what the heck is wrong

[trueblackpercula]

Sorry about the aefw post some pictures. There is a thread around here that talks about the life cycle. I think aefw can like 10 days with no host and they lay down eggs that will hatch and live another 10 to 15 days with out a host. It's a bad cycle, So keeping Sps out of the main display for 45 dYs would be better.

 

[trueblackpercula]

Here is the link

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2346292&highlight=aefw+experiment

 

[Stolireef]

What kills me about this is that you already follow good hygiene procedures and still ended up with AEFW. this is a tough hobby.

 

[greg1786]

What kills me about this is that you already follow good hygiene procedures and still ended up with AEFW. this is a tough hobby.

Yea man it is driving me crazy. I am so meticulous about everything involving my reef tanks so when something like this happens its real moral killer!

Thanks for the info michael. Ill try and get some photos up later tonight as im going to be dipping acros for a while this evening

 

[animalkingdom]

well AEFW didnt hurt the stylo...so something else is going on too

 

[porsche908]

Same thing happened to me a couple months ago it's a mystery

 

[greg1786]

well AEFW didnt hurt the stylo...so something else is going on too

Yea they definitely didnt. Though the stylo is not showing the same symptoms. The acros are losing flesh and have bitemarks on them. The stylo is just bleached where it isnt getting light but its polyps are still fully extended where its bleached.

 

[Mark SF]

what the heck is wrong

I skim on the dry side its sludgy stank dark brown. Im 99.9% sure its aefw unfortunately

I thought AEFW only consume acropora. Sorry to hear about your AEFW situation, wish you the best.

I will say that I have tried a dozen different Mithrax crabs at this point, and all of them consume stylophora, pocilipora and seriatopora. Their favorite is bird's nest for certain. They stripped a 7" diameter birds nest in my tank in 24 hours. They didn't have the pleasure of making it to the sump...

This to me looks like a low light event, I have some larger cats paws that look similar. I would guess that going from t5 to MH could have something to do with it, I.e. Linear light source vs. single point light source.

 

[Rickyrooz1]

I skim on the dry side its sludgy stank dark brown. Im 99.9% sure its aefw unfortunately

AEFW does not affect Stylophora, it doesn't look like it is pest related. I have the same issue with my corals that are shading the branches underneath. the white patch in the first picture is most likely due to an alkalinity swing, (quick drop) I have personally had this issue because i dose my two part manually and if I forget to dose a day or two I have seen this happen.

 

[BrentH]

well AEFW didnt hurt the stylo...so something else is going on too

I agree with this I've has aefw for a long time and as long as your reef is healthy u won't see rtn

 

[greg1786]

I agree with this I've has aefw for a long time and as long as your reef is healthy u won't see rtn

The tissue necrosis is not rapid. It was happening very slowly. I understand that the stylo cannot be affected by AEFW, I thought I mentioned it earlier but I thought it was happening due to the top of the coral growing so large it has completely shaded the trunk where its turned white. The stylo is also not losing flesh like the others had and where it had bleached was still extending its polyps. Since creating this thread ive found several others with larger stylos that have the same whitening around the shaded areas so I am begining to think its normal. I have however had a change of heart on the AEFW.

After spending several hours pulling every acro and dipping them, I no longer think its aefw. I did find more flatworms upon dipping, however I believe them not to be of the acro eating type. I started looking around and found a link on RC to a page that has photos and IDs of alot of the little critters in our tanks. It showed a flatworm that is harmless. Until then I didnt realize that there were flatworms other than Acro eaters. Anyhow I realized these not harmful flatworms are identical to mine. While this is good news, it only makes my issue more perplexing, now without a cause.

As we all know, Alk is often the cause of acros RTNing and STNing when it is not stable. I keep my alk supplement on a brs peralistic dosing pump and it keeps it rock solid. It is dispensed into the tank at 14 different 1 minute intervals throughout the day (24hrs). I checked it immediately after noticing the issue and have been daily since. It has yet to fluctuate more than +/- .2 on any given day. Before the issue occurred I checked alk and all other params once a week( mondays) during my weekly water change and maintenance. I record them to an app on my phone and a log on my laptop which graphs the results each week so I can keep an eye on any fluctuations. Point is im very meticulous about my tank and if it were an alk issue I would have known. The tissue necrosis has completely halted on the jf purps acro but is slowly continuing to move upward on the red acro. Im seeing no other negative issues on any other coral in the tank. I have no clue what to point to, however im wondering if its a P04 issue. Is it possible that the two acros simply did not adjust well to the declining nutrients? The vodka dosing was at 1.5 months and the N03 had gone undetectable and the P04 was down near undetectable though not completely yet. I was very careful about the dosing regimine and have kept a daily log. I started with .4ml and over the course of 5 weeks had worked up to 2.3ml daily. If anyone has an idea im open to any and all! Thanks for the input so far everyone

 

[BrentH]

Not to be off topic but how long did it take for your carbon dosing to start workin? And whatever was going on sounds like it's corrected if no other corals are stn ?

 

[greg1786]

Not to be off topic but how long did it take for your carbon dosing to start workin? And whatever was going on sounds like it's corrected if no other corals are stn ?

I saw noticeable results after about three weeks. The first thing I noticed was the green algae on some of the rocks and back wall receeding and then the coraline EXPLODED. The tank was already full of coraline and there wasnt much algae to begin with but the coraline went from " ive got a decent amount of coraline" to "holy s**t it looks like im farming coraline". Its a very slow process I think because you have to start slow and over time ramp up the amount of vodka you use to allow your bioload to adjust to the massive growth in bacteria. I stopped carbon dosing right when the issue started but there was a marked difference in the water clarity, coraline growth, algae reduction, and PE on my sps. I saw my P04 and N03 start to drop after two weeks. After 4 weeks my n03 was undetectable(red sea test). My p04 went from .16 to .08 after 3 weeks. Every subsequent week after it dropped by .02 until it got to .02 where it kinda hovered until I recently stopped. My last dose was 2.3ml of vodka and because my nutrients were holding steady at such a low number, I was ready to cut the 2.3 in half and go with it as my maintenance dose. Hope this helps