Salt and corals probs

S

Steve attewell

New member
Hi all I have been having salt problems in my tank and in the process of getting my salt levels down. Now I know salt puts stress on fish and corals and it affects them all in different ways. But in some of my corals I have noticed some changes to them and there not looking to good. Here are 2 pictures to show you guys what I am concerned about.


Now I know that this coral does look like this, it like shuts down for a week or two. But are the white dots on it normal or bad???
white.jpg


Now this one concerns me because its has turned black in some areas, now I know some corals can be stung and they sort of die off in certain parts, but does it look this bad????
black.jpg




Thanks to all replies as always.

Thanks Steve
 
I've had the kind of leather coral you posted in the first of the two photos for two years. It goes through that kind of appearance regularly and it can take as much as a week or so before it opens up and shows its polyps so don't worry. I am wondering why your salt departed so much from the norm that it's taking time to get it corrected.

As for the second photo, that's a Sun Polyp (Tubastrea sp.) This is a coral that can not go without being fed. Its tissue doesn't contain zooxanthellae (algae) so it will decline and die unless you make some kind of food available to its individual polyps to consume and metabolize. I'd suggest that you cut off the flow in the tank and put some food in the tank...when the Sun Polyp recognizes it, the polyps will begin to open. Using a turkey baster, put some chopped mysis shrimp or other chopped shrimp onto the opening polyps. It will ingest the chopped shrimp and you should see an improvement very shortly.

Once it starts to take food...and you feed it about twice each week, you will see tissue growth and extention.
 
Ok first things first by problems with salt exactly what is happening? and what is your salt level reading I suggest around a SG of about 1.023 and maintaining that by toping off your system daily with fresh water. Mark a line on your tank and keep the water level as close as you can to that line. As the water evaporates your salt level will increase so topping off keeps the SG level at your set point. Anytime you adjust your salt try to do so very slowly as certain coral can react negatively to a massive change in the salt level.

Second your first coral (sarcophyton) will go through a slough period every now and again and will begin to shed off a waxy film. This is normal make sure you have enough flow in the system to remove the film. In several days the coral polyps will be out. The second coral is a hard one to keep and recommended for those more experienced with keeping aposymbiotic animals as it requires feeding as mentioned above. Look up sun polyps and see what others have done to keep theirs alive. If you have a refugium on your system it increases you odds a bit as well.
Hope this helps,
Ron
 
I change my water every week, my salt level is 1.028 so its way to high i am in the process of bringing it down now. How would you recommend doing this???
 
Actually your salt is not way too high. 1.026 is optimum. If you look at this you will see optimum parameters for our captive friends.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-05/rhf/index.php

Looking at the photos again I also am wondering about the back rounds. It appears that there is a lot of algea. This is not indicative of a healthy tank. Maybe there are some other things going on as well.

Regards,

Pat
 
Well my salt you say is ok. my phosphate is 0.01 my calcium in 450 PPM

I will test my nitrate and nitrite today, is there anything other that could be causing problems?
 
The Sun Polyp is in bad shape but I believe it can be helped back to a state of health. I have a black Tubastrea that was in similar poor condition that was given to me by a fish store that didn't target feed as a probable lost cause and it's now flourishing.

Steve...what I meant by cutting off the flow is shut off all the powerheads and water pumps that make the water in your reef move. This would be so that the Tubastrea will have the time to ingest the food you target feed it before the waterflow in the tank blows it off the coral. After a while, you turn those pumps and powerheads back on.
 
Steve can you remove the sun polyps and place them in a bowl of your water everynight? If so place it in a bowl with some cyclopeez or brine shrimp every night for a few weeks and see if there is a noticable change. It's hard work but it would be worth it to keep this animal alive IMO.
 
Right i have done the above and there looking better already. there sending out there tenticals to eats the food i think, how long will this take i am guessing a good month for them to recover???
 
It will take that long...maybe even a bit longer until the tissue recovers and it's back to a robust condition. But watching that happen is kinda rewarding because you can see the coral improve because of what you are doing for it. Hey...try to post some pics of it here as it improves.
 
Great to hear Steve, all to often these guys are sold to hobbyists who later find out what they have to do to keep the animal healthy. Just keep feedig it daily and you will see a big differece in time. You will have to do this for a few month at lest.
 
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