What is wrong with my system?

[Bluephish13]

please just give me your thoughts what i am doing wrong or what i am missing. allmy corals look like A$$. SPS STN then stop sometimes it takes the entire coral. lps polyps are very short stubby(torch,divisia) and only extend in the lowest shaded areas of the tank

overall everything is very pale, sps extremely pale for almost a full year sometimes stn. some stuff still grows (most noticeable a sunset milli, and pink cap).

I have tried to put my finger on it myself for a long time but no luck.
Sometime stuff looks to be making a comeback, but it is short lived. Everything i try leaves me in the exact same spot with no change at all.

now i am freaking cause more and more acros are getting stn including a rare find acro i found on a piece of lr when i first started.


tank stats/ specs
60 gal display 15 gal sump, 10 gal remote fuge

6 54 watt t5 aquaactinic slr's ( new ati bulbs i have now used almost every brand)
08-2009 version nw-150 octo kept clean and preforming at max.
mp40w and k3 (display flow) MAG 7 sump return.
TLF po4 reactor(BRS GFO)
ROX 0.8 carbon in bag (booo to the bag i know)

very open rock work.

Shallow sand in display removed and swished clean weekly, and stirred with nass. snails, noticeable detritus build up is syphoned out threw a micron sock to remove detritus and not water in between water changes.

Newly added 4" deep sugarfine deep sand bed in fuge never had nitrate be for but i guess i really wont now.


sg. 1025 on its way back up to 1.026. recently found my refractometer was really reading 1.024 for sometime. I did have the coral problem be for my refractometer went off.

temp- 78-79

kh - tried 10-11 dkh but for the last few months i have it at 8.5
cal-always 430
(bionic part A&B) 40ml of each on opposite nights added around 12-1 am

PH right now is 8.26 about norm, and drops to about 8.08 at night (when part A is added every other day it jumps to 8.3 for about an hour, and then settles back down)

nitrate i have only used api but always got solid yellow never a hint of a darker color.

PO4 last time hanna tested was 0 as low as the meter went 0.01(using rowa at the time but recently switched to a less extreme gfo from bulk reef)

mag 1400 i add epsom salts in with my water change water.

water changes once a week every 10 days or so, 15 gal with oceanic salt.
BRS 5 stage ro/di filters all new just replaced. My other are not even bad(still reading 0 tds) i just replaced them to rule it out.


Thats what i can think of for now. Please help me i am starting to lose all sps fast. Even my double softball size pocci got stn.

ask what you need pics of, or what other parims you need me to figure out i just really need help. I realize i will never figure this one out on my own.

 

[dreaminmel]

6 54 watt t5 aquaactinic slr's ( new ati bulbs i have now used almost every brand)

Shallow sand in display removed and swished clean weekly, and stirred with nass. snails, noticeable detritus build up is syphoned out threw a micron sock to remove detritus and not water in between water changes.

kh - tried 10-11 dkh but for the last few months i have it at 8.5
cal-always 430
(bionic part A&B) 40ml of each on opposite nights added around 12-1 am

mag 1400 i add epsom salts in with my water change water.

These four things popped out at me. Have all of these been in play the entire time you've had the issues?

-Concerned 6 T5's over a 60g may be too much?
-Constant weekly disturbance of the sand may be disturbing something?
-I always dose both Ca and Alk parts in same day, just separated by maybe 20 minutes. Alternating the parts every other day makes me wonder how much of a roller coaster the balance is experiencing on a daily basis.
-It's suggested to use more than epsom salts to boost Mg. I mix a BRS Mg supplement with epsom salts and RO water.

Hopefully one of us can help you figure this out... :hmm2:

 

[toddmh]

what t5 bulbs you running?? Also how is your flow with that mp40? 60 gal seems pretty small for a monster like them..

I'm still new at this hobby and do not want to give bad advice,but 1/3 water change a week seems much when you are running carbon and gfo..

I would let the water go for a couple weeks without a change and quit dosing everything in that time and see how you system reacts and then start adding things back once at a time..

But i'd get a second and third opinion

 

[Gary Majchrzak]

I agree with Mel: dose liquid two part daily but several minutes apart.

Is this aquarium fed... does it contain any fish?

 

[Bluephish13]

The issue is pale colors(not brown) in all corals overall, stn random appear in sps. Growth in all corals is nil but no lps or softies have every died. This has been going on for a solid year now. When i noticed the change happen a yr ago i noticed purple algae growth on the glass bleached and xenia growth stopped. My cheato for the most part will not even grow. everything looks open and has decent polyp extension but are dead. lol

Its like my tank is in purgatory!



dreaminmel-toddmh

Maybe too much light i tried a few different combos. right now running all ati blue+ with 1 ABS and 1 75.25. had more day bulbs with same results. Also reduced day times down to 4 hrs and had the same results. Now same results.lol

Sand maybe but it is only .5 " deep at most. It is syphoned out and rinsed in cleaner tank water (weekly)as i do my water change. Then replaced. Basically the sand is for looks. I have had deeper sand undisturbed with same results. I removed it for this method, and added deeper sand to my fuge.


ca/kh this is what i am leaning on now. I did ca/kh on same day with same results for a long time. Every time i test i get the numbers i am aiming for at that time. (mag/kh/ca) so i dont get how i make it more stable. Plus with no growth im not using up much ca anyways.lol


Recently heard this about the mag so i will try some but i am not sure if that would be my sole problem.?

thanks for getting me started, lets see what everyone else says if they read threw all my babbling.


todd the do nothing approach seems scarey my tank gives me OCD.lol

 

[Bluephish13]

gary-

yes it is fed, i have a hippo tang almost 2yrs getting bigger, 2 clowns 3 yrs old, 2yr old sixline, and a 2yr old mandarin.

I feed mostly spectrum pellets, omega 1 marine,and omega 1 algae(flakes), occasionally cyclops, and rods coral food.

I do feed as light as i can, while allowing my fish to still be full.

thanks

 

[toddmh]

todd the do nothing approach seems scarey my tank gives me OCD.lol

haha yeah very scary I agree,but one thing I learned(the hard way)in setting up industrial machinery..

The more you try to fix a screwed up set up the worse it gets lol,It's much better to reset and get back to basics and start over and build from there..

I wish you luck on this problem

 

[dreaminmel]

A long shot but, any chance a powerhead or other device is leaking current into the water?

 

[GMaquarium]

Too much gfo? Get a clear po4 reading with a photometer.

 

[mr.maroonsalty]

Something I might suspect would be a heavy metal or other contamination (maybe try running a ploy-filter); how well do snails fare? Do you have a other corals like Gorgonians that my have taken chemical control of the tank? Might it be a simple waning of diversity of lower level food chain organisms; I just read an article about how amazing dinoflagelates are some signal corals to rapidly grow, others to withstand higher water temps, some can even end in the death of the the end user in the food chain (people)...

 

[Bluephish13]

dreaminmel-I did get a meter a while back when this first happened and found no current leak, but i should check again. Thanks

Honestly i have a new esv ground probe but never hooked it up. It has only a little ring at the plug end, and i was unsure on its correct install.



GM- my last p04 reading tested with hanna photo meter was 0.01.
I thought this was low also and switched from rowa to BRS regular GFO only used like 3 table spoons.

And i waited like 5 months to change out the rowa so i would think it was prob not even working near the end.

How much should i use?. Should i stop using it? . Not sure if i ever tried not using it at all. hmm

 

[GMaquarium]

if your po4 is chronically low I think this may be a reason for faded or bleached color. I would use a very small amount (fat pinch) of gfo or non at all. Let it go up to .02-.04 Amino acid additions will also help with color when p04 is low.

 

[Conesus_Kid]

Any pics of these corals? I'm wondering if you're experiencing bleaching from too much light: if the corals were experiencing STN, you would not be getting polyp extension on those parts.

I have bleached plenty of corals under 4x54 watt T5's (w/ an Icecap 660) when I was first starting out. If you're using 6 bulbs on a 60 gallon aquarium, that may be a bit much, as there's not as many lower light spots as when you're using a point-source light (like a MH fixture).

I would run a polypad just in case there might be some contamination of some sort, but I'm initially going to agree with Mel's theory of overdoing it on the T5's.

Again, I'd like to see some pics to see if anything else jumps out at us.

 

[Bluephish13]

I just took some pics its late so no lights on, but this pic i think sums it up pretty good. That is a pocci in that mess. In the back ground you can see a another acro suffering no stn on that one YET.

On the pocci the tissue with polyps still expanded would blow off if i dusted it with a turkey baster. I grew it from a small 2 inch frag and fragged it multiple times so it def grew at some point(long ago)


shh dori is sleeping

 

[Bluephish13]

double post

 

[superkat]

i can't help you, since i am still extremely new at this...but i completely feel for you...i hope you can figure out a solution quickly.

 

[dreaminmel]

Even if you've done it before... I would highly suggest having someone double check your test results. The time I experienced STN and then tissue w/ polyps blowing off when basted like that, I found out that my Alkalinity was way off.

 

[jfl14609]

i agree with mel I had that when I first started turned out I had a bad test kit

 

[Newreeflady]

I've also had gfo (phosar and phosban at different times) cause rtn and stn in my tank. I think if I use this again it will be tiny pinch. Things good, changed media adding gfo at 1/2 recommended dose--> death. :/ I've also seen tissue death from alk issues. And, I also suspect my tendancy toward immediate gratification (pre-emptive purchase of coral.)

I've had all of these problems. I've lost hundreds of $$ in gorgeous coral. It's so sad and discouraging.

OK, I'm rambling. For me I have see this from low alk and from gfo and simply too new of a system to possibly be a good and stable environment for coral. For you it could be something(s) different. I think we have to remember that most people who get into this hobby likely fail. There are a lot of ways to fail- I've probably found them all by now! I know this isn't very helpful, but you're not alone.

Keep troubleshooting, stop adding to the system, and add maybe consider a cuke instead of the sand vacuuming and rinsing. As someone said, try to dose alk/Ca closer together. I use a peristaltic pump at diff ends of my sump. Make sure the alk portion is dosed into a very very high flow area and that it isn't precipitating.

Good luck!
Angela

 

[mr.maroonsalty]

I'm by no means super experienced keeping sps; in the first picture I'm thinking you have a good amount of nutrients, and/or not enough flow. I don't think the same way looking at the second picture. I also wonder if perhaps the coral grew well somewhere else in the tank and was moved?