Gorgonian in trouble - help with centerpiece coral

SteadyC · Mar 21, 2018

It’s a pretty common misconception, I have about 5 gorgs, two in a seahorse tank, these are attached to a rock, I pull this rock out monthly to clean off bubble algae, never had a problem. This one, picture below, sticks out of the water of my other tank.

In this tank, if you saw more of it, I have green algae on sand, and brown algae on the glass, but the gorgs don’t get covered, they are in high, high, flow though, which probably keeps them clean. I have read about using a soft tooth brush to help clean them, as others have mentioned, I’ve never had to do this though, but give it a shot. It is important to have high flow on them, in the ocean, they are usually bent over sideways from current.

My nitrates are zero, I feed a lot to try and raise them, but nothing. In my two tanks, having zero nitrates doesn’t seem to impact the gorgs.

Huskymaniac · Mar 21, 2018

My sea whips do this from time to time. Usually I do a couple of water of water changes and adjust the flow a bit and all goes back to normal.

DeniseAndy · Mar 22, 2018

The Grube's gorg in the picture is a very forgiving gorg and easy to propagate, grow, and is less of an issue to other gorgs. I will say the bipinna that the op has is a bit more tempermental, but should recover fine. JME

andrewkw · Mar 22, 2018

Huskymaniac said:
My sea whips do this from time to time. Usually I do a couple of water of water changes and adjust the flow a bit and all goes back to normal.

Did you wipe it down or just leave it alone? Condition is basically unchanged. It's not really getting worse but also does not appear to be dying. Did my regular tank feeding / water change yesterday. This is a very frustrating situation since it's very difficult for me to determine what exactly is wrong, and as the title mentions this is basically my center piece coral. While I have a few older corals this is one of my biggest and after losing many old pieces 2 years ago this is one I really treasure and there really isn't much that can be done.

DeniseAndy · Mar 22, 2018

Still the same, huh? Well, I would go in very carefully and try to get some of the algae off with a gentle toothbrush. If it is stuck on, that is more of an issue. Up your flow a bit if you can. See how it reacts. Make sure nothing is touching it (another gorg).

Fallling · Mar 22, 2018

vetteguy53081 said:
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.

I'm also going to disagree with this. I have a dozen different species of gorgs in my tank (including 4 nps species) in my 5 year old tank and exposing to air is not a problem. Frankly, I man-handle mine without issue including using epoxy/superglue on the base without first stripping the flesh back like you're suppose to. If you had an issue after exposing to air, I'd wager there was something else going on. KP Aquatics doesn't even ship gorgs in full bags of water- they wrap them in wet paper towels with a bit of water in the bag so they're out of water for 24 hours. Certain sponges can't be exposed to air.

As for OP, sometimes, they just need extra time to shed. For whatever reason, I'll suddenly have a gorg that needs 2 weeks to shed vs the usual few days. As long as the flesh isn't disintegrating, they'll live even staying closed up (for photosynthetic ones). I have one particular gorg who has been closed up for a month or 2 now as I keep moving it around and trying to stick in not great spots (running out of real estate). It's closed up but not dying by any means- receding flesh is when to start worrying.

Mike Reef Addict · Mar 23, 2018

Fallling said:
I'm also going to disagree with this. I have a dozen different species of gorgs in my tank (including 4 nps species) in my 5 year old tank and exposing to air is not a problem. Frankly, I man-handle mine without issue including using epoxy/superglue on the base without first stripping the flesh back like you're suppose to. If you had an issue after exposing to air, I'd wager there was something else going on. KP Aquatics doesn't even ship gorgs in full bags of water- they wrap them in wet paper towels with a bit of water in the bag so they're out of water for 24 hours. Certain sponges can't be exposed to air.

As for OP, sometimes, they just need extra time to shed. For whatever reason, I'll suddenly have a gorg that needs 2 weeks to shed vs the usual few days. As long as the flesh isn't disintegrating, they'll live even staying closed up (for photosynthetic ones). I have one particular gorg who has been closed up for a month or 2 now as I keep moving it around and trying to stick in not great spots (running out of real estate). It's closed up but not dying by any means- receding flesh is when to start worrying.

I agree with you on the fragging and air exposure as I stated earlier I'd hit the beach after storms on the gulf coast of Florida and just wrap them in wet brown paper towel from the bathrooms on the beach, then spend two hours or more riding public transit back home, unwrap them cut the parts with lost tissue off and superglue then to rubble rock they always survived 95% of the time. That was after being beaten up and broken off durring a hurricane or tropical storm!

andrewkw · Mar 27, 2018

I am very happy to report for the first time since the problem started I am noticing improvement! While I did wipe the gorg a couple of times I found it very troublesome so I've kinda just left it and watched it carefully for signs of tissue loss. While the algae itself has gotten worse despite an increase in flow the polyps are starting to peek out! I think there is hope for this coral and it may be weeks, or even months but for the first time since I posted I am not so worried that death could happen at any time.

While I still don't know seeing any polyp extension is better then none. This also confirms it's not dead under the algae.

DeniseAndy · Mar 27, 2018

Good news. I do not see any skeleton showing, so looks pretty good.
I just had to remove algae on one of my yellow bipinna and it immediately came out full polyp extension. I guess I should have done it earlier. I was hoping it would resolve itself.

andrewkw · Apr 1, 2018

So I was just gone once again for 3 days and as soon as I walked in the door the first thing I saw was the gorg looking good as new.

Must have just been some crazy shedding experience. I never did wipe the algae off again it took care of it on its own. Since I don't normally leave the tank for more then a day at a time prior to leaving instead of turning off carbon dosing I slightly increased the nitrate levels so they wouldn't get too close to 0 before I left. This is normally not a problem since my feeding schedule is pretty consistent. Glad this ordeal is behind me! Thanks for all the suggestions and support.

andrewkw · Sep 21, 2018

I'm sure some new people or people who forgot about this thread will see the help and worry but just wanted to document that the coral is again displaying similar symptoms. That being said I'm not worried since it went back to normal last time.

Interesting this time was not brought on by a 4 day no feed period. Nutrients are on the high side of normal vs the low side.

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

This time :
No3 approximately 5ppm (salifert)
P04 0.15 - this is somewhat high especially compared to last time but keep in mind the .03 margin of error of the photometer + I just replaced gfo so its likely less then my 2 day old test result.
dkh 8.0 - this is basically the new normal - when I had the problems last time and it was 7.0 I was "aiming" for 7.7 but don't chase numbers to this extent.
Ca 400 - was also a bit low but have been adjusting dosing
MG 1410 - I raised this some time ago got up to almost 1500 and have been slowly headed down other then water changes mg only needs to be dosed about every 6-8 weeks in my tank.

A side note I have small frag of this in a 10 gallon nano. That piece is unaffected and all of its water changes come from this tanks water. This is just a mystery but at least it's a mystery I've had before so I'm not going to freak out about it. There is so much going on in our reefs we just don't understand.

DeniseAndy · Sep 21, 2018

They do this from time to time in my tank too. I have had gorgs (at least 16 species) for years now. Am cutting back to have other corals in the tank and lost a few large pieces in the move. The gorgs will shed and sometimes go through algae build up if not enough flow. I moved mine to a lower flow area for 1 day and it looked to be disintegrating and I moved it back to high flow and it is now perfect a day later. Looks to be same yellow Pseudopterogorgia bipinnata I have.

Just make sure the algae does not build up too much while it is closed and shedding. If it does, I just wipe down as stated before. Should be fine.

Fallling · Sep 21, 2018

Your P04 is high- IME, that'll makes gorgs grumpy. I expect once that comes down, your gorg will be happy again. I run about 10ppm No3 and that's never an issue even with sensitive nps gorgs I keep. Of course, for this type of gorg, shedding is normal so it just may be time for it to shed.

vetteguy53081 · Sep 21, 2018

Mine is growing out of control. Medium light and medium flow.

andrewkw · Sep 21, 2018

Fallling said:
Your P04 is high- IME, that'll makes gorgs grumpy. I expect once that comes down, your gorg will be happy again. I run about 10ppm No3 and that's never an issue even with sensitive nps gorgs I keep. Of course, for this type of gorg, shedding is normal so it just may be time for it to shed.

We'll see, the last time P04 was really low. I actually suspect it's already dropped since I changed gfo wednesday. I'm almost out of reagents so I'll wait a bit longer to test. When this first happened back in March I was freaking out. Now it's just like huh this again. I've had the coral close to 5 years and it's been through hell and back but this week and that one other week in March are the only times it exhibited this behavior.

Katrina71 · Sep 22, 2018

I think I'd like to try a small one.

jd371 · Sep 22, 2018

Mine does the same from time to time.

rhdoug · Mar 17, 2020

Glad I found this -- my 3 yr old Grube's is doing exactly the same thing right now. It's polyps are just beginning to show thru the dark material after several days. It had not shown this behavior/condition before, but I assumed it was probably just a molt. Thanks for all the input here everyone, especially the photos. Here is what mine usually looks like, hopefully it will be back to normal soon.

vetteguy53081 · Mar 18, 2020

These are very hardy and i had one fall into a crevice and forgot i had it. Pulled it back up after well over a month and it came right back in a couple of days

1979fishgeek · Mar 25, 2020

I’ve got ALOT of photosynthetic gorgonians and one of mine is very similar to yours and once and while closes up gets a covering of diatoms and refuses to reopen until I take a toothbrush and gently remove the film that’s built up. Normally it’s open and happy again within 24 hours.