Tuscaquatics
Active member
To get the details out of the way first - 75 gallon display with 100 lbs. live rock, 30 gallon sump/fuge with DSB, around 25 lbs. rock rubble and chaeto, Bubble Magus NAC6A skimmer, 4xT5s, 2 K3 powerheads.
Parameters - SG 1.025-26, pH 8.5, nitrates undetectable, phosphates undetectable. I try to keep calcium at around 460 and alk around 12 dKH, but it's not easy with the ridiculous coralline growth I have. I drip kalkwasser to maintain.
This tank has been up since March but everything except around 50 lbs. of the base rock came out of my 55 gallon that had been up since March '09.
Here's my problem. The tank has mostly soft corals aside from a couple anemones and a couple pieces of LPS. All of my livestock is doing great except for the absolutely most hearty softies, specifically mushrooms, Kenya tree and, to a lesser extent, xenia. They had been growing like crazy and acting normal for months, but now that I have everything under complete control, they seem to be acting goofy.
A lot of the mushies, especially the red ones are growing really tall with long, thin necks. Instead of lying next to each other peacefully against the rocks, they seem to all be stretching up and out as if they were competing for light, which I really don't think is the case since they don't need much light to begin with and they've never done it in the past.
Many of them, after stretching out for a few days, will begin to twist a bit at the necks until they break off. I know that mushrooms will jump off and go for a ride once in a while as they attempt to spread, but this is different, and is occurring on a larger scale.
The xenia is simply limp and somewhat bland. Not dead or dying by any means, just not doing well and certainly not spreading.
And the Kenya tree is acting incredibly goofy, especially considering that I've never had it do anything but spread exponentially and thrive under any conditions I throw at it. I have a huge shrub of it right up under the lights and in quite a bit of flow. It's seriously one of the bigger Kenya trees you'll see. The trunk of it is probably two inches in diameter. It's gotten quite accustomed to the high light and flow and always excelled. Lately, it's been giving off a ton of branches and falling over limp. Much of the time it closes it's polyps and turns white; if you have any you'll know what I'm talking about.
There are many satellite trees growing all over the tank and in the corners and most of them are open and looking fine, but the last couple of days a few of them are acting the same.
This is all so puzzling because everything else is excelling. My BTA just split and both of them look great and never act funny. I have an open brain that does fine on the sandbed. Green star polyps are taking over an entire large rock. Palys are covering huge sections of rock. Torch coral is growing on the sandbed. Heck, even the mushrooms and Kenya tree that aren't acting funny are doing fine.
And this has all started happening since I got my phosphates down to undetectable. My nitrates had been at zero since not long after I set things up, but I had some lingering phosphates from the new rock I added. I battled hair algae and bryopsis for a while, but that's long gone now and I have no nuisance algae in the display or fuge.
Could my water maybe be too clean for these soft corals? I don't have a lot of fish so I don't feed a ton and I don't dose phyto or zoo or anything like that. I had always thought that, even though they like nutrients in the water to a certain degree, they would still do well in extra-clean water or SPS-type systems.
What are your thoughts? Anybody else have problems like this?
Parameters - SG 1.025-26, pH 8.5, nitrates undetectable, phosphates undetectable. I try to keep calcium at around 460 and alk around 12 dKH, but it's not easy with the ridiculous coralline growth I have. I drip kalkwasser to maintain.
This tank has been up since March but everything except around 50 lbs. of the base rock came out of my 55 gallon that had been up since March '09.
Here's my problem. The tank has mostly soft corals aside from a couple anemones and a couple pieces of LPS. All of my livestock is doing great except for the absolutely most hearty softies, specifically mushrooms, Kenya tree and, to a lesser extent, xenia. They had been growing like crazy and acting normal for months, but now that I have everything under complete control, they seem to be acting goofy.
A lot of the mushies, especially the red ones are growing really tall with long, thin necks. Instead of lying next to each other peacefully against the rocks, they seem to all be stretching up and out as if they were competing for light, which I really don't think is the case since they don't need much light to begin with and they've never done it in the past.
Many of them, after stretching out for a few days, will begin to twist a bit at the necks until they break off. I know that mushrooms will jump off and go for a ride once in a while as they attempt to spread, but this is different, and is occurring on a larger scale.
The xenia is simply limp and somewhat bland. Not dead or dying by any means, just not doing well and certainly not spreading.
And the Kenya tree is acting incredibly goofy, especially considering that I've never had it do anything but spread exponentially and thrive under any conditions I throw at it. I have a huge shrub of it right up under the lights and in quite a bit of flow. It's seriously one of the bigger Kenya trees you'll see. The trunk of it is probably two inches in diameter. It's gotten quite accustomed to the high light and flow and always excelled. Lately, it's been giving off a ton of branches and falling over limp. Much of the time it closes it's polyps and turns white; if you have any you'll know what I'm talking about.
There are many satellite trees growing all over the tank and in the corners and most of them are open and looking fine, but the last couple of days a few of them are acting the same.
This is all so puzzling because everything else is excelling. My BTA just split and both of them look great and never act funny. I have an open brain that does fine on the sandbed. Green star polyps are taking over an entire large rock. Palys are covering huge sections of rock. Torch coral is growing on the sandbed. Heck, even the mushrooms and Kenya tree that aren't acting funny are doing fine.
And this has all started happening since I got my phosphates down to undetectable. My nitrates had been at zero since not long after I set things up, but I had some lingering phosphates from the new rock I added. I battled hair algae and bryopsis for a while, but that's long gone now and I have no nuisance algae in the display or fuge.
Could my water maybe be too clean for these soft corals? I don't have a lot of fish so I don't feed a ton and I don't dose phyto or zoo or anything like that. I had always thought that, even though they like nutrients in the water to a certain degree, they would still do well in extra-clean water or SPS-type systems.
What are your thoughts? Anybody else have problems like this?
