Birds nests "BLEACHING??"

[pmgaudio]

OK, I have a green Birdsnest, I have had for MONTHS and was doing VERY WELL. Picked up a PINK BN a couple Months ago and it TOO was doing GREAT..... As of the last two weeks or so, they are turning WHITE, like a BLEACHING effect... NOTHING has changed, in fact my Params are the best they have been. CA-460, KH 7.7, Mg 1270.... can some one let me know what else I should look for.... weekly water changes, and since the tank has been going from last Feb, I have had only a few issues with algae that have been dealt with.. Great flow and I do not come CLOSE to over feeding the only TWO fish I have.. JBJ 28, and a red Cap that has grown exponentially. with zoas and a gold torch that are fantastic, not to mention my two green Hydnophora that are amazing as well....

Thanks

 

[mike007]

I have had similar Issues with my Birdnest and I found that they grow so fast that they don't get enough light. What I done is I prune them back a little so they can received more light and I have had good results. If you are confident on your parameters you might try this.

 

[pmgaudio]

I do not think light is the issue, unless they are getting TOO much.... but not much has changed in any aspect of their existance and well being.... I am deeply puzzled and very disheartened....

 

[mike007]

My leds are very strong and these guys grow like crazy. Might want to have your parameters double checked by another source.

 

[tigerdragon]

To me your kh and mag are low i have 5 different birdsnest colonies all growing great. My kh is 9.1 and mag 1400-1460. Running mine under led also i keep a little po4 and nitrates in my sys.

 

[pmgaudio]

as I have doubled checked my readings (test's) and not much if anything has changed in the last few months, I find it very perplexing.... I have had an issue in my last tank with SPS not lasting long at all, but then I also had Hydo's and they followed along with the Birdsnests, but they are undamaged... and that makes me sad, I was doing very well with the EASY to keep SPS and now they suffer.... perhaps there is something ELSE that could cause just them to do this... I will try to UL pics when I get home... before and after pics....

 

[deerhunter06]

you say you had algae issues and you took care of it ? Thats prolly the issue, they need some nutrients. Given you said you took care of excess nutrients you are probably starving it, find a happy medium with your phos and nitrates

 

[pmgaudio]

I don't think I have NO "nutrients" although too much Phos is never a good thing, I have not tested Nitrates in a while... even when I had them at a steady 20, (To make my zoas look amazing) My sps was still in good a shape...it really seems mysterious.. I am at a loss... I will do a few more tests this weekend....

 

[Triggreef]

I have issues with bn as well. Never an issue with stylo or pocci though, which I'd almost consider one and the same. Almost.

mine grow great with great color, get to baseball size & turn to jelly. Luckily I usually have several back up frags of each type of bn to use to continue the trend. That began about a yr ago when I had my green bn that was about soccer ball sized turned to jelly over night. I still have some frags from that same colony but it's been happening since. I kind of assume its from to much carbon dosing since I have very heavy bio load I kind of have to. But I used to dose microbacter7 as well and I think that helped keep better bacteria in the system. I'm planning to start doing that again to see if it puts an end to it. I didn't really stop doing it purposely, I just ran out, never re ordered, & forgot about it until it recently crossed my mind. I originally began dosing the stuff to help with red cyano, which it did.

 

[ca1ore]

Is your birdsnest bleaching or dying? Bleaching is where the polyps remain but lose their pigments and is almost always a lighting issue - either too much or too little. For example, many of the larger colonies in my tank have bleached bases due to a lack of light, but you can still see the living polyps. If the polyps are dying and leaving the white skeleton behind, then that is a much trickier diagnosis and could be the result of any number of things.

 

[pmgaudio]

This is what the green USED to look like a couple months ago.....( the growth comparison is a couple months ... grew like a weed

 

[pmgaudio]

this the pink a month or two after i set them in

 

[pmgaudio]

This is what they look like now. Lighting is the same. Flow is the same. Params are the same (note the hydno's thriving)

 

[pmgaudio]

Just for fun heres the few months of progress of the red cap i got way back. It is even bigger now

 

[pmgaudio]

 

[pmgaudio]

Full tank shot

 

[ca1ore]

OK, very useful pictures, clearly bleaching ...... IME it's usually light, but as your other corals look good is very strange. What light are you using, and are you dosing anything?

 

[pmgaudio]

it is a standard lame Compact lighting system.. Stock JBJ... untill I get the $$ for the led retro kit.... I have had great success keeping the params up with Brightwell aquatics, Liquid reef... it is amazing stuff... pricey perhaps but I will NEVER again compromise with supplements... (Last tank crashed hard trying to cut cost) And if one needs a boost I have a bunch of Kent Ca and alk still here.... I do water changes and that helps too... alk was LOW for a while I think, I hadn't tested in a long time and sw it ws t 6.. (when I noticed the bleaching) Not sure how long it was low, but my pulsing xenias look FINE so they are a great alk indication "canary" so...... and yes everything else looks great so..... it is a mystery.... lucky ME they all only cost $10 total, but stilll I want nothing to die....

 

[Triggreef]

Lack of light bleaching IMO. I'd go very slow when you swap out those compacts.

My issue is much different. I was assuming yours were probably dying since most people say they are bleaching followed by pics of dead stuff. Mine die when they get big. It's very annoying.

 

[pmgaudio]

there is a WHITE bulb and a BLUE one....... I am trying to understand what you could mean by light issue..... nothing has changed.... they really get plaenty of light. have NOT been moved since they were put in the tank.....perhaps I missed something....