Coral issues

Unfortunate reefer

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all my corals were doing really good colorful and big and I recently changed my sump setup and I think that may have done something cause now all my coral don’t look right below are pictures

My torch coral looks dull and won’t open up as big as before

my candy cane coral is basically all dead it has one little spot of life left on it

my frogspawn won’t open up much and I can see skeleton so it makes me afraid it’s receding and dying

my Acan coral looks like it’s receding and looks like some sort of algae is growing on it

my Duncan won’t fully open

I tested my water phosphate,nitrate, ammonia, nitrite, is all good alk is really low at 4.5 (I don’t dose anything but I’m planning on doing a water change tomorrow and I’m looking into dosing two part) didn’t get to test calcium but I’m guessing that is low too

So basically I’m trying to figure out what’s wrong anybody have any ideas?

B2A00FCC-177A-48C1-A90B-E3DBABA5371B.jpeg D0C37A9D-CA86-4695-82A1-998E35650581.jpeg 0AF36642-8C91-4B45-A220-2F047E5BED98.jpeg 8BBB308A-8639-4857-B6FD-904EF4521A85.jpeg F54CCEF5-9896-42F7-AD62-49466428C87F.jpeg
 

nereefpat

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That alk is suspiciously low. What does it usually run?

Can you tell us more about your new sump? Did you build it?
 

jorwill

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Pic of the sump would also help so we can see how everything is flowing. How did your alk get so low? When did you last do a water change?

By changed your sump around, what all was done. Did you also clean it out?
 

Gtinnel

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Is your alk 4.5 meq/L or is that in dKH? If dKH then that is really low. Do you know what your alkalinity was before changing the sump and were the corals happy then? I would think it would take a little while for your candy cane to get that bad so I'm wondering if your corals were already declining before you changed the sump out. Also, I can't think of any reason changing the sump would greatly reduce alkalinity.
 

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Your alk should be at least at 8 (DKH). when was the last water change, how often? Do you dose kalkwasser? when did you last test it?

if it was me I would fix that first. Then test everyday for the next 3 days.
 
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That alk is suspiciously low. What does it usually run?

Can you tell us more about your new sump? Did you build it?
Last time I checked it it was 8.1, I don’t check that often and yea I built it... it comes down into corner chamber, flows over to next chamber and into filter sock, then down and under into skimmer section, then over to refugium, then bubble trap and return section
 

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Pic of the sump would also help so we can see how everything is flowing. How did your alk get so low? When did you last do a water change?

By changed your sump around, what all was done. Did you also clean it out?
Not sure how it got so low, I do a water change once a month or twice a month and I’ve been doing that for about 6-8 months and everything was doing really good...but I took the old sump out removed baffles cleaned it out and made new baffles...I kept my ceramic media in a bucket of water with my chaeto only thing that dried out was my skimmer and return pump
 
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Is your alk 4.5 meq/L or is that in dKH? If dKH then that is really low. Do you know what your alkalinity was before changing the sump and were the corals happy then? I would think it would take a little while for your candy cane to get that bad so I'm wondering if your corals were already declining before you changed the sump out. Also, I can't think of any reason changing the sump would greatly reduce alkalinity.
Yea, 4.5 dkh ... not sure what it was before, last time I checked was in October and it was 8.1...and yea maybe the candy cane was dying off before and I just didn’t notice, just figured it was dying along with all the others...but before I changed my sump everything was all big and plump and was looking great...this picture was just taken at the end of November
 

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Your alk should be at least at 8 (DKH). when was the last water change, how often? Do you dose kalkwasser? when did you last test it?

if it was me I would fix that first. Then test everyday for the next 3 days.
Yea I was looking into two part to fix it and the last water change was about 3/4 weeks ago, I have some new water mixing now and plan to do a water change tomorrow and I do not dose kalk, last time I tested was Tuesday but before Tuesday it was October, I don’t test often, everything was looking good so I was going off of looks then I noticed this last weekend everything was looking kind of bad waiting it out and it just got worse so I tested Tuesday and those were my results
 

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i know its very basic thing but did you track your salinity? i think the issue might be a sudden change in salinity. check if ur ATO is dumping too much RODI water. in fact test ur RODI water before anything else.
 
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i know its very basic thing but did you track your salinity? i think the issue might be a sudden change in salinity. check if ur ATO is dumping too much RODI water. in fact test ur RODI water before anything else.
That’s what I was thinking initially but I checked and it was at 1.024, so it’s good...I usually keep it in the 1.024-1.026 range
 

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Last time I checked it it was 8.1, I don’t check that often and yea I built it... it comes down into corner chamber, flows over to next chamber and into filter sock, then down and under into skimmer section, then over to refugium, then bubble trap and return section

Nice work on the sump. I always build mine too.

Did you let the silicone cure for long enough? Just a thought.
 

jorwill

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I would double check your salinity tester. I am guessing you are using a refractometer? Very high possibility it is off, it's the only thing i could think of to get that low of alk. even a water change would straighten that out unless your tester on your salinity was reading way off then you wouldn't be adding near as much salt as you should be using. Also 1.024 is not high enough, 1.025/.026 otherwise your calc, mag, and alk will not be at the correct amounts depending on the salt you use.
 

jorwill

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Nice work on the sump. I always build mine too.

Did you let the silicone cure for long enough? Just a thought.
not letting the silicone cure enough may throw things off too but i don't suspect thats the problem here. I would do some massive water changes over the next couple of days, prolly 30-50% everyday for the next few days to get a handle on that low alk.
 
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I would double check your salinity tester. I am guessing you are using a refractometer? Very high possibility it is off, it's the only thing i could think of to get that low of alk. even a water change would straighten that out unless your tester on your salinity was reading way off then you wouldn't be adding near as much salt as you should be using. Also 1.024 is not high enough, 1.025/.026 otherwise your calc, mag, and alk will not be at the correct amounts depending on the salt you use.
Gotcha I’ll double check me refractometer
 
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not letting the silicone cure enough may throw things off too but i don't suspect thats the problem here. I would do some massive water changes over the next couple of days, prolly 30-50% everyday for the next few days to get a handle on that low alk.
That’s what I was thinking but I let the silicon dry for a while 24 hours before putting water in so I’m not sure and I plan on doing water changes, got water mixing as we speak lol...I’m also thinking about dosing kalkwasser but is it a good idea to put it in my ATO? I have a 15 gal container with my topoff water, but I read you shouldn’t let it sit for a long time and I usually refill the ato about every 3 weeks-ish...is that too long for kalk to sit?
 

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same thing happened to some of my corals (not all like yours though) when I changed my sump with a new one. Corals stayed closed for about 2 weeks then opened back up. Agree with others, would raise Alk
 

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That’s what I was thinking but I let the silicon dry for a while 24 hours before putting water in so I’m not sure and I plan on doing water changes, got water mixing as we speak lol...I’m also thinking about dosing kalkwasser but is it a good idea to put it in my ATO? I have a 15 gal container with my topoff water, but I read you shouldn’t let it sit for a long time and I usually refill the ato about every 3 weeks-ish...is that too long for kalk to sit?
Before going to kalk i would get the water changes done over the next few days and get things stable. Then monitor and watch and see how quickly your calc/alk drop as that is the only thing that kalk will affect. To much and youll shoot your calc and alk sky high. I have a 13gal top off that is gravity fed and i only do 1tsp in that entire 13gals. mix well and let it sit for 2hrs then i top off the sump with fresh none kalk top off water and then open the top off back up so it doesn't pour in a lot of kalk water. if that makes sense.

alk is everything in tanks, unstable bouncing up and down kills corals beyond anything else but salinity bouncing.
 

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