SPS dying slowily from the bottom up

[ctniners]

So i have a 40 gl breeder and in it i have a few sps frags and one duncan with 4 or so heads...i changed my lights from chinese leds to a 6 x 39 w t5 fixture....4 blue plus 1 purple plus 1 coral plus....so i went away for 10 days and some of my frags were looking really bad after the change of the lights...i was told that i should have gradually add the on time of the new t5....so for the past 3 weeks i went from 4 hrs to 6hrs of daylight...adding about 30 minutes every 5 days...2 of the blue plus are on for 10 hrs....so my issue is that I thought that if the frags we're not getting enough light or too much light for that matter you would see it on the tip of the branches of the frag not at the base of the frags with bleaching moving up....

I do have a little bubble algae but can this be the cause?....is not happening to the duncans or my maxima....im going to add a gfo reactor...my salifert phosphate is showing zero but i really doubt that is correct.....

Also nothing new has been added and i have checked each frag for bugs with high end magnifying glass and nothing...but the issue is def starting at the base

Sorry to me this so long.....any inputs will be greatly apreciated.

Thanks

 

[dentdominator]

In all my trials and errors with sps. Every time my sps started to die from the base up it was related to low alkalinity levels. However, all of the other parameters should be in check. But, every time I raised the alkalinity I managed to bring them back. Then again, I've fragged them from the healthy tissue on up and they've survived.

 

[ctniners]

thanks....I just tested the water and gave me 0 phosphates..(highy doubt it)....425 calcium and 8.5 Alk....I checked for nitrates and nothing either.

Some of the frags are too small to even refrag....they are the so called high end that are about an inch or little more each...

I am hoping my reactor gets here next week, in the meantime I went to the lfs and found Kent Marine Phosphate Sponge....it looks like tiny little white rocks that i have to put in a filter bag and leave it in the flow no more than 2 days...anybody has any experience with this product?...i also heard that completely depleting all phosphate may not be good is that correct?

thanks again

 

[dadnjesse]

when I switched from 400w halides to 6 bulb Ati T5's all my SPS died, bleaching from the bottom up, I believe it was the light change. T5's are that strong.

 

[Chriskid]

thanks....I just tested the water and gave me 0 phosphates..(highy doubt it)....425 calcium and 8.5 Alk....I checked for nitrates and nothing either.

Some of the frags are too small to even refrag....they are the so called high end that are about an inch or little more each...

I am hoping my reactor gets here next week, in the meantime I went to the lfs and found Kent Marine Phosphate Sponge....it looks like tiny little white rocks that i have to put in a filter bag and leave it in the flow no more than 2 days...anybody has any experience with this product?...i also heard that completely depleting all phosphate may not be good is that correct?

thanks again

i highly doubt its BC of phosphates, i suggest to test everything first, GFO might just be the straw on the camels back.

alk
cal
mag
PH .... if had this BC of low ph
nitrates

also with everyone striving for ULNS 8.5 alk might burn sps(usualy tips but not always)

GL ether way, i hope you get to the bottom of this

 

[ctniners]

Thanks for the inputs....

when I switched from 400w halides to 6 bulb Ati T5's all my SPS died, bleaching from the bottom up, I believe it was the light change. T5's are that strong.

well thats not good, the frag rack is sitting about half way up so should i move them to the sand or at this point just deal with it and what makes it make and what doesnt then doesnt?I can say that the change started when i introduced the T5s...either it started with the lights or just happened to be a perfect storm and other things happened at the same time

i highly doubt its BC of phosphates, i suggest to test everything first, GFO might just be the straw on the camels back.

alk
cal
mag
PH .... if had this BC of low ph
nitrates

also with everyone striving for ULNS 8.5 alk might burn sps(usualy tips but not always)

GL ether way, i hope you get to the bottom of this

i dont know what else to test...everything looks normal, i know there are phosphates because of algae on some rocks and certain areas of low flow...along with some bubble algae...are the phosphates in the tank enough to kill the corals i dont know either....

I always thought that if they were going to bleach because of too much PAR then the part exposed like the tips would be the first to bleach and not the base first....also my RBTA has not moved at all from the spot it had before the light change....I have a setosa little colony unaffected, a setosa frag on the same rack others are dying and it looks like nothing is wrong with it.....my small maxima clam doesnt look bad either

 

[biggles]

Sometimes we try too many things at once when looking for a fix in a desperate situation. From your first post it appears that the only change made after which time some of your frags began bleaching was the move from LED to T5. Having both an LED lit frag section in my sump and T5's (3 x B+ and 1 x Fiji purple) as supplements on my DT i can assure you those T5 bulbs pack a lot more punch than your eyes register and just because it looks like reef lighting on valium doesn't mean the corals see it that way.
I would drop all affected to the sand bed and run some Rowaphos etc in small amounts slowly building the amount up until you see an impact on the algae. Good luck and i hope things take a turn for the better.

 

[dentdominator]

One thing I've noticed with keeping sps is,
When you actually see the issues/damage to the coral.
More than likely it happened a week to two weeks before it's actually seen. So, trying to make some adjustments isn't a bad idea but by then it might be to late.

 

[ctniners]

Thanks...that's what I'm thinking....I don't want to do too much to the tank and affect any healthy livestock in the other hand moving them may also help those frags that may not be showing ill effects right now but will if I keep them there

When I first started in the hobby I was a big MH Radium guy and never ever burned a Sps coral or frag...I always thought T5 didn't compare to them but I guess I was wrong...I guess having a 17" deep tank and with the T5 about 4-5" from the water is a little shallow when u add up the 2" of sandbed....that puts the frag rack roughly about 13-14" from the bulbs

 

[ctniners]

So my next question is...at what point do i bring them back up to either half way up or to the top...how do I know if the frags are not getting enough light on the rack sitting on the sand bed?...any specific signs I should look for?

Thanks again!

 

[biggles]

I recently bought a bleached purple colony for $20- as only the last few inches of the branches was still alive and baby blue in color which i learned long ago was often a sick purple coral rather than a healthy blue coral. I fragged the colony after watching the tissue loss continue and they are all residing low down until i see good PE and pigment return at which time i will start moving them up to see what happens with the color. I would suggest you leave the affected frags low until you see good PE from them and the recession ceases.

 

[trueblackpercula]

I recently bought a bleached purple colony for $20- as only the last few inches of the branches was still alive and baby blue in color which i learned long ago was often a sick purple coral rather than a healthy blue coral. I fragged the colony after watching the tissue loss continue and they are all residing low down until i see good PE and pigment return at which time i will start moving them up to see what happens with the color. I would suggest you leave the affected frags low until you see good PE from them and the recession ceases.

Very nice sps what lights are they under?

 

[barjam]

when I switched from 400w halides to 6 bulb Ati T5's all my SPS died, bleaching from the bottom up, I believe it was the light change. T5's are that strong.

I wouldn't expect them to bleach bottom up due to lights. This was always an indication of an alk issue for me.

I went from 6x54 to 250x2 mh and I had minor bleaching. 500 watts of phoenix 14k was way more light than my mix of ati bulbs.

Was your 400 a low par bulb?

 

[ctniners]

Here are some bad pictures i took of the frags and tank....sorry for the bad shots I did it with my phone...the color in the tank is pretty much a 20K look

1. ORA Frogskin
As you can see i put some arrows showing the dying line and area above with PE...the part where there is PE is brownish.....

2. Stylo
Also put arrows although I am sure you can clearly see the line

3. Unknown acro
This one had full PE until a couple of days now is not showing much, it was looking nice and pink and now the base is looking whiter and not much PE

4. Front shot of the tank
The horizontal line shows about where the frags were until today when i moved them to the bottom....the circles are showing a healthy mini colony of Setosa, a duncan and my RBTA

In terms of the previous light i had, i had 2 x 120 W Chinese LEDs...not sure how much PAR they were giving but im sure from what I have read about them and about the ATI bulbs im sure these 6 ATIs are giving the tank more PAR


BTW Biggles great looking shots and frags....

All inputs are appreciated....thanks again!

 

[drw94]

I also had some issues with acros dying from the bottom up. I changed nothing but stopped my rowaphos. They started to recover after that. Doing some research I found other cases where some rowaphos particles leaked into the tanks and settled on the base where there is less flow. This made sense as I had crappy sponges in my reactor. This is just my experience, but something to look at.

 

[trueblackpercula]

Is your coralin algae turning white?

 

[biggles]

Very nice sps what lights are they under?

Currently running a radium 250W with 3 B+ and a Fiji purple 39W T5's but the tank is only 2 months old and the corals are starving which finally prompted me into ordering a skimmer so i can add something more than RO to the tank - i finally starved the algae into submission.
Anyhow back to the important issue which is saving ctniners's expensive frags ! I see now how little you have to work with mate, those frags are pretty small so you have three options as i see it.
1. Use a dremel or similar rotary tool with a cut off wheel and slice them up - you can do very fine and precise fragging with a dremel, then super glue gel them to new plugs.
2. A trick that i have used before to stop the spread of recession on acros is to use a small bit of reef putty rolled into thin string, wrap it around the dead zone and just cover where living tissue remains - you are basically fragging it without cutting it off and the coral can't tell the difference. Think about it, you cut the branch which is dead skeleton and then glue to a plug with living tissue meeting a glue or epoxy contact point - same thing here but we are not cutting the dead skeleton and the coral doesn't know the difference.
3. Watch and hope for the best.

If it was me i would go with no. 2 as you don't need to remove them from the water - they are already stressed to the max so the least invasive action for now is best imo. The stylo is clearly bleached but i can see the polyps still alive so don't touch that one.

Hopefully the die off is progressing slowly enough that you can watch and wait a bit longer but if you see further recession i really urge you to bite the bullet and go for broke to save them. I've been in your situation before and i know how strong the urge is to just watch and will them to recover lol - in case doing something will make things worse. I have my fingers crossed for you :thumbsup:

 

[ctniners]

Thanks Biggles...Option 2 def sounds like the easier one, the strange part is that I have other frags in the same rack doing perfectly fine..but im gonna try it, i dont want to just watch it die and do nothing...i will def try option 2 on the frogskin......we will see

Thanks again

 

[ctniners]

Is your coralin algae turning white?

Interesting you ask that, no the coralline algae is turning white, however i did see a change in the growth, at one point all three sides were completely covered with coralline algae, now i see pieces missing on the side glass and on the back, almost like the growth stalled or is actually recessing...but that could also be lights correct?....the rocks still dont have coralline growing on them, the tonga rock and the rest of the rock was put together while dried....the live rock went in the sump.

Also I dose magnesium and last week it showed at 1450...

 

[dentdominator]

Interesting you ask that, no the coralline algae is turning white, however i did see a change in the growth, at one point all three sides were completely covered with coralline algae, now i see pieces missing on the side glass and on the back, almost like the growth stalled or is actually recessing...but that could also be lights correct?....the rocks still dont have coralline growing on them, the tonga rock and the rest of the rock was put together while dried....the live rock went in the sump.

Also I dose magnesium and last week it showed at 1450...

That right there pretty much answers the question. The coralline dying off is a tale tale sign that the alkalinity levels have depleted. A tank with a lot of coralline uses about 2dkh alone in just alkalinity per day, never mind sps, lps and snails if there are any. That being said, can't forget about the calcium and magnesium levels those should all be in check. All 3 should be within reasonable levels etc. If I would to stop dosing alkalinity for 1 day in my tank the dkh would drop about 5dkh within 24 hours. So, if your not dosing enough alkalinity, calcium and magnesium then that could be a huge factor why the corals are dying and the coralline is dead.