SPS Dying?

BioRee

New member
Hello I am new to reef keeping. It seems there's many knowledgable reefers on this forum. I would like your help to understand what is happening to the frag. I had it in my tank for three weeks and it seems doing fine until I noticed some of the pores are missing/bleached? The frag was placed in mid lvl of the tank and now moved to the bottom. I think it might have to do with light, but what do you guys think?
 

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It could be lighting but also high Alk can also cause bleaching.I also noticed Cyanobacteria on your sand.High phosphate levels can be causing a problem.I would do some water changes to see if that helps.
 
Thats an sps coral that likes less light than most of SPS corals.Place it lower in the tank.Its diying but it could recover after a while because this is one of the most resistant sps corals.Its called green birds nest coral.
 
Looks like pocillopora not birds nest..

What are your nitrate/phosphate levels?
Size of tank?
Type/model of light?
Alk/cal levels?
Salinity?


clearly you have other problems too (like that cyano all over the sand bed)
 
Looks like pocillopora not birds nest..

What are your nitrate/phosphate levels?
Size of tank?
Type/model of light?
Alk/cal levels?
Salinity?


clearly you have other problems too (like that cyano all over the sand bed)

It seriatopora gutattus(green birds nest).
 
It's seriatopora. Pocillopora are much thicker and the tips are not pointed.


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It looks like green birds nest to me also. Sps in general dont like swings of any type. Salinity or alk swings with for sure cause rtn and stn issues, tissue necrosis. In my experience they like stability and higher salt level. 1.025 or so. Mag can be an issue also if it is to low. Hope any of this helps. Good luck. Happy reefing.

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It's seriatopora. Pocillopora are much thicker and the tips are not pointed.

I agree.. It didn't look like the normal "birdsnest" I've always seen... Which I believe is Seriatopora hystrix which is far more "pointy" in the tips vs the seriatopora gutattus..

Its so hard to tell some of them apart sometimes..

No matter..
 
Looks perfectly fine to me. The polyps are an off colored white, but they're still full extended around what looks like 100% of the coral. Doesn't look to me like there's a single thing wrong with it.

Edit: If you want to see what I'm talking about you could lightly brush it with something so it retracts the polyps. Almost guarantee the white goes away. Do it at your own risk though haha
 
Thanks for all the responses. Clearly there is much to learn here.

@Percula9 - I do water change every week about 10 to 15%. I get the filtered water from Safeway and mix my own salt. Maybe I should test the phosphate and nitrate level of the water from Safeway.

@mcgyvr - This is a 14 biocube with stock lights. I did not check the ALK/CAL level because I do water change every week and only have two frag in the tank so far. Thought it wouldn't matter that much. But I do notice the tank temperature can get pretty 80 to 82 due to the heat from the light. Maybe this is the cause?


From my understanding (browsing through the forum), that stock light from the Biocube gives 100 to 200 par (bottom to top), while SPS usually requires higher par usually upper 300. Would you agree that lighting is not the issue?
 
@BioRee, How about nitrate/phosphate levels?

While they do require decent lighting if your 100-200par at the bottom is accurate then I'd say lighting is not an issue.. (but I wouldn't think a stock biocube light was sufficient for SPS.. softies..sure.. SPS.. not so much)..
 
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