Scolymia Receding, Help Please

Reeferhead

Recovering Reef Addict
Premium Member
I wanted to see if there is anything else I can do to help this coral out…

I’ve had this scoly for about two months. It spent a month in QT. 1st picture is from the day I got it. It was under about 100 PAR of 20K LED lighting


FallFragswap1 by nickgrant79, on Flickr

The next pic is a few days after adding it to my 60 gallon tank. This tank contains all softies and I rarely do WCs or test the water. I do make sure the temp (78-81) and SG (35ppt) remain stable. All the other corals (zoas, rics, and leathers) are doing great. It sat under a 6 bulb (mostly blue) T5 unit at about 180 PAR. It may be important to mention that I have been doing some pretty heavy Flatworm exit dosing in this tank lately.


IMG_6745 by nickgrant79, on Flickr

After a month I noticed it wasn’t expanding out much and the tissue started to pull away from the skeleton.


Untitled by nickgrant79, on Flickr

A couple days ago I moved it to my 150 which is mostly SPS and LPS. The water quality is better I’m sure. I placed it in a slightly shaded spot at around 80 PAR. Flow there is pretty good but not crazy. Its in the bottom left corner of the pic below.

Temp 78-81
ALK 9.5-10.5
Ca 400-425
Mg 1800-1900 (fighting bryopsis at the moment in this tank)
N03 undetectable
PO4 undetectable


IMG_6834 by nickgrant79, on Flickr

I'm thinking it was maybe too much light and/or poor water quality??

I’ve tried to feed it a few times in the past but it didn’t take. I’ll try again in the near future but is there anything else I can do or anything I’m doing wrong here? I’ve never spent this much on a coral before so myself and my wallet would be really happy if this thing survives. ;)
 
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They are pretty adaptable to different lighting so I think that's the least of the problems. My guess would be the poor water quality and dosing you were doing. I'd leave it in your SPS tank for awhile and try to get it to feed.
 
They are pretty adaptable to different lighting so I think that's the least of the problems. My guess would be the poor water quality and dosing you were doing. I'd leave it in your SPS tank for awhile and try to get it to feed.

Thank you for your reply. I enticed it to open a bit this morning by feeding the tank some Rod's Food and Golden Pearls. Then put a few mysis shrimp on top of the coral and covered it with a glass. The feeding response wasn't eactly what I was hopeing for. I think it might have eaten one. I'll try again tomorrow morning.
 
I was able to get it to eat several pieces of mysis yesterday morning but by yesterday night it looked be getting worse. I guess there isn't much else I can do other than "wait and see???" How often should I feed it while its in this sickly state?
 
you said you were doing some Flatworm dosing. Chemicals? That might of affected it. They don't like flow either. The less the better. These corals come from some pretty dirty water in the wild compared to your tank. He might stop receding. Hard to tell. My meat coral receded all the way back and thought i would lose him but he has stopped and now is growing. Corals are funny creatures. Little love and they come right back. My 2 cents.
 
You might try a dip in CoralRx.

It was dipped in TMCC before every transition: into QT, into the 60, and into the 150.

A couple days ago, I moved it to the lowest flow area I could find in the 150, which was tough but it seem to be a lot more expanded already
 
IME, you need to feed it well. I have a bleeding apple that did this exact same thing. I fed it a little for the first few months in my tank but my fish would always steal food from it. Finally decided to sit it in a bowl of water with mysis while I did my weekly water change. After a couple/few weeks of good feedings, it had inflated to its normal size.
 
After about 4 months in my tank with very little feeding...
IMG_0218.jpg


After weekly feedings...
IMG_1029.jpg


IMG_1015.jpg
 
Just an update,

The scoly is now doing quite well. It looks as good as the day I bought it. :D

I had to move it again to find a spot will even less flow. I noticed the water current would actually press the coral’s flesh hard enough into the coral’s skeleton that the flesh would tear and the skeleton would start to poke through. I found a more protective spot that I could still reach easily enough to feed. I enticed it to open more by broadcast feeding the whole tank with Golden Pearls and dried Cyclopeeze. For about 3 weeks I fed it mysis twice a week. Now I don’t need the Golden Pearls or Cyclopeeze. It’s always wide open in the mornings before I leave for work and I now feed it about once per week.

Thanks everyone for your help, I hope this thread will assist others

Take Care,
 
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