SPS Problem

[BigBlue187]

I have been having some problems with my sps dying. I thought I was burning them with my lights but I have cut down on how long my lights are on and I'm still pulling out dead sps. The ones that are still alive are brown. Even my green slimer is brown . Needless to say I'm getting kind of pi$$ed. I tested my water tonight and here is how it read:

KH- 11 dKH
Phosphate- 0ppm
Calcium- 400
PH-7.8 (I know ph is kinda low)
Ammonia- 0ppm
Nitrite- 0ppm
Nitrate-5ppm
Salinity- 1.025

If you are wondering I run 2 175watt MH. They turn on at 5pm and go off at 10pm. My temp runs about 79-80 during the day and 79-80 at night. I don't know if this matters but I run a BAK-PAK skimmer. I also do 10 gallon water changes every Sunday. I use RO water but it test kind of high too 29-30 TDS.

I don't know what else I can tell you guys about my tank. If you guys have any idea whats going on please let me know.

Thanks for reading

Monty

 

[jbrunken]

What type of bulbs are they? Could be UV killing stuff. Is it possible that you might have a cracked bulb or UV shield?

-JB

 

[waverz]

Man monty that really sucks.

I guess it could be a cracked bulb. How often do bulbs do that? I mean i have heard of it happening a few times but, does it happen that often?

 

[Double-J]

how did they start to die? from the base or the tips? did they just RTN?
Your params look good, alk might be a little high but people run it that high all the time.

Hmm... just throwing out ideas off the top of my head

check electric current in the tank.
Could be bulbs
recalibrate your salinity meter, could be off (doubtful)
I'd start running some carbon incase it got something in the system.
TDS at 30 shouldn't cause it

It's tough to say, nothing really sticks out at me for causing such a big problem. Hope you get to the bottom of it. Good luck man!

 

[dascharisma]

If I had to guess, I would say the deaths are caused by high alk and possibly temp swings (I didn't see what your temp range is). Although people run as high as 11dkh, I have personally seen bad things happen when I push it past 10. If your sps are already weakened due to the issue below, then it wouldn't take as much to kill them.

As for the browning, I think that your nitrates are too high. Yes, lots of people run 5ppm nitrates and have great coloration, but most of those people are running 400watt halides for 8 hours a day. Running 175s for only 5 hours a day is far too short and weak of a photoperiod in my opinion.


Hope that helps,
Brad

 

[Double-J]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10513504#post10513504 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by dascharisma
If I had to guess, I would say the deaths are caused by high alk and possibly temp swings (I didn't see what your temp range is). Although people run as high as 11dkh, I have personally seen bad things happen when I push it past 10. If your sps are already weakened due to the issue below, then it wouldn't take as much to kill them.

As for the browning, I think that your nitrates are too high. Yes, lots of people run 5ppm nitrates and have great coloration, but most of those people are running 400watt halides for 8 hours a day. Running 175s for only 5 hours a day is far too short and weak of a photoperiod in my opinion.


Hope that helps,
Brad

Disagree (with both) maybe 1/2 agree with alk... maybe :wave:

He did give his temp swing if you just read the original post, I'll help ya 79-80. :wildone:

Anyways get your chiller already

 

[tibbs2]

Perhaps you've angered the sea gods...






or it could be your bulbs.

 

[BigBlue187]

JB- The bulbs are 175watt 20k Hamiltons. Is there any way of telling if a bulb is cracked or if the UV shield is cracked?

tinytool- When they start to die they start turning white at the base. I have no idea what RTN stands for . I haven't got around to buying a chiller yet. I thought sence my tank was in the basement it would stay cool enough.

dascharisma- I use to run my lights for 10 hours but cut back cause I thought that was to long and I was burning my coral. See all my sps use to be under a 150 watt bulb so I thought that my new 2 175 watt bulbs were burning them. I should be able to get my nitrates back under control when I do my water change. As far as getting my alk down how would I go about doing that?

The only thing I can think of doing is getting new bulbs. Other then that I have no idea. I will try to do what you guys suggested and get my alk down and my nitrates down.

tibbs2- I think you might be right. The sea gods are really pi$$ed at me. :furious:


Monty

 

[musty baby]

You mentioned UV shields, so I'm assuming DE bulbs? You should be able to see any problems with the shields, and I wouldn't think the bulbs would fire if they were cracked, but I've never dealt with DE bulbs, either.

I wouldn't think that 30 tds would be a problem, but you never know what that little bit could be. Copper from plumbing? It may not be the problem, but might be a good idea to eliminate it as a potential factor.

Admittedly I'm very little help.

 

[bgreenlee]

Monty

Give us an idea of what kind of things you add to your tank. Do you supplement calcium and Alk, add trace elements. While I agree the nitrates are higher then desired, that should not cause death in your corals by any sense of the word.

What is the rest of the photoperiod, do you run VHO's or PC's, how old are those bulbs.

How often do you do water changes?

What kind of test kits do you use and are they expired?

Do you have redbugs or any other sort of undesirable?

Billy

 

[BigBlue187]

I dose dow flake once a week and thats all I dose. The only lights I run are my MH. The lights are about 5 or 6 months old. I do 10 gallon water changes every Sunday. I use Salifert to test Phosphate, Calcium,and Nitrate the experation date on all of those are for 12/2007. For PH, Ammonia, Nitrite I use Aquarium Pharmaceuticals. I did have red bugs but I sucked them out with a turkey baster for about a week and I haven't seen any sence.

The only other thing that I have on my tank is a jug of r/o water that I drip in to my sump threw a rubber airline for like a bubbler. Thats all I have going in to the tank.

Monty

 

[glaspie69]

Maybe I can help clear up a few things, the bulbs are actually hamilton 14k's, there only 4 months old in burn time (i ran them for 4 hours a day then up to 8 hours gradually over 3 months) I'm not sure a cracked bulb is the problem. As I understand it when you switched the tanks over you ran the MH's for a full photoperiod? This would cause the corals to be stressed, on top of already being stressed from moving into a different tank. Now the temp swings could be topping them off or some other stress. SPS (in my experience) don't come back from getting kicked very quickly, so after getting burned they would be very suseptable and very touchy towards small changes in anything, temp, nitrates, ect. It's a good rule when upgrading lights to slowly up the time you run them from a few hours a day to more and more over a few months. I guess I should have asked if you knew that when you bought the tank, you can come down after things get settled and I'll give you some frags of what you lost if I have them. J

 

[leeweber85]

I agree with J, The move to the new tank and the new lights probably stressed them out. I prefer acclimating new lights by shielding some of the light rather than reducing the photo period.

It could also be some sort of bug that you're not seeing.


How is your alk so high if you only dose the Ca part?

 

[BigBlue187]

Thanks J for filling everybody in on the lights.

Lee I have know idea how my alk got so high. Like I said I only dose calcium.

 

[Double-J]

Bigblue, I was talking to Brad about the chiller he still needs to buy.

 

[bgreenlee]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10517058#post10517058 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by BigBlue187
I dose dow flake once a week and thats all I dose. The only lights I run are my MH. The lights are about 5 or 6 months old. I do 10 gallon water changes every Sunday. I use Salifert to test Phosphate, Calcium,and Nitrate the experation date on all of those are for 12/2007. For PH, Ammonia, Nitrite I use Aquarium Pharmaceuticals. I did have red bugs but I sucked them out with a turkey baster for about a week and I haven't seen any sence.

The only other thing that I have on my tank is a jug of r/o water that I drip in to my sump threw a rubber airline for like a bubbler. Thats all I have going in to the tank.

Monty

Personally I am not a dow flake fan, but if you dose something like that you shoudl be dosing it over the week instead of once a week. Any significant change in an aquarium parameter can lead to stress.

As for your temperature swing, one degree change throughout the day is pretty good without running a two stage controller with a heater and chiller. In past aquariums I had much larger swings then that with out a problem at all.

Your RO water would be the first thing I would attack. Like someone mentioned, there is no telling what that 30TDS actually is.

With nothing but MH, 5 hours is pretty short.

If you had red bugs I doubt that using a baster would get rid of them completely. I had them last year and fought like a mofo to get rid of them completely. They came as a gift with an expensive coral that I did not want to stress by putting it in quarantine (Never again). Three doses of interceptor later I was finally bug free.