Too much flow bad?

[ojonas81]

Can you have too much flow for a SPS? I have a specific location in my tank where I now have had two different SPS and they both are showing the same symptoms. First one started to get a lot of brownish hairy stuff around it. The frag fell off the rock a couple of times due to snails knocking it over so I finally placed it somewhere else. It has not recovered fully.

The second SPS I have at roughly the same spot is starting to show similar brown hair stuff on its branches (only the branches with the most flow). I have made q lot of changes between the time the first one got relocated and till it recovered (such as chiller, automatic dosing ant ATO etc) so I cannot tell for sure that it is flow related.

The spot is approximately 4" away from the direct path of a MP10 at 80% reef crest mode. So is this flow related or should I start looking at something else that could cause this?

 

[allsps40]

You just dont to blast a coral with a power head.

 

[bobssecrtsn]

i have my millie 4" away from mp10 at 95% and its shaggy

 

[Alex T.]

More flow than a wave crashing reef break zone? Move the body of water as much as you want IMHO. Just don't point any flow generating power heads or return pumps directly at a coral. SPS grow in some very turbulent zones...much more water movement than we can provide.

 

[thor109]

I have two that like low light low flow. All corals are different. I place them where I think is best and if they don't do good I start moving them around.

 

[Alex T.]

A few things I've found are that their branches can tell you a lot. If they're thick and robust, they most likely need strong flow. Conversely, delicate and thin branched SPS seem to like random, slower flow, but all SPS seem to like a more brisk water movement in general.

 

[robs.mark]

doesnt matter how much flow your creating, its not going to be as much as the ocean!