Gorgonian in trouble - help with centerpiece coral

[andrewkw]

I was just away for 4 days - weird stuff happens when you are away. The day I left the gorg was closed, no big deal. From time to time it does this.When I got home I was so tired I thought it was partially open. Turns out it was covered in a thin brown algae. I removed about 80% with a paper towel after turkey basting was mostly ineffective. This coral is blasted with flow and if it actually stood up it would be 2-3" out of the water. The flesh still felt fine as I wiped it down and pulled on the base.

I've had it at least 4 years and it's at least 5x bigger then when I got it. The only change is no feeding for 4 days. NO3 is dangerously close to 0 but even if it was at 0 this is pretty short term. Other parameters are slightly low but nothing sticks out :

No3 very close to 0 slightest shade (salifert)
Po4 0.03
DKH 7.0 - slightly low
Ca 390 - slightly low
Mg 1320

Usually phosphate and nitrate are a bit higher but not crazy. All the tank missed was pellets. I can only "afford" to feed frozen food once or twice a week since I can't source it locally. Target feedings are done once a week which was not missed, nor was water change. I didn't test last week and I normally try and test once a week and alk twice thus levels are slightly low. That is just coral growth though, everything is done via dosing pump.

I don't really think there is anything else I can do. I'm going to adjust dosing to raise dkh to 7.5 and calcium to 420 but both are still in the range of acceptable. I'll feed some frozen one extra time but other then this I am out of ideas.. I probably wouldn't be posting this if it wasn't my largest coral.
Today's pic is just a cell phone shot but you can see the algae / shape of the coral.

Last month :

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

No new corals recently?

 

[andrewkw]

2 small frags about 3 weeks ago. A paly frag and small cyphastera both have looked great since being introduced. They were in my frag tank for about a week before I mounted them in display.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Soo odd.

Off the top of my head I’d say run purigen or fresh carbon.

I’ve only had two gorgs get weird on me. One is still struggling. But I added other gorgs.

#reefsquad @DeniseAndy @kireek

 

[jsker]

Look like you alk demand is up by add the new corals.
Do you have seafood shops around? The reason I am asking is that I can give you a recipe to make your own frozen.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Look like you alk demand is up by add the new corals.
Do you have seafood shops around? The reason I am asking is that I can give you a recipe to make your own frozen.

I would love to hear it as well. I already make my own from fish at the local store but always looking for other options.

 

[norfolkgarden]

Do you have a pic of the paly?

Just a stab in the dark. Some of them are pretty noxious.
We have a nice dull olive green one with a dull yellow center I'm considering removing while I still can.

LFS had a grapefruit-size colony in the tank I got one of my wrasses from. He took it out and set it to the side on the counter to help catch the fish.
It stunk to high heaven and he had to go wash his hand afterwards because it was starting to itch and burn.
A half hour later the paly's looked good again in the tank.

We can only keep noxious ones because the flame angel munches on everything else.

Our current frag only has about 10 polyps on it.

We do run carbon on and off . mostly on.

Our yellow gorgonian hasn't had any problems yet.

 

[Lasse]

I have been out for something like this a couple of times in some of my old tanks. I think its a type of cyano/dino or something rather close. The way I treated this it was cleaning - nearly every day - and adding some NO3.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[SAPPER]

My gorg has had algae grow on it before and I just brushed it down with a paint brush. I got most of the algae off then it shed its skin and was clean. If it' cyanobacteria you can brush it then soak it in freshwater for a minute or two. Obviously try and match the RO as much as you can with the temperature. Then you can tackle the reasons why the Cyano or algae is there.

 

[andrewkw]

I have been out for something like this a couple of times in some of my old tanks. I think its a type of cyano/dino or something rather close. The way I treated this it was cleaning - nearly every day - and adding some NO3.

Sincerely Lasse

I'll have to test the water but I believe my fowlr has nitrates of at least 50ppm maybe way more I only periodically check it to make sure it's not going toxic but regardless of whatever level it is, I'll swap out a small amount of water between tanks to increase the no3 in the display. Hopefully that plus another wipe down does some good.

As for the palys it was just a 10 or so polyp frag, there are 100s and 100s of other zoas and palys in the tank including some grandis and button polyps which are far more toxic then these. Also a 3 week delay to effect only one coral would seem strange, but I suppose not impossible.

 

[DeniseAndy]

Very nice size gorg. Most other corals do not effect gorgs except other gorgs. My Pseudopterogorgia bipinnats have issues when they close up too long. This is what allows the algae to build on them. So, if a fish was bothering them, the flow or water chemistry, they would close and once algae builds, takes time or interference to fix the issue. As stated, I do not see skeleton showing. So you can just simply get to feeding more (like reef roids, gorg food, oysterfeast, etc) and make sure it has plenty of turbulent flow for that guy, not direct as they generally close more with direct flow. Should shed and get back to normal. Also, if it is out of water (mine grow out too), trim it down. This will allow it to expand fully.

You can brush off the algae, but if you have to do that, something else is off. Mine will get algae on them at times and then they shed it off and come out again. That goes for most my gorgs. Only if really unhelathy do you really have to intervene. This means placement is wrong or you have a fish bothering them (or other gorg in my case).

Hope it improves soon. Feeding is really necessary even with the photosynthetic gorgs.

 

[kireek]

I have been out for something like this a couple of times in some of my old tanks. I think its a type of cyano/dino or something rather close. The way I treated this it was cleaning - nearly every day - and adding some NO3.

Sincerely Lasse

Low NO3 would be one of my concerns as well.I would try feeding additional frozen foods.

Very nice size gorg. Most other corals do not effect gorgs except other gorgs. My Pseudopterogorgia bipinnats have issues when they close up too long. This is what allows the algae to build on them. So, if a fish was bothering them, the flow or water chemistry, they would close and once algae builds, takes time or interference to fix the issue. As stated, I do not see skeleton showing. So you can just simply get to feeding more (like reef roids, gorg food, oysterfeast, etc) and make sure it has plenty of turbulent flow for that guy, not direct as they generally close more with direct flow. Should shed and get back to normal. Also, if it is out of water (mine grow out too), trim it down. This will allow it to expand fully.

You can brush off the algae, but if you have to do that, something else is off. Mine will get algae on them at times and then they shed it off and come out again. That goes for most my gorgs. Only if really unhelathy do you really have to intervene. This means placement is wrong or you have a fish bothering them (or other gorg in my case).

Hope it improves soon. Feeding is really necessary even with the photosynthetic gorgs.

This is really sound advice.Thank you for the recommendations!

 

[andrewkw]

To recap things are looking the same today maybe more of this mysterious brown dino like algae. Unfortunately I don't have a microscope to examine it. It just appears to be a thin but stuck on good coat. Similar to what you get on the glass. EVERY single week I turn off the flow in my tank and target feed mysis, reef roids, other various foods. I think I've missed one week in the past year and a half. Sometimes I do this a second time. I don't play with my lighting or flow (much).

I did test my fowlr at close to 100ppm nitrate. That will soon probably have to be brought down anyway so I've done a 1 gallon water switch between tanks. The total water volume of the reef is over 100 gallons so I will do this at least 2-3 more times but throughout the day and get the nitrate up to at least 2ppm and then bring it up further to the 2-5 range which to be fair is hard to tell on the colour range but switching 5% of the water should do the trick. I fed the fish frozen food last night as well. Hoping the next post in this thread will be that there is some improvement! When I moved in 2016 I lost so many of my long term corals and this is one piece that I'm really proud of how it grew out. If it does recover I will trim it, but if it wasn't encrusted to the rock I'd probably just move it down further so it could get even bigger.

 

[vetteguy53081]

The two big things are ( They must remain in water). Any exposure to air will destroy them.
They like moderate lighting and water flow. If you feed your fish- you have already fed them. Stability will keep them looking nice.
Here are some of mine....................................

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

The two big things are ( They must remain in water). Any exposure to air will destroy them.
They like moderate lighting and water flow. If you feed your fish- you have already fed them. Stability will keep them looking nice.
Here are some of mine....................................

Being subject to Murphy’s laws , having had accidents , reacted to emergencies , I can tell you, with the four or five I have, this is not true.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Being subject to Murphy’s laws , having had accidents , reacted to emergencies , I can tell you, with the four or five I have, this is not true.

Gorgs cannot be exposed to air.. . . . have had gorgs over a decade and learned the hard way. I do nothing to feed them as it was Julian Sprung at a trade show that told me feed the fish and they will get their food requirements. I have them in moderate current under blues and this is where I have experienced growth and good polyps.
Naturally, everyones' tank, conditions and lighting will differ.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Gorgs cannot be exposed to air.. . . . have had gorgs over a decade and learned the hard way. I do nothing to feed them as it was Julian Sprung at a trade show that told me feed the fish and they will get their food requirements. I have them in moderate current under blues and this is where I have experienced growth and good polyps.
Naturally, everyones' tank, conditions and lighting will differ.

Yup. I’ve some had simila and do the same for husbandry.
But I’ve also had bags beak and tanks that had to be drained fast and rocks that had to be pulled.
No idea why they didnt die.
I’m not reccomending it. Jus sayin it has happed more than once or twice.

 

[andrewkw]

This gorg has been out of the water before but that is not the cause of it's current problems. It's encrusted to the live rock it's attached to and would stick out of the water if stood up straight. In the past I have pulled it out of the water to see just how far it sticks out if stood up straight. No effect at all on the coral. This was not recent so basically impossible that sticking it a couple inches out of the water would weeks or months later cause problems after it had opened up and acted normal in the mean time.

It's also moved tanks, and moved 700km in 2016 in a long distance move. It's been through some tough times, but nothing drastic has changed from October 2016 to this month. Yes my nitrates are a little too low, alk and calcium are a little low but still in the safe zone (all 3 of these problems have since been corrected).

I didn't feed the tank for 4 days, while that is uncommon it's been through this before without incident. Other then that the only change was I wasn't here. The 4 days I was gone do not include weekly target feeding day or water change day. Nothing else in the tank is effected in the least. It's a mixed reef with a lot of softies but I do have some acros and they are fine as well as lps.

 

[Jr'sReef]

Pulling gorgs out of the water will not “destroy them” as long as they don’t start drying up and we’re only out for a few minutes at most they will be fine.

 

[Lasse]

At least the one I have will not be destroyed because it comes out of water - as long as it is not total dry. Its not either target feed during the nearly 2 years it has been in this tank. I have transport this type of gorgonia dry but with some moist for more than a hour. Never ever had heard this before,

Sincerely Lasse