Red Montipora cap gone pale

I

Ifeelsick

New member
Hi all, i didn't do a water change for nearly two weeks and my red monti cap has gone pale and looks washed out. I think it was due to nitrate's being around 25ppm. I have done 3 water change's and got it down to around 8.5ppm. This helped as the polyps are out more so the water changes are working.

Question time;

1. Should i bring my nitrate's down to 5ppm or lower?

2. Will moving the coral to the sandbed help it recover?

3. Will running my lights from 10 hours to maybe 7 hours help?


Thanks for reading
 
what kind of lights are you running, and is that their peak or total photo period?

my total photo period is about 10 hours long. but that includes a 3 hour ramp up and a 3 hour ramp down. so they're only at peak power for about 4 hours of the day total.

light cycle is something i would probably consider separately though. i doubt it will have an effect one way or another on the coloration in this particular case. likely the color change was caused by nitrates rising and alkalinity dropping. so stabilizing those would be my primary concern.

i wouldn't bother moving it just yet so that you can control for some variables.

nitrate targets depend on the tank and what your goals are as far as stock, but generally speaking 5 or below is perfectly acceptable. in most cases, the lower the better within reason. e.g. a true 0 reading isn't great either.

corals are real good at going south quickly, but not so good at recovering at the same kind of speed. so my over all advice would be to check your salinity, nitrates, calcium, magnesium, and alkalinity regularly, and do what you need to to stabilize it. the coral should come back around with time and proper care.
 
MondoBongo said:
what kind of lights are you running, and is that their peak or total photo period?

my total photo period is about 10 hours long. but that includes a 3 hour ramp up and a 3 hour ramp down. so they're only at peak power for about 4 hours of the day total.

light cycle is something i would probably consider separately though. i doubt it will have an effect one way or another on the coloration in this particular case. likely the color change was caused by nitrates rising and alkalinity dropping. so stabilizing those would be my primary concern.

i wouldn't bother moving it just yet so that you can control for some variables.

nitrate targets depend on the tank and what your goals are as far as stock, but generally speaking 5 or below is perfectly acceptable. in most cases, the lower the better within reason. e.g. a true 0 reading isn't great either.

corals are real good at going south quickly, but not so good at recovering at the same kind of speed. so my over all advice would be to check your salinity, nitrates, calcium, magnesium, and alkalinity regularly, and do what you need to to stabilize it. the coral should come back around with time and proper care.
Click to expand...

Hi MondoBongo, my alkalinity was dropping but is now fixed as of last week. That is my nitrate's jumped up because i was worrying about my alk / dkh. Your right about going then going south quick!

Thanks
 
Absolutely. I have a gorgeous Idaho grape monti that would be the first to pale if something was out of whackm and also the last to return to its normal color once things straightened out. Literally weeks to months sometimes. But alas, everything in its time, and it keeps coming back. Right now it took a crap again, as I've just moved it to another tank. The color is pale-ish, but it is growing.
 
jml1149 said:
Absolutely. I have a gorgeous Idaho grape monti that would be the first to pale if something was out of whackm and also the last to return to its normal color once things straightened out. Literally weeks to months sometimes. But alas, everything in its time, and it keeps coming back. Right now it took a crap again, as I've just moved it to another tank. The color is pale-ish, but it is growing.
Click to expand...

Hi jml1149, that's good to hear! I will post a photo in a month and hopefully with good news.

Thanks
 
Yep, I think if you bring the nutrients down a little more and your water stays in check you should be ok. IMO, I don't think you need to tweak your lighting right now, at least in this instance. I run my lights fairly similar (10 hours, including 1 hour up/down) with a couple decent sized caps.



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GimpyFin said:
Yep, I think if you bring the nutrients down a little more and your water stays in check you should be ok. IMO, I don't think you need to tweak your lighting right now, at least in this instance. I run my lights fairly similar (10 hours, including 1 hour up/down) with a couple decent sized caps.


That is a lovely looking tank. Well done! I will keep everything in check and hopefully upload a better looking coral soon.

Thanks
Click to expand...
 
Thanks! Just keep with it and you should be ok. (They're fairly resilient, IME.) Definitely share pics as it progresses too. :beer:
 
Did you move your light or the coral? Mine started to get pale after I moved it toward the back of my tank. I shifted my light, and it's recovering just fine.
 
Fiver said:
Did you move your light or the coral? Mine started to get pale after I moved it toward the back of my tank. I shifted my light, and it's recovering just fine.
Click to expand...

Hi, i got it from a friend. It was under a maxspect razor led then to my 3 bulb t5 lighting.To be honest when i first put it in my tank it started to go dark and then bleach. I'm not sure if it's a lighting problem or a nutrient one. Time will tell as i'm hoping to get my nitrate's between 1 or 2ppm this week.

Thanks for the reply
 
Hi, I have no idea to be honest. It was a bit chaotic with her kid's and i was disorganized. As far as i know they were fine.
 
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