please help with torch question!

[smitten with ocean life]

hi friends, im hoping someone can give me some torch/ hammer advice. my tank is a 125 gallon a few years old. my parameters are sal.-1.024, alk.-7.7, nitrates 13.7, phos. .19, cal.-451, temp. 77, ph 7.8.. why cant i keep these things alive?? im careful about the flow. par is 150. they can look so good for a couple of months, than just slowly shrivel up and disappear! i alternate with broadcast feeding them reefroids and benepets. id be so glad for some advice! i did dip them again and carefully inspect for pests. havent seen a thing. thanks!

 

[dakoop]

I don't have a good answer for you. I can't keep some stuff and never could figure out why. No acans for me

 

[PeterC99]

How consistent are your parameters - especially Alkalinity, PO4, & NO3? How often do you test these parameters and do you do water changes?

 

[smitten with ocean life]

dont show me pics like that! yes, i keep my parameters stable. i test weekly. water changes weekly. trying to put in a pic and i cant get it figured out

 

[PeterC99]

Are you local to NYC area? You can come pick one up!

 

[smitten with ocean life]

thats so kind of you! but no, im in CA and i would really like to figure out what im doing wrong before i kill more!

 

[smitten with ocean life]

 

[PeterC99]

Couple of questions:

1) Which corals have you kept consistently and for how long?

2) Do you have a sump with Chaeto growing well?

3) How do you keep your Alkalinity consistent from day to day?

Par on my torch above is over 300.

 

[smitten with ocean life]

plenty of zoas, mushrooms, a goni, elegance coral, leather and a few others that im not sure what they are! most of them a few years old.not sure about question #2. i have uv sterilizer that i clean out every two weeks or so. as far as the alk- i dont know! i dont really mess with stuff. i was going to start all 4 reef. changing the flow a little to get more surface agitation to try and raise ph. maybe ill try raising them up a bit closer to the lights...

 

[smitten with ocean life]

anyone else have some tips?

 

[slingfox]

For me torches have been near indestructible surviving a bout of dinos that wiped out pretty much everything else in my tank other than my torches and some hammers.

Where are you buying your torches? Many torches are imported marine culture from Indonesia or Australia. These are more risky then torches which have been living in a contained reef aquarium environment for a long period of time. That said, I have not had many issues even with marine culture torches.

If you are having all your torches die there may be some sort of infection going on. To deal with that you can look into the KFC coral dip. Three rounds of that once a week for three weeks. When I make the dip I make a large batch in 10 gallon breeder from Petco and put in all my torches, hammer, frogspawn, and mushrooms for 12-18 hours with flow and a heater.

 

[smitten with ocean life]

from wwc. ok thanks. its never all at the same time. i just decide to try again and again can only keep it for a couple of months

 

[smitten with ocean life]

if you dont mind my asking, what part of CA are you in?

 

[slingfox]

You should also get an ICP test of your water to make sure there are no issues on that front.

 

[steveschuerger]

Good fairly strong flow, I use my wavemakers on a pulse cycle, keep them in the lower part of the upper half of the tank with PAR 200-250. My Alk is pretty high , around 10 presently and Mag 1500.
Here’s a video showing my flow

 

[smitten with ocean life]

clue me in on the ICP test. ive been reading about it, but not real clear about what it stands for or where to get it done

 

[ajremington68]

clue me in on the ICP test. ive been reading about it, but not real clear about what it stands for or where to get it done

Little thing about what someone else has said, the marine cultured torches so anything that is from a shop is ussaly marine cultured and if they aren’t the will be very proud and it’ll be posted ussaly, or they will have a lot. However all my torches from local reefers, (knock on wood) dang near bulletproof. I mean I’m not swinging any parameters but they do exponentially better and last. Any torches that are marine cultured are gone within 3 months, and they will get a disease out of no where and you have to make sure they don’t pass it to your other euphyilla. Recommendation is get in a local Facebook and get a good deal on a torch frag and watch it grow.

 

[ajremington68]

@smitten with ocean life also I currently dose afr and I like it, one thing I don’t like is you choose one element (all,ca,mag) to track and correct on that, which allows 2 other elements to fall wherever which can cause you to correct every other month. But not that big of a deal. What are your water changes like if you’re not dosing after 2yrs?

 

[CoralCrafted]

Bacterial issues, Chemiclean the tank usually the best start or setting up a UV.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Can we see a tank pic?

The parameters are right on, so to me, that leaves light and flow. Can you tell more about your light and flow?

Slowly wasting away over months, to me it again means light deprivation or lack of nutrients. And since your nutrients are fine, it leaves light and flow.