Favia of the gods help needed

[katsreef]

This is my first favia coral. It’s been looking a bit funny with this whitish pink showing up. Is that the skeleton? My tank has had issues with too much light so is this a sign of bleaching? Advice needed please so I can see it flourish again!

 

[Timfish]

Looks like it's partially bleached to me. You didn't list what your parameters are or what you dosing/supplementing. A PO4 deficiency will cause corals to be very sensitive to bleaching as well as labile DOC (carbon dosing).

 

[katsreef]

Looks like it's partially bleached to me. You didn't list what your parameters are or what you dosing/supplementing. A PO4 deficiency will cause corals to be very sensitive to bleaching as well as labile DOC (carbon dosing).

Alk:7-8
Mag: 1320
Calc: 410
Temp:78-80 summer it fluctuates more but I turn fans on if it gets to 80
Salinity: 1.025

Phosphate and nitrate test as 0 but they are not actually 0 (big bryopsis and bubble algae issue that my tank is currently going in treatment for with reef flux) my corals are growing so they are definitely not starving in that sense.

Not dosing or supplementing anything. I had a few corals have a bit of a bleaching issue but moved out of the light they are better. Could this be another case of too much light?

 

[Timfish]

Definelty get a good test kit and test you PO4. Research done with corals in a typical system over a decade+ has identified a threshold level of .03 mg/l to minimize PO4 dificiencies in corals. Low PO4 can cause bleaching so while light intensity is part of the equation it is not the primary issue and lowering the intensity might help short term but it doesn't resolve the underlying problem.

FWIW .03 mg/l is the minimum based on Southampton's research, .5 mg/l is acceptable and even .9mg/l might not be an issue.

The phosphorus cycle in reef systems is complex and include Particulate Organic Phosphorus (POP) and Dissolved Organic Phosphorus (DOP) as well as PO4 which is aolso known as Dissolved Inorganic Phosphorus (DIP) and orthophosphate. Unfortunately PO4 is the only one we can easily test for. So a system might be getting enough of the organic forms but if corals are bleaching and PO4 isn't above the threshold level of .03 mg/l I'd be either feeding more or adding phosphorus to ensure it's above the threshold level.

If you're interested here are some links:

An experimental mesocosm for long-term studies of reef corals | Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom | Cambridge Core

An experimental mesocosm for long-term studies of reef corals - Volume 92 Issue 4

www.cambridge.org

An Experimental Mesocosm for Longterm Studies of Reef Corals

Phosphate Deficiency:
Nutrient enrichment can increase the susceptibility of reef corals to bleaching:

Nutrient enrichment can increase the susceptibility of reef corals to bleaching - Nature Climate Change

Increased dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) concentrations in sea water have been linked to a reduction of the temperature threshold at which corals bleach, however, the mechanism underlying this change is not known. This phenomenon is now explained in terms of increased phosphatase activities...

www.nature.com

Ultrastructural Biomarkers in Symbiotic Algae Reflect the Availability of Dissolved Inorganic Nutrients and Particulate Food to the Reef Coral Holobiont:

Ultrastructural Biomarkers in Symbiotic Algae Reflect the Availability of Dissolved Inorganic Nutrients and Particulate Food to the Reef Coral Holobiont

Reef building corals associated with symbiotic algae (zooxanthellae) can access environmental nutrients from different sources, most significantly via the uptake of dissolved inorganic nutrients by the algal symbiont and heterotrophic feeding of the coral host. Climate change is expected to...

www.frontiersin.org

Phosphate deficiency promotes coral bleaching and is reflected by the ultrastructure of symbiotic dinoflagellates

Phosphate deficiency promotes coral bleaching and is reflected by the ultrastructure of symbiotic dinoflagellates

Enrichment of reef environments with dissolved inorganic nutrients is considered a major threat to the survival of corals living in symbiosis with din…

www.sciencedirect.com

Effects of phosphate on growth and skeletal density in the scleractinian coral Acropora muricata: A controlled experimental approach

Effects of phosphate on growth and skeletal density in the scleractinian coral Acropora muricata: A controlled experimental approach

Phosphate contamination can negatively affect corals, modifying growth rates, skeletal density, reproduction, mortality, and zooxanthellae. We determi…

www.sciencedirect.com

High phosphate uptake requirements of the scleractinian coral Stylophora pistillata

High phosphate uptake requirements of the scleractinian coral Stylophora pistillata

SUMMARYSeveral untested aspects of the regulation of inorganic nutrient uptake were examined using nutrient depletion experiments with the symbiotic coral Stylophora pistillata. The total inhibition of phosphate uptake in artificial seawater lacking sodium indicates the involvement of a...

jeb.biologists.org

Phosphorus metabolism of reef organisms with algal symbionts

https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ecm.1217?casa_token=ziDzrEEJ8g0AAAAA%3AHnfuGTIntMdqOtx2ij-lnoTh7qVg8VBhYFz98e60zfBEvx5IcIVGhmlpUYmzIJuqUNVm0sG8_0vth6lq

2657円まるいち 博多辛子明太子(無着色) 「博多の華」 (ギフト用) 180g Z6572海産物イクラ,タラコ,魚卵 Qoo10]　「博　まるいち　博多辛子明太子(無着色) | therichross.com

2657円まるいち 博多辛子明太子(無着色) 「博多の華」 (ギフト用) 180g Z6572海産物イクラ,タラコ,魚卵 Qoo10]　「博　まるいち　博多辛子明太子(無着色) | therichross.com

therichross.com

Sponge symbionts and the marine P cycle

Sponge symbionts and the marine P cycle

Marine sponges are ubiquitous colonizers of shallow, clear-water environments in the oceans (1, 2). Sponges have emerged as significant mediators of biogeochemical fluxes in coastal zones by virtue of respiring organic matter and facilitating both the consumption and release of nutrients (3, 4)...

www.pnas.org

Phosphorus sequestration in the form of polyphosphate by microbial symbionts in marine sponges

Phosphorus sequestration in the form of polyphosphate by microbial symbionts in marine sponges

Coral reefs are highly productive ecosystems that raise a conundrum called “Darwin’s paradox”: How can high production flourish in low-nutrient conditions? We show here that in three abundant Caribbean sponges, the granules that have been commonly observed in sponge tissue for decades are...

www.pnas.org

Fig 4 from "Phosphorus metabolism of reef organisms with algal symbionts"