SPS and leathers....

[EnderG60]

I have a 58g reef with a 400w 20k XM on it and I have been trying out some easyer SPS in hopes to get going with some(pocillipora, milli, birds nest, and some hydeno..yeah i cant spell i know) anyway all have lost color and only the milli and birdsnest are left still alive, but not growing.

Now My guess is that its my big finger leather, I run 3 cups of carbon and 3 cups of phosgard in a reactor replaced every 3-4 weeks in hopes of taming the leathers crap, but I dont think its working.

here is a pic for referance

I have lots of flow, and my nitrates never get over 5, everything else is 0, and i keep my calc between 380 and 450 and alk 3-4. Is there anything else I can try or is it just time to say see ya to the leather?

 

[PUGroyale]

From everything I've read, leathers/sarco's can inhibit SPS growth but I've never heard of the chemical warfare being potent enough to kill them. I'd wager you have some other issue that caused those corals to die. hth

 

[Jaime_309]

i have 2 giant toadstool's leathers in my 125 gal and pleanty of sps with no prob... pleanty of groath and coloration... your alk needs to be about 8 and try to keep the calcium above 400... nitrates should be zero... i used to have a noitrate problem in my fish only tank many years ago and it was i did not have sifficient flow from my main tank to my wet/dry... maybe you dont actualy have enough flow runing through your system...

 

[cwegescheide]

Yeah I don't really buy that leather and sps thing either. Ive got 2 huge sinularia's and a couple small leathers in my sps tank. Everything seems to be ok.. Maybe they would grow a little quicker if I didn't have them in there but I like the movement...

 

[h20cooled]

I have 2 large leather in my SPS tank and it has NOT effected the growth or color at all. I tried carbon and it didn't change anything in the tank. Don't believe the hype they are fine together...

 

[CeeGee]

phosguard can cause major problems as well if not used properly.

 

[EnderG60]

I was listing my alk measurments in mg/L not degrees hardness BTW

and I rinse the crap out of both my carbon and phosgard before they go in the reactor.

Im really not sure whats going on in there. The milli i have now(lil finger frag on the middle columb) used to be a nice blue and now is green, still nice but... its getting blasted by a maxijet 1200 which is pretty much the same flow as it was getting off a sea swirl, and the birdsnest gets the return blowing across it. both just dont seem to grow. the Milli encrusted the base a bit and then just stopped, and the birdsnest(was pink) browned out and stopped growing.

could them being surrounded by zoo's at the base be ****ing them off?

Im just at a loss, im trying the easyer SPS to get things going and they should be doing well. I mean everything else is doing great. the only things that never seem to work are euphillia and yuma's. which I cant figure out either since florida rics do so well and i have lots of other LPS doing great

 

[murphreef]

yeah ive had issues with sps when switching from a mainly softy and lps tank..... i still have a large fiji yellow finger sinularia and a nice colt coral in the tank... i do run carbon just incase...

i have lost some sps corals here and there and cant keep montis for the life of me....

i just dont know its a toss up i weeded out a lot of the colot coral and was considering gettting rid of the leather too but i just dont know ....

its very confusing and who knows i dont think its as bad as mentioned before but i still think an all sps tank does fair better imo

 

[Serioussnaps]

ALSO LOOKs like your tank lacks flow as well.....and i DO buy the leather/sps argument....i have seen it.....if you want peace of mind dont mix em