Corals are lame

[Syrandy 36]

I just don't get it. After about 3 months my corals bleach or are just plain lame.

I have a 72 gal tank. Been up for a year and a half. Fish are all great and thriving.

Set up: 2 aquion 110 mechanical filters. Sponge and activated carbon

4 bulb t5. Whites are on for 5 hours. Actinics for 12

4 power heads. 20x flow

Ammonia, nitrite, nitrate all 0

Salinity at 1.024

Alk 3.5meg/l 9.8dkh

Mag 1440

Calc 450

I do water changes every three weeks. About 25 gallons. Clean my sponge filters 2 times a week. My tank isn't stocked at all. I have one leather coral. One star polyp rock one rock of mushrooms and a hammer. All were awesome for a few months then bam. Ugh. I'm lost. I could use some help

 

[calvo15290]

What lights do you have

 

[tcarter1936]

Sounds like there starving whether it be the lights or food .you say not stocked at all what is there for them to eat

 

[buckroe07]

Hello,

Sounds like you're doing things correctly. The only thing I could think of is the time on the lights. With only 4 T5's, 2 of which are whites that are run for 5 hours is a little short. I would at least try to run the whites for 8 hours and keep the actinics at 12 hours. If you don't run into algae issues, then try whites for 10 hrs and actinics for 12 hrs. I run my halide for 3 hrs and my T5's for 7 hrs. My halide is 250 watts and I have four 24 watts T5's. So my lighting schedule is short but I run a lot of wattage. I like how the grow slowly so I don't have to buy a bigger tank so soon

Hang in there….

 

[TruRacr314x]

Sounds like there starving whether it be the lights or food .you say not stocked at all what is there for them to eat

My thoughts exactly! For the corals you are keeping...they like a dirty tank with some nitrates. Do you have any fish? I'm guessing that you need to feed the tank more...

It wouldn't hurt to know what bulb combo you are using, but I'd guess that isn't your problem..

 

[Syrandy 36]

I've only a few fish. And I'm not feeding the corals directly. Should I? What should I feed? Or should I try and feed more of what I feed the fish? Flakes , pellets, shrimp.

 

[Sully]

I'll add my .02 cents of a guess too. You're changing 25 gallons in a 72 gallon every 3 weeks. Assuming you have adequate live rock for that size, your actual water volume may only be 60-65 gallons. At that rate, your changing out roughly 35-40% of your water volume at 3 week intervals. There's no way you can keep stable parameters doing that. You should back that down to 5 Maybe 10 gallons max every week or two. I've been told by someone who's been in SW for 30+ years that these smaller more frequent WC's will keep your tank more stable than big infrequent WC's.

Maybe I'm off here but changing the water chemistry that much could be part of your issue.

 

[joshbbert]

+1 on the water changes, and I would maybe look into natural filtration a fuge maybe? Since I added mine I went from weekly water changes to once every 3 weeks in a 10g and thats mostly for nutrient export. Also did you make any changes before they bleached? Im still new so just my 2 cents good luck man.

 

[joshbbert]

Also im using reef roids to feed and the corals seem to love it a pinch twice a week it expensive but the 30$ jar will last forever! and frozen mysis once a week

 

[james30ct]

I recommend trying ati bulbs with a better color combo.

 

[ontop27]

Two actnics give no par so really you have like a 2.5 bulb fixture... Swap the actnic for ati blue plus. Great blue color but also great par

 

[Reefing Madness]

Your system is to clean for the types of corls your keeping, let the nitrates come up to 20 and watch them grow and perk up some. Also, didn't see a phosphate number, yuou can have everything inline, and have high phosphates that will wipe them out.

 

[Syrandy 36]

Phosphates are 0. Really. Dirty my tank some. So when should I worry about changing water?

 

[Simon Garratt]

Your chemistry looks within ranges although the Alk could be allowed to drop a tad, say to 8-9.0 Dkh. I take it when you say No3 etc are at zero, we are talking simply below the range of the test kit (if you are feeding other things in the tank, fish etc, then even trace levels will be sufficient for most corals) although you haven't mentioned Po4..?

From the look of the corals however it seems more like zooxanthallae loss (bleaching) is your primary route of failure.

Firstly I would extend your white tube duration to a minimum 8hrs with an hour or so either side for the actinics (ie 10-12hrs) as actinics on their own provide relatively little intensity in the bands required for photosynthesis. plus they kick out next to nothing in the upper red band which also has a response point for photosynthesis which for more shallow water species such as Euphyllia and many soft corals can be a good area to ensure you have covered.

Before all of that though, get a second device to check ad preferably log your temperature observing if it sits or goes frequently above 80-82f...If it swings wildly, then this may be a stressor for the zooxanthallae causing them to die off or the coral to expel them.

Kind regards

The first thing I would look

 

[mainereefer]

Phosphates are 0. Really. Dirty my tank some. So when should I worry about changing water?

you should test before making any drastic change to your aquariums chemistry. if your system requires a water change every 6 weeks you are wasting valuable time and money doing it every 3 weeks. or if you want to change water every 3 weeks try only 10g at a time depends on your levels...

 

[Reefing Madness]

I'd personally leave everything go until you see some nitrates and phosphates up to at least .03, then I'd think about a partial WC at that point. My softies will let me know when my water gets to clean, they stop opening up.

 

[Simon Garratt]

To the OP what kits are you using for No3 and Po4... And What is the first graduation on the test kit after 0.0

Kind regards

 

[Syrandy 36]

I use API for almost everything. I use Red Sea for mag and alk. Both pro kits. I'm going to increase my lighting times and let the tank dirty up a bit. See what happens. I just hope the algae doesn't go crazy.

 

[h2pvnus]

Parameter fluctuate too much?

 

[ontop27]

I'm still going with to little light. Two actnic bulbs is way to many for a four bulb combo, heck I wouldn't even run one in a four bulb.