Sinularia and Anthellia dying

[cknguyen3]

Hello everyone,

recently my father realized he had installed the metal halides incorrectly and that the protective film was still on the metal part, so the lights werent giving off the maximum light they could.

Somewhere he read that if you take tin foil sheets you can make a cheap reflector. After putting on these "reflectors" i noticed a few days later that my mother colony of Anthellia has developed a dead spot in the center. Also my neon green Sinularia has not been looking so great.

Could the extra light from these "reflectors" actually hurt these soft corals?

All the params for the tank have stayed the same since the added "reflectors"
The only other thing i could think would do this would maybe be the 50 Astreas that were added recently but i highly doubt that.

 

[nathan.hales]

depending on what lighting you had on the tank before. they could have light shock. what kind of lighting did you have on it before?

 

[arresife]

I seriously stressed out my corals and my coralline algae died half way up the tank. This happened after I switch from
265 watt PC's to 2 175 watt metal halides and t5's. I didn't loose any thing other than the coralline Eventually every thing recovered. I did have to move some corals down to the bottom of my tank. I even had to move some like my mushrooms and some lps under caves. It's frustrating you think your improving your tank but if you don't acclimate well you can have the opposite affect.
I yould move the corals showing stress down to the bottom.

 

[cknguyen3]

Thanks for the input,

unfortunantly i do not know what type of lighting i have off the top of my head. I know there are VHO actinics and metal halides but the specific type ill have to check after school.

Ill try moving the coral down a bit if that doesnt work ill remove the tin foil sheets.

-Chris

 

[cknguyen3]

Update

I removed the tin foil sheets. The Sinularia showed immediate signs of improvent with way more polyp extension. The Anthellia looked ok but then took a turn for the worse with the whole colony about 5x5 turned dark purple instead of pink and the shrunk to 1/3 of its size. At that point i thought my Anthellia was a gonner, but in the last day or so ive seen the Anthellia make a recovery, more then half of the colony has recovered and i hope the rest will return to its original color and bulk.

-Chris