What's wrong with my Torch Coral?
- Thread starter pcannone
- Start date
Daytonarick
New member
I've been waiting for someone to advise you on this because the exact same thing happend to my torch 3 days ago. Since it looks like no one is going to give any advice and I've had a hard time finding info on-line. I was wondering if you have had any luck getting to the bottom of this.
The base skeleton of my polyp is completely exposed. It appears to have grown a very thin, opaque film over the area. I'm not sure if this means it may come back or this is the end. The part that really worries me is the other two polyps are not looking as they should either. Everything else in the tank is fine. I did do a 5 gallon water change and this happened shortly afterward. I've had this torch for about 5 months and it seemed so happy until now.
The base skeleton of my polyp is completely exposed. It appears to have grown a very thin, opaque film over the area. I'm not sure if this means it may come back or this is the end. The part that really worries me is the other two polyps are not looking as they should either. Everything else in the tank is fine. I did do a 5 gallon water change and this happened shortly afterward. I've had this torch for about 5 months and it seemed so happy until now.
I did get some answers. I also posted this in the reef discussion forum. Here is the link.
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1432133
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1432133
First off, once one of the polyps dies, ie goes white and the sweeper tentacles fall off, it's done for and won't ever come back. Luckily, the other polyps will be just fine. As for why it happened, it's hard to say. I've had it happen because it got too close to a mushroom and they went at it with their defensive chemicals, resulting in the death of almost all of the torch and a few of the mushrooms. Remember that the tentacles can extend up to twice the length of the base, often during the night. Also, torch corals do not like intense water flow, too much of it can cause the thin membrane that covers the polyp to strip off, leading to its death. If the tentacles are doing anything more than just slightly waving back and forth in the flow, then move it somewhere with less current. More info about how/when it happenedwould be helpful.
PVChick12
New member
Daytonarick, I have EXACTLY the same problem...the thin, opaque film over a now dead looking skeleton. It is not all dead yet though...Whats scaring ME is that I had the same problem a few days ago on my candy cane coral, but that coral has not been looking 100% healthy for a long time while everything else was thriving, so I thought it was finally just giving up. The candy cane had that same film looking stuff starting about 3 days ago and all of it is dead now except for one head. Now my torch (which is over a foot away from the 98% dead candy cane) has the same film starting to cover one of the head. AND my flowerpot is getting the same stuff and that coral is on the other side of my 60 gallon tank. So I am just wondering if I need to pull these three apparently dieing corals out before it spreads to anything else in the tank, or should I just wait it out...?
I will say I changed out 20 gallons today and threw in a new bag of carbon in response to this...Oh and that I have had all these corals over a year, and in the meantime there is frogspawn in middle of the dieing corals that is unaffected...***?!
I will say I changed out 20 gallons today and threw in a new bag of carbon in response to this...Oh and that I have had all these corals over a year, and in the meantime there is frogspawn in middle of the dieing corals that is unaffected...***?!
bzotter...Thanks for the input. I have two Koralia 3's. One on the top rightside and the other on the middle left side of the tank. The Torch used to be near the top right Koralia, until I moved it because it was leaning against the rock. I moved it to the bottom left hand side of my 55G. It is underneath my powerhead with less flow.
PVChick12
New member
I've been flipping through my fatty coral book and I'm starting to think these corals are bailing due to stress...I did move my torch a few times before it started doing this, but what gets me is that it started on a different coral that wasn't moved. In my book what sounds most like all this is "Large-polyp recession condition 1":
"An apparently healthy coral with good expansion begins to display a loss of tissue from the margins, exposing septa and the rest of the skeleton. The condition may or may not be accompanied secondarily by Ostreobium algae or protozoan brown jelly. The tissue recession seems forced as even marginal tissue at the edge of recession appears healthy, though slightly shrunken or "stretched". The coral may experience a certain amount of tissue loss and then have the progression halt as quickly as it began. At other times, the entire coral is lost through slow wasting. . .
The coral seems unrepsonive to normal courses of action. It may well be that a nutritional deficit is being experienced. . .In most anecdotal observations, salinities lower than those of natural seawater seem to increase the incidence of this syndrome."
The other thing that sounded similar was if the coral had been bitten by a fish....
Either way, I still don't know what to do about it?!
"An apparently healthy coral with good expansion begins to display a loss of tissue from the margins, exposing septa and the rest of the skeleton. The condition may or may not be accompanied secondarily by Ostreobium algae or protozoan brown jelly. The tissue recession seems forced as even marginal tissue at the edge of recession appears healthy, though slightly shrunken or "stretched". The coral may experience a certain amount of tissue loss and then have the progression halt as quickly as it began. At other times, the entire coral is lost through slow wasting. . .
The coral seems unrepsonive to normal courses of action. It may well be that a nutritional deficit is being experienced. . .In most anecdotal observations, salinities lower than those of natural seawater seem to increase the incidence of this syndrome."
The other thing that sounded similar was if the coral had been bitten by a fish....
Either way, I still don't know what to do about it?!
Daytonarick
New member
PVChick12, it's just an idea but check your temperature. I just checked mine and although the digital thermometer I have reads 79.2 I checked with a $.98 glass thermometer I started with and it is reading almost 85 deg F. What finally made me check it out was my star polyps have all hidden themselves which is not normal for this time of day. This happened in February when my heater went haywire and my stars did the same thing. I got this new thermometer along with the new heater and everything recovered well although it has been a challenge to keep my nitrates under 10 eversince. Any suggestions out there for a good thermomoter. I hate to lose anything else because of a crappy thermometer!
PVChick12
New member
Haha, well I don't have any suggestions for a good thermometer, I just have 4 different ones all around my tank and sump. I see you live in FL, I live in SoCal so I know the challenges in the summer, esp. since I run Halides. I have thought about a chiller, but I feel that is just more shizzz to go wrong. I just check it several times a day and opening the hood and an old fashioned fan across the top seem to do the trick for me for now.
As for my corals, I did a 30% water change yesterday, and another one today, slowly of course....I also vaccuumed off the dead head of the torch as it appeared to be stinging what still appeared healthy on the coral. I fragged the only live head of the candy cane that was left on the skeleton, and the flowerpot seems to have stopped "bubbling" as it appeared to be this time yesterday. But thanks for the help and I am glad your tank calmed down as well!
As for my corals, I did a 30% water change yesterday, and another one today, slowly of course....I also vaccuumed off the dead head of the torch as it appeared to be stinging what still appeared healthy on the coral. I fragged the only live head of the candy cane that was left on the skeleton, and the flowerpot seems to have stopped "bubbling" as it appeared to be this time yesterday. But thanks for the help and I am glad your tank calmed down as well!
