SPS die off at the base.

[beapeams]

Question, I have a purple acro and it has been in my tank the longest, granted I have only been keeping acros since March. It has been doing great and It has grown at least a 1/2 inch. A couple of days ago it was looking fine. I looked last night and it is bleaching at the base one side that Its turned to the back of the tank already has algae growing on it where it died. My water conditons are normal( 0 ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, phosphate 8.2 ph, salinity 1.024, temp 77.4(day) 76.8(night)) except for calcium being higher than normal (close to 500). Could high calcium cause the bleaching? I will hold off on dosing until it drops to more in range.


My next question is the colony is still extending its polyps and the not bleached peicies of the colony still have good color. Since, the base on both stalks are doing this should I frag off the good piecies of the colony and remount them. I have seen no signs of flatworms, I do have the dreaded red bugs, but after inspection there appear to be none on this colony, I have heard that the hairy acros tend to not get them, and this might be the case, but no red bugs were spotted.

Should I let it go as is or Frag it and what do you think caused the inital issue?

No other Acro colonies showing any signs of problems. Also, I recently added a modified Maxi-Jet on the otherside of the tank from my Tunze 6060. Could it be to much flow?

Thanks in advance.

 

[rigleautomotive]

usually it is lack of light or burning from a neighboring coral.try moving it first.if no improvment in a couple of days then frag above the recession and glue to a rock.i dont think high cal or too much flow would do it.it happens on some of my old acros that are big from shading .if it starts at the base of the coral then it is usually lack of light

 

[beapeams]

Last week I added a pink porcillaphora to the tank and it is near the purple acro. I will move it and see if that helps. The way that the acro is shapped, and angle of placement in the tank the base should be getting light. It is possitioned at the top of the tank. Its about 4-5 inches. I will try to adjust the positioning to get better light coverage. Your probally light. looking at this pic of it before the die off. It is at the underside of the stalks where light would not hit it directly.

Here is a pic of it before the base die off.

 

[rigleautomotive]

you might want to look at it at night with a bright light.pocillapora will send sweepers.if you just added the pocillapora a week ago it could be the problem.chemical warfare.how old are bulbs.

 

[beapeams]

Halides and acintics are 4 months old I inspected this last week when I discovered the red bugs and it was fine. It definitly happened after the pocillapora was added. It is a small one, if you look at the pic above in the bottom left corner you see the top of my pavona. I moved the pavona and put the small porcillapora there so it would definitly be in striking distance.

 

[RichConley]

Check your alkalinity. IMO, its much more important than calcium, and chances are, if your Ca is that high, your alk is low.

 

[rigleautomotive]

good point.testing is cheap.corals are not

 

[beapeams]

Checked it twice Alk was 9-10. I thought the same thing with my calcium high my alk might be off. I dose with Kalk nightly and do a weekly maintenance dose of Reef complete, this helps keep my Calc and Mag up. My water has been fairly consistant, my calc has always been between 420 - 440 the 500 reading really shocked me. I have been doing nothing different for the past 3 months. Also no other acros are having issues. Only this one which is near the porcillapora I added a week ago. Even with the die off I am still getting full polyp extension from this acro. All of my other acros and corals are giving me full PE and are showing no issues. I will be taking my water to my LFS tonight. I always do this to help verify my test. Never know when a test kit will give you bad readings, I test everything twice personally to vefiy, I did not do it enough when I started my tank, and lost my first 8 fish. I am very an*l about it now. Once a week and if there are any signs of problems. Also, always keep 30 gallons of water mixed and ready to go.