Yellow Porites never open

[jmowbray]

So I received a shipment of new coral from PE a week ago yesterday. Everything in the tank is doing great except for one....Yellow Porites. I have no idea why. My two new acros still are hardly extended but I understand that they are getting used to the tank and it may take a while for them to be "happy" and extend. I'm just mainly concerned about the yellows right now. I'm currently testing the water and will report results. I'm also doing a WC tomorrow.

These are the tank stats below:
Frag Tank: 20 Gallon long (30"x12"x12")
"¢No sand bed, 2lbs live rock
"¢DIY step style frag rack from PVC and Egg crate
Pump: HOB Fluval C2
Skimmer: AquaC Remora powered by a Rio 1000
Lighting: 1 AJM Multicolor LED fixture running 9 hours a day at 30%
Water Movement: 2x Maxi Jet 600 PRO with Hydor FLO Rotating Deflector
Dosing:
"¢Ca, alk. Mg.
Heater: Finnex HMO-100
Controller: Digital Aquatics RKL
"¢2 PC4's
Topoff:
"¢JBJ ATO
"¢Toms aqualifter
"¢5 gallon water jug

Fish:
"¢ A. Percula

Coral:
"¢ Green Hornet Povona maldivensis
"¢ Green Sheen Acropora
"¢ Aussie Acan lord
"¢ Green Moseleya Moon Brain
"¢ Teal Acropora
"¢ Yellow Porites
"¢ Alveopora
"¢ Teal Maze Brain
"¢ Hollywood Stunner Chalice
"¢ Nuclear Green Zoas
"¢ Yellow Polyps
"¢ Eagle Eye Zoas
"¢ Monti Cap
"¢ Pulsing Zenia
"¢ Frogspawn
"¢ Green Zoas
"¢ Metallic Green Mushroom
"¢ War Coral
"¢ Orange Bam Bams
"¢ Finger leather
"¢ Green spongodes
"¢ Bubble Coral
"¢ Green Toadstool
"¢ Green and Purple Duncan's
"¢ ORA Red Planet
"¢ Blastomussa
"¢ Encrusting Gorgonian

Invertebrates:
"¢ Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
"¢ Maxima Clam
"¢ Nerite Snails
"¢ Brittle Star

My spongodes has full polyp extension and is encrusting on my egg crate like mad. My new maxima clam has also attached to the egg crate with bissle threads. So everything new seems to like their home but this one. I know some claim that they are nocturnal. I do see slight protrusion of polyps at night but no real extension.

I feed phyto every morning and dose vodka for nitrates and phospahtes. I also have a GFO reactor running.

Recently since the addition of the new stock I have been experiencing a dino and cyano outbreak. No clue why No3 and PO4 are at 0ppm (yes I know it could be a false positive). How no idea why they came or how to get rid of them.

Please help me and get me in the right direction.

 

[birdman1979]

I had porites a few years ago and was also dosing vodka at the time like you. As soon as my Alk got above 7.6ish, with my Hanna Checker, my porites would loose all polyp extension. I also found that it needed tons of flow. For example, I had two vortec MP40's on the 75 gallon tank. When one of the wet sides needed to be replaced i lost a lot of PE until I received the replacement unit. I had a 6 bulb T5 unit for lighting. Once I got things dialed in I got decent growth. It was fussy though, maybe because it was a wild specimen.

 

[jmowbray]

Dang I didn't know that they required that much care.

Below are my results:

Ca: 437
Alk: 9.8
Mg: 1500

PO4: 0.04
NO3: 0.0

Temp: 81.1F

If what your saying is true birdman about alk. it's no wonder I have issues. Anyone have any idea what this would be?

 

[ksicard]

stop dosing alk and let it come down to 7.6-8dkh. Your nutrients are very low to be running a higher alk

 

[birdman1979]

If your alk consumption is low then it could take a while to come down. You could stop dosing vodka/gfo and see if PE improves or find a salt like Red Sea (non pro), reefer's best, or NSW if close to the ocean that has lower alk and do water changes to bring down your alk.

Alk that is much over NSW in a low nutrient tank is not good. Not sure the science behind it though.

 

[jmowbray]

Thanks guys for all the help. I will start to lower the alk. It only takes about three days to drop that low so I'll let it.

 

[kleach]

Bringing this back to life...I just got a shipment yesterday and everything also seems great, but no extension on the porites. Did it help you to drop the alk? How is it doing now?

I'm scared because its a big colony (5" or so) and I don't want to kill it!

 

[jmowbray]

Sorry I didn't see this until now. I still have color on the frag but no extension yet not even at night