tips on acro looks abraded... help...

[flipteg]

i noticed last night that at the very tip of one of my bigger acropora frag looks like it is abraded... it affects about 3-4 coralites...

when the lights turned on this afternoon, i noticed that another tip is affected... it was fine at lights out last night cause i even took a picture...

the only thing that i can think of is the acro crab that is in it... the crab is a small brown crab... but really, i've never seen the crab venture out to one of the tips... it's always deep within the branches... another culprith might be hermit crabs but i think it is unlikely...

so do you all think i should get rid of the acro crab...?

 

[RichConley]

Do you have any urchins, or large fish? Somtimes things will break the tops off of acros just because theyre clumsy

 

[flipteg]

my tank is 30 gallons so i only have a clownfish and 3 small gobies... the only things that have claws in my tank are the acro crab, hermits, and coral banded... other than that, i don't really know who else could do it...

 

[flipteg]

here are the pictures of the acropora tips... tip 1 was the one i was talking about that it happened to first... as you can see, it's starting to heal back up... tip 2 is the recent one...

here is another view of tip 2... you can also see tip 1 directly below it...

this is the picture i took last night... i was trying to get an ID of the coral... tip 2 is not in focus since that's not where i focused the camera, but as you can see, it was perfectly fine then... you can also see the brown acro frag directly to the left of tip 2...

any help would be appreciated... thanks...!

 

[Corn]

are you getting a fast grow rate ? if yes that is why the typs are white. the coral is growing to fast for the skin to cover the ends and color up.

 

[flipteg]

yea, but i'm pretty sure that doesn't happen over night...

 

[jjackson]

it can... especially with a staghorn.... some of mine grow about a 1/4 a week... I am constantly cutting it back so it isnt out of the water.

 

[Corn]

that is what is going on and why you have white typs. as long as you dont see any receding on the coral then it is fine.