppm, alk is 9.8dkh, magnesium is 1335ppm. I don't run any carbon or GFO.

Any thoughts on what I might look for?

 

[mav3rick478]

What type of lighting do you have?

 

[BrettDS]

What type of lighting do you have?

I have three radion xr30w pro's over the 220. I had two of the xr30w pro's over the 75 and added a third when I upgraded.

 

[mav3rick478]

Did you acclimate them from the sand bed when you transferred then to the new tank?

Were you feeding the LPS at all?

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[BrettDS]

Did you acclimate them from the sand bed when you transferred then to the new tank?

Were you feeding the LPS at all?

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I didn't start them on the sand bed, but I did start them pretty low in the tank... At least 3/4 or more down.

I haven't consistently fed any of the LPS... Every now and then they'll get one or two of the pellets I feed the fish, but I've never target fed them.

 

[mav3rick478]

I would try feeding them some mysis or salmon. I feed all my LPS some salmon, Frogspawn, Goniastrea and Hammer once a week, Acans and Chalice every couple of days. Usually the size of a granola grain or up to half a pencil eraser size.

Maybe even lower the Frogspawn and Duncan down and put them in an area that does not have too much flow and less direct light, just enough for their tentacles to sway gently. Well you know what I mean considering they don't extending as much.

I'm a little concerned though that even the new Torch melted away.

Do you have any fish or inverts in the tank?

What's the tank temperature?

Maybe lower the salinity to 33ppt, I usually like to keep my tanks at 1.023-1.024 which translates to 31-33ppt.

 

[BrettDS]

I would try feeding them some mysis or salmon. I feed all my LPS some salmon, Frogspawn, Goniastrea and Hammer once a week, Acans and Chalice every couple of days. Usually the size of a granola grain or up to half a pencil eraser size.

I've got some mysis... I'll try to feed them and see how that does.

Maybe even lower the Frogspawn and Duncan down and put them in an area that does not have too much flow and less direct light, just enough for their tentacles to sway gently. Well you know what I mean considering they don't extending as much.

The Duncan is very close to the bottom now... Maybe only two inches above the sand bed. The frogspawn is a bit higher... Maybe 8 or 10 inches up, but the tank is 30" deep, so it's still pretty far down.

I'm a little concerned though that even the new Torch melted away.

I am too... Especially since it happened so quickly... It appeared quite healthy in the store, but it was completely gone after only a few days in my tank. That's the big reason that I've been holding off on getting anything new. I can work with the frogspawn and the Duncan to try to get them happy again, but I don't want to get something just to watch it die

Do you have any fish or inverts in the tank?

Right now I have a sailfin tang, a kole tang, two green chromis, a Christmas wrasse, a matted file fish, and a true percula clown.

Invert wise, I have a number of porcelain crabs, a few mithrax crabs, a couple of cleaner shrimp, a handful of hermits, astraea, trochus, and turbo snails, a few urchins that came with my live rock, a serpent star, a cucumber, and possibly a pistol shrimp that came with the rock, although I haven't seen him recently, so I'm not sure if he's still in there or not.

I haven't seen anyone, fish or invert, pick on the corals at all.

What's the tank temperature?

81F

Maybe lower the salinity to 33ppt, I usually like to keep my tanks at 1.023-1.024 which translates to 31-33ppt.

I'll do a little research and consider that. I've been keeping my tanks at 35ppt pretty much forever, but it's certainly worth re-evaluating periodically.

 

[peterl23454]

How far are the lights from the waterline? Running at max power?

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[tanked_life]

Lower the temp to 78 for starters as my Lps love it at 78 and recede more above 80. Do you have any leathers like a large toadstool?

 

[mav3rick478]

Oh yes, it's a little warm. I keep mine at 74°-76°, heater set to 75°. We have central a.c. So it's a little easier.

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[BrettDS]

How far are the lights from the waterline? Running at max power?

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Lights are 9 inches from the surface, which is what ecotech recommends. I have them starting at 0 percent and ramping up to 90% over a number of hours, then back down to 0%. The curve looks like this:

 

[BrettDS]

Lower the temp to 78 for starters as my Lps love it at 78 and recede more above 80. Do you have any leathers like a large toadstool?

Oh yes, it's a little warm. I keep mine at 74°-76°, heater set to 75°. We have central a.c. So it's a little easier.

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Ok. I think I can get it down to 78 or 79 by using my sump fan, but I'm not sure it will be easy to get it much lower than that. I'll lower it slowly over a few days or more.

No toadstools or leathers. The softies I have are gorgonians.

 

[Reef Frog]

I don't think you posted your Calcium or Magnesium test results. Low mag can be hard on some LPS species.

Too much light intensity could be a root cause, as well as an uncalibrated refractometer resulting in improper salinity levels.

Growing softies, LPS & SPS in the same tank can be quite the challenge, especially if you're talking about the worst of the chemical warriors & acropia. Also Torches can be tough to keep long term from my reading & one experience, so I now avoid them. Good luck.

 

[MondoBongo]

i've had similar issues since moving to my new tank as well.

most of my LPS has melted away while my SPS has grown out of control, albeit with much less color than previously.

i've watched several chalices, my scoly, acans, and a few others just melt away before my eyes.

i've started to suspect in recent weeks that the tank might actually be too clean, even though i have algae growing everywhere. so i've started to increase my feedings in an attempt to make my water a little bit more dirty. the tank they came from was filthy by reef tank standards, but LPS always did well, and SPS had much better color.

my cal/alk are always stable with my two part, i usually test 1 - 3 times a week. my mg has been a little low (around 1300) but nothing i would deem catastrophic, unless maybe my test kit is bad, which is always possible.

in my case i had the same lights as well, adding two to cover the extra few feet on the new tank, and the new tank is much deeper than the previous one, so i doubt that light intensity has been an issue for me.

the only things that have seemed to do well for me LPS wise are my large established colonies of euphyllia. it seems any of the smaller pieces i had were the first to go.

 

[BrettDS]

Problems keeping LPS in new tank

i've started to suspect in recent weeks that the tank might actually be too clean, even though i have algae growing everywhere. so i've started to increase my feedings in an attempt to make my water a little bit more dirty. the tank they came from was filthy by reef tank standards, but LPS always did well, and SPS had much better color.

This is an interesting thought and actually one I had as well as I've been doing more research and reading other posts. It's kind of a long story, but the 75 that everything came from had been somewhat neglected before I moved. I was still doing water changes, but it was definitely on the dirtier side and I started to grow a lot of hair algae. I've been battling with the hair algae since moving to the 220 and in an attempt to fight it I've been feeding pretty lightly. Not so light as to kill the fish, but less food than I was feeding the 75 and there are more fish in the 220 to eat it.

My chaeto has taken hold in the refugium and I think the hair algae in the DT is starting to receed, so maybe I'll try stepping up the feeding a little and see if that helps as well. I'm also going to try target feeding the corals as suggested above.

 

[jerseypete]

I thinking along the lines of the tanks being too clean. You went from a 75. I don't know what your no3 no4 was? But now you just add 150g of volume. I'm sure no3 no4 dropped to almost nothing compared to the other tank.

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[MondoBongo]

This is an interesting thought and actually one I had as well as I've been doing more research and reading other posts. It's kind of a long story, but the 75 that everything came from had been somewhat neglected before I moved. I was still doing water changes, but it was definitely on the dirtier side and I started to grow a lot of hair algae. I've been battling with the hair algae since moving to the 220 and in an attempt to fight it I've been feeding pretty lightly. Not so light as to kill the fish, but less food than I was feeding the 75 and there are more fish in the 220 to eat it.

My chaeto has taken hold in the refugium and I think the hair algae in the DT is starting to receed, so maybe I'll try stepping up the feeding a little and see if that helps as well. I'm also going to try target feeding the corals as suggested above.

it's worth a shot.

i've been beside myself the last weeks trying to figure out what to do. i'm watching most of my LPS (chalices, acans, blastos) and my pectinia, all of which have been with me for at least 3 years now, just melt away and i'm not sure what to change to help out.

all my acros have been going bonkers though. growing way better than the previous tank. so if this is some kind of weird tank crash or contamination it's happening in reverse of what i would expect, where all my touchy things are doing fine but the more hardy stuff is vanishing almost over night.

i always have tons of algae, and i mean TONS spread out all over the tank, so i didn't start considering lack of nutrients until lately, but maybe there was so much algae and so little nutrients that they were being sucked up before the corals had a chance to get at them?

the most frustrating part of this hobby for me is having a problem and not being able to find a root cause. i ordered a new mg test that should be here monday, and i think i am going to go get a second opinion at the LFS on my water tests, just to make sure, but other than that i'm kind of stumped.

 

[leviburns89]

Biggest problem I've had with lps corals is having too clean of water.

Running good gfo+carbon+water changes+ skimmer... strips the water of the readily available nutrients that lps thrive on.

Perhaps feed a little more, or increase phosphates slightly. 0 phosphates is not optimal for coral growth, although that's what seems to be the norm for low nutrient systems.

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[BrettDS]

Biggest problem I've had with lps corals is having too clean of water.

Running good gfo+carbon+water changes+ skimmer... strips the water of the readily available nutrients that lps thrive on.

Perhaps feed a little more, or increase phosphates slightly. 0 phosphates is not optimal for coral growth, although that's what seems to be the norm for low nutrient systems.

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No gfo or carbon for me, but I do have a skimmer and I do water changes, of course. I get low to undetectable readings of both phosphates and nitrates, but I'm not sure how much faith to put in those readings because I think a lot of it may be bound in the algae, plus they are API test kits, which aren't really known for accuracy. I stepped up my feeding a bit as I really was feeding very little because I was trying to fight the algae. We'll see if the additional feeding helps

 

[Reef Frog]

If you think ultra low nutrients are at the root of the problem, one way to handle it might be to increase feeding to the fish and target feed the corals you can.

I'm not a magic in a bottle kind of guy, but I've seen with my own eyes LPS & SPS color up sometimes when using amino acid supplements used directly to the tank water & also a few drops in the solo cup when target feeding with a turkey baster.

I use TLF Acropower using much less than the label directions & stop using it when things are looking good. I will turn off the skimmer for up to a day after dosing; the idea being I want to give the polyp tissue a chance to uptake the material. Be watchful of overdoing it as it may cause cyano to grow a little bit, but this was a minor & temporary thing for me.

Use of some of the Zeovit amino acids & other products might also be something worth looking into. In your case I might consider keeping the skimmer off for a longer period. Good luck - I hope you can get to the bottom of your issue.