All LPS Slowly Dying

[Clownfishy]

Does anyone know if there is a reference for lps specific diseases? I have a nano containing soft corals, lps corals and some monti corals and over the last couple of weeks, a lot of my lps corals are dying away. In most of the micromussa corals, the heads either detach from the coral or shrink away. Other lps corals, the edges turn white and then die away. My soft corals and monti seem fine but my lps are dying off almost daily now. Could I have an lps disease or pest that is specific to lps corals? My phosphate and Nitrate keeps creeping up but I am assuming this is the due off of the corals so I am doing 40% water changes now to keep them under control. Phosphate still a little high but will continue to water change and get this down to at least 0.1.

Water Parameters
Alk 9.3
Cal 450
Mag 1500
Phosphate 0.23
Nitrate 8
Salinity 35

Any help gratefully received.

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

Hi. Sry u r exp this. All seems ok but Phos. Slowly get that down. U have any pics? Do u dip? What was the last coral added and when ?

 

[reefman888]

Sounds like Recession. Usually associated with alk/ca out of range or unstable, high phosphate

 

[Lividfanatica]

My LPS all bailed out slowly due to very low potassium. I'd say get an ICP test in the mail and see if anything is way off. Or, you may have a fish that is constantly terrorizing your LPS coral. Lastly, chemical warfare from one of your softies? Do you run carbon? Based on the information you have provided those are my best guesses. Good luck!

 

[Clownfishy]

WOW, many thanks for all the very quick responses! I will try and answer all the questions below -

• Last coral added was several months ago.
• I will try and get some pictures tomorrow when the lights are back on
• Alk/Cal out of range is an interesting point. My Alk keeps needing more and more dosing for a period of time compared to my calcium. I raise my alk dosing, until it catches up which means I am dosing Alk at 10ml and calcium at 5ml. I can then bring the alk dosing back down to the calcium dosing and it stays like that for a week or so and then the whole thing starts again. I am mostly dosing alk at much higher dose rates than I am calcium.
• Unstable phosphate is certainly a problem for me at the moment. I have been dosing 2ml of NOPOX a day in a 75 litre aquarium and I am now doing 40% water changes also. I started to use Rowaphos but found my phosphate falling but my NItrate raising so stopped doing that. Maybe I will being that again and continue with the water changes to keep the NItrate down.
• I have tried carbon and then stopped carbon to see if it made any difference using it or not using. It has not made any difference but might start using it again just to filter out anything in the water.
• My Potassium is quite high which is coming from my Fritz salt as I have not added any.
• I did an ICP test last week and here are my results https://lab.faunamarin.de/de/share/analysis/20221. I was a bit worried about some of the low and high points from this test and this is why I am doing large water changes for a week or two. I will then send away another ICP test just in case there is a salt issue.
• I have observed my fish and I cannot see anything nipping the corals during the day.
• Interesting point on chemical warfare from the soft corals. They are not touching the lps but there is a possibility they are releasing something

 

[DeniseAndy]

Lots of help can be given if we can see the tank and have a list of occupants. The pictures you mentioned will help a lot. Then, what animals are in the tank.

 

[Wasabiroot]

You should be dosing calcium and alk equally. It's normal to see less calcium use than alkalinity; calcium declines much more slowly.

To quote from this excellent article by Randy Holmes-Farley:
1. Corals and coralline algae use calcium and alkalinity almost exclusively to deposit calcium carbonate. Because of this they use a fixed ratio of calcium to alkalinity, which is driven by the ratio of calcium and carbonate in calcium carbonate (1:1). The net consumption is about 18-20 ppm of calcium for each 1 meq/L (2.8 dKH) of alkalinity. The reason the amount of calcium varies is that the incorporation of magnesium in place of calcium varies a bit from species to species.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-06/rhf/index.php#2

I highly recommend you check out his articles on water chemistry on that site- very informative.

 

[Clownfishy]

You should be dosing calcium and alk equally. It's normal to see less calcium use than alkalinity; calcium declines much more slowly.

To quote from this excellent article by Randy Holmes-Farley:
1. Corals and coralline algae use calcium and alkalinity almost exclusively to deposit calcium carbonate. Because of this they use a fixed ratio of calcium to alkalinity, which is driven by the ratio of calcium and carbonate in calcium carbonate (1:1). The net consumption is about 18-20 ppm of calcium for each 1 meq/L (2.8 dKH) of alkalinity. The reason the amount of calcium varies is that the incorporation of magnesium in place of calcium varies a bit from species to species.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-06/rhf/index.php#2

I highly recommend you check out his articles on water chemistry on that site- very informative.

Thanks for this, I will give it a read. I will begin dosing equal parts. I am a little nervous watching my alk plummet with the reduced alk dosing but it does not seem right that alk consumption is so much higher than calcium

 

[Harold999]

Possible something in the water that doesn't belong there, do you use hand cream/moisturizers?

 

[Clownfishy]

Possible something in the water that doesn't belong there, do you use hand cream/moisturizers?

I always rinse my hands before putting my hands in the aquarium. I am wondering if it is my daughter spraying here perfume in her room which then finds its way into the aquarium. Maybe something to consider

 

[Clownfishy]

Here are some pictures of the lps corals dying. The Micromussa are loosing their heads and the others are losing their tissue from the base inwards.

 

[Harold999]

I always rinse my hands before putting my hands in the aquarium. I am wondering if it is my daughter spraying here perfume in her room which then finds its way into the aquarium. Maybe something to consider

That's why i always run activated carbon.
(rinse the carbon well by the way, so no dust enters the watercolumn).

If i was in your shoes i would do as many waterchanges you can handle and use much activated carbon.

 

[DeniseAndy]

The photo looks that you are fighting some cyano. Try to get that under control. The micromussa look like they were stung/warfare from another coral. They tend to be on the worse side of any fights.

Any FTS for us? Looks like a toadstool was close to a lps, this usually does not benefit the lps.

 

[Lavey29]

What are your lighting and flow methods?

 

[Lavey29]

You should be dosing calcium and alk equally. It's normal to see less calcium use than alkalinity; calcium declines much more slowly.

To quote from this excellent article by Randy Holmes-Farley:
1. Corals and coralline algae use calcium and alkalinity almost exclusively to deposit calcium carbonate. Because of this they use a fixed ratio of calcium to alkalinity, which is driven by the ratio of calcium and carbonate in calcium carbonate (1:1). The net consumption is about 18-20 ppm of calcium for each 1 meq/L (2.8 dKH) of alkalinity. The reason the amount of calcium varies is that the incorporation of magnesium in place of calcium varies a bit from species to species.

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-06/rhf/index.php#2

I highly recommend you check out his articles on water chemistry on that site- very informative.

While I agree in theory, in reality a lot of us have to dose more alk then cal in the tank due to existing conditions which cause more alk consumption then the theory accounts for. Even Randy has explained this previously although balanced parameters would be 1 to 1 ratio.

 

[Macdaddynick1]

“Unstable phosphate is certainly a problem for me at the moment. I have been dosing 2ml of NOPOX a day in a 75 litre aquarium and I am now doing 40% water changes also. I started to use Rowaphos but found my phosphate falling but my NItrate raising so stopped doing that. Maybe I will being that again and continue with the water changes to keep the NItrate down.”

My bet is on Carbon Dosing. As I’ve killed off a major portion of my sps and LPS trying to carbon dose due to what I thought was “high” nitrates and phosphates. My corals were doing great at the high levels until I started aggressively trying to remove po4 and No3 with water changes and carbon dosing. The acans looked exactly like yours, they were dying off from the edges. Multiple of my SPS RTNd on me. Basically I was thinking that my PO4 was killing them until I starved them out. Another giveaway is that I see cyano popping up. In my experience it happens when the nutrients drop too fast.

If you already did multiple water changes then there shouldn’t be anything in your water to worry about. Just stop carbon dosing, get some aminos, and a bag of mysis shrimp, feed your fish multiple times per day. Try to get your no3 to ~15-20 ppm, and make sure tour po4 is over.8 for now. If you can, I would spot feed your corals also.

 

[Dburr1014]

Does anyone know if there is a reference for lps specific diseases? I have a nano containing soft corals, lps corals and some monti corals and over the last couple of weeks, a lot of my lps corals are dying away. In most of the micromussa corals, the heads either detach from the coral or shrink away. Other lps corals, the edges turn white and then die away. My soft corals and monti seem fine but my lps are dying off almost daily now. Could I have an lps disease or pest that is specific to lps corals? My phosphate and Nitrate keeps creeping up but I am assuming this is the due off of the corals so I am doing 40% water changes now to keep them under control. Phosphate still a little high but will continue to water change and get this down to at least 0.1.

Water Parameters
Alk 9.3
Cal 450
Mag 1500
Phosphate 0.23
Nitrate 8
Salinity 35

Any help gratefully received.

What test kits are you using and did you confirm against another kit? How did you test sg?

 

[Clownfishy]

Just picking up on the point of cyno, when you see the aquarium, it is no cyno but the pictures and the lighting the camera shows it as such. Its more of an algae.

 

[Clownfishy]

“Unstable phosphate is certainly a problem for me at the moment. I have been dosing 2ml of NOPOX a day in a 75 litre aquarium and I am now doing 40% water changes also. I started to use Rowaphos but found my phosphate falling but my NItrate raising so stopped doing that. Maybe I will being that again and continue with the water changes to keep the NItrate down.”

My bet is on Carbon Dosing. As I’ve killed off a major portion of my sps and LPS trying to carbon dose due to what I thought was “high” nitrates and phosphates. My corals were doing great at the high levels until I started aggressively trying to remove po4 and No3 with water changes and carbon dosing. The acans looked exactly like yours, they were dying off from the edges. Multiple of my SPS RTNd on me. Basically I was thinking that my PO4 was killing them until I starved them out. Another giveaway is that I see cyano popping up. In my experience it happens when the nutrients drop too fast.

If you already did multiple water changes then there shouldn’t be anything in your water to worry about. Just stop carbon dosing, get some aminos, and a bag of mysis shrimp, feed your fish multiple times per day. Try to get your no3 to ~15-20 ppm, and make sure tour po4 is over.8 for now. If you can, I would spot feed your corals also.

This has really got me thinking. I wonder if there is something not quite right with the phosphates or something in NOPOX that is causing an issue. I am trying to remember but I wonder if I have been getting this since moving my NOPOX up to 2ml a day. I cant be 100% sure but that may be the case.

I know I have phosphate in the water as my hanna low phosphate test and an ICP test shows I have really high phosphate. Could it be that there is a difference to what is being measured to what is available to the corals? @Dburr1014 so the testing is accurate as my hanna matches the ICP tests.

@Lavey29 I have increased and decreased my lighting and water flow and it did not make any difference. Thanks for the suggestion.

At this stage, I have nothing to lose as I am losing corals daily so I am going to stop dosing completely. Here is another one that looks like is going to be dead by tomorrow

 

[Clownfishy]

Full tank shots for those that requested it. As you can see not all corals affected. My Monti is doing amazing!