Hammer coral doing weird stuff

[MugiwaraGrape]

Hello,

The past couple of days I have noticed my hammer is acting odd. It started sucking the left heads inward and I can’t figure out why. All of my parameters are stable and good. Nothing new added in weeks. No dosing. I first assumed splitting, but not so sure. The right side is bloomed up and looks what it normally looks like. It’s just the left heads here that are doing this. Sorry for the blurry pics. Where I have it mounted makes photos from certain angles rough. Haha

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

When did you move it? Before or after it started looking like this?

 

[Mr. Roboto]

They do stupid stuff from time to time, as long as its healthy I would let it ride, first sign of decay or death and it would get a dip in revive. May even dip it anyway.

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

When did you move it? Before or after it started looking like this?

Haven’t moved it at all. Been on that post for about 6 months.

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

Yeah

They do stupid stuff from time to time, as long as its healthy I would let it ride, first sign of decay or death and it would get a dip in revive. May even dip it anyway.

Thats my next step if it seems to be detrimental, but it does seem perfect fine. Just closing up all weird like that so was curious what others thought.

 

[Stang67]

Do you happen to have any shrimps or crabs that could be stealing food from it or picking at it? What do you have fish wise?

 

[Propane]

What are your water parameters?

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

Do you happen to have any shrimps or crabs that could be stealing food from it or picking at it? What do you have fish wise?

No shrimp or crabs, but I do have a foxface, clown pair, and a sailfin. None of them have been observed nipping and I technically over feed, so I assumed no issues. I also see no visible damage.

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

What are your water parameters?

Salinity: 1.026
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 9
Alk: 11
pH: 8.1
Temp: 77.0-77.3

I dose nothing in this tank either.

 

[Mr. Roboto]

That alk is HIGH for a nitrate of 9

 

[rsaylor3]

Small red spots appear to possibly be flatworms. Just went through the same with a hammer. Lost four of the ten heads before realizing it.

Take a turkey baster or feeding baster and blow or suck on off there. If it is, dip weekly is what I read and watched inappropriate reefer do. Worked great!

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

That alk is HIGH for a nitrate of 9

Can you elaborate?

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

Small red spots appear to possibly be flatworms. Just went through the same with a hammer. Lost four of the ten heads before realizing it.

Take a turkey baster or feeding baster and blow or suck on off there. If it is, dip weekly is what I read and watched inappropriate reefer do. Worked great!

It’s actually floating food! Sorry! I had just finished broadcast feeding like 10 seconds before this picture.

 

[rsaylor3]

Unless that was just leftover food I see. I only seen a couple on mine, but so many fell off with that first dip!

 

[Mr. Roboto]

Can you elaborate?

If 12 is the roof, you are at the bar joist... not saying it's what caused the torch thing, just an observation of the numbers you posted.

But yeah. Most of the time alk and nitrate levels play with each other. High nitrates and high alk work well but high alk and clean water can cause alk burn and harm corals.

If you were at 20ppm I wouldn't have said anything but below 10 and 11 alk is like woah!.

Just saying it's a red flag for me. I would prefer my alk to be around 8 or 9 at 10ppm nitrates

 

[MugiwaraGrape]

I

If 12 is the roof, you are at the bar joist... not saying it's what caused the torch thing, just an observation of the numbers you posted.

But yeah. Most of the time alk and nitrate levels play with each other. High nitrates and high alk work well but high alk and clean water can cause alk burn and harm corals.

If you were at 20ppm I wouldn't have said anything but below 10 and 11 alk is like woah!.

Just saying it's a red flag for me. I would prefer my alk to be around 8 or 9 at 10ppm nitrates

I’m super curious of the chemistry behind the correlation. I didn’t realize they correlate in such a way. With some thought I would assume the levels changing would correlate like increasing nitrates causes alk to decrease and the inverse, but didn’t expect an actual static number correlation for concern. My values don’t bounce a lot though. There is usually a minor shift after a water change and then it stabilizes back to “normal” pretty quickly (24 hours).

 

[Mr. Roboto]

I’m super curious of the chemistry behind the correlation. I didn’t realize they correlate in such a way. With some thought I would assume the levels changing would correlate like increasing nitrates causes alk to decrease and the inverse, but didn’t expect an actual static number correlation for concern. My values don’t bounce a lot though. There is usually a minor shift after a water change and then it stabilizes back to “normal” pretty quickly (24 hours).

I don't know what else you have in the tank and I will swear I could prolly tell you more about my experience with this and these numbers but it's something to think about. One water change and the nitrates fall into that danger zone and alk nukes your high lit corals. It happens.