Hammer Dying Fast - help needed !

[SahnCH]

Hi there !


I'm new here, I've been following the forum since 3-4 months but this is my first post :)
I'm having a problem with problem with coral hammer and believe it's dying - I would need your help to understand why and what would be the best course of action.
It seems to die pretty quickly now.

Equipment :
System is 125 gallon (550L) : 100 gallons in the display (450L) and 25 gallons in the sump (100L).
Skimmer : Bubble Magus Curve 5
Socket Filter : 7 inches changed every 3 days.
Lighting : 3 PopBloom RS90 - using Vivid preset.

Current tests :
Ammonia : 0
Nitrite : 0.5
Nitrate : 10
Kh : 8.5 (started dosing 3 weeks ago, now it's kind of stable, I think it still varied in a range of +/- 0.5 per week).
PH : 8.2
Temp 25.5C - stable within +/- 0.3C. -> Reef-Pi Temperature

Fish :
2 Clowns

Corals :
1 hammer coral (introduced 16th May 2022)
1 Favia (introduced 3rd June2022)
1 Montipora (introduced 3rd June 2022)
1 Zoanthus (introduced 3rd June 2022)

Timeline :
Tank started to cycle on 19/04/22, dry rocks with bacterias (prodibio & daphbio).
When introducing the Hammer, parameters were :
Ammonia : 0
Nitrite : 0.1
Nitrate : 5

When we bought the coral some heads were dead already but it looked overall healthy :

I did a light acclimation by limiting the output of the light at 50% and then increased by 5-10% per week.
After a couple of weeks I felt like the coral was loosing his colors and was getting whiter (bleaching?), it's getting worse to the point where I think we're loosing it quickly.
I'm target feeding it with RedSea AB+ - I've reduced the max output of my light to 75% but it seems to continue to lose and I see more and more of the skeleton.

Here are the picture took today :

On the last picture I noticed something organic growing on the skeleton (circled in red), could it be pest ?

Here is a video to in case there's something I don't see : https://www.youtube.com/shorts/7I3N6LPB3kc

Thanks again for your support, always super appreciated - please let me know if there are information I'm missing in the post!

Nico

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

The tank is about 6-7 weeks old, its just too new. Most poeple suggest not to try corals for at least a few months. Your tests show ammonia only recently down to 0 but still nitrite reading, so its still cycling and still growing more nitrifying bacteria. There is a lot going on in the water in a new tank that we cant test for, basically, it is not a stable environement.

 

[Koh23]

Like i suggested, cut down ch1, but, also, new suggestion, from this video, flows seems too harsh, if judging by my euphilias, they like medium, but soft,swaying flow, so try to adjust it bit, or move coral somewhere where flow is softer.....

How other corals are doing?

 

[Nate Chalk]

Zero phosphate = starving coral

 

[SahnCH]

Thanks for your ideas !

@Koh23 For light I decreased CH1 to 50% and channel 2-3-4 to 80% for now. Tomorrow I will also try your custom program for light : chanels 2 starts at 9, others at 10, ramping up to 100% at 12, then to 20 is full power, then ramp down until 22:00 - or something in this area.
For Flow currently I have 2 Jebao SOW-15 running in wave mode at lowest setting for flow - I unplugged one of the 2 wave maker to get an even lower flow in the tank. Will send another video to the treat tomorrow to showcase the new flow.

@Nate Chalk - I read that too, and I tested it again today, phosphates remain at zero. I found a tons of different way to decrease phosphate but there is none to increase them right ?

 

[gbroadbridge]

Hi there !


I'm new here, I've been following the forum since 3-4 months but this is my first post :)
I'm having a problem with problem with coral hammer and believe it's dying - I would need your help to understand why and what would be the best course of action.
It seems to die pretty quickly now.

Equipment :
System is 125 gallon (550L) : 100 gallons in the display (450L) and 25 gallons in the sump (100L).
Skimmer : Bubble Magus Curve 5
Socket Filter : 7 inches changed every 3 days.
Lighting : 3 PopBloom RS90 - using Vivid preset.

Current tests :
Ammonia : 0
Nitrite : 0.5
Nitrate : 10
Kh : 8.5 (started dosing 3 weeks ago, now it's kind of stable, I think it still varied in a range of +/- 0.5 per week).
PH : 8.2
Temp 25.5C - stable within +/- 0.3C. -> Reef-Pi Temperature

Fish :
2 Clowns

Corals :
1 hammer coral (introduced 16th May 2022)
1 Favia (introduced 3rd June2022)
1 Montipora (introduced 3rd June 2022)
1 Zoanthus (introduced 3rd June 2022)

Timeline :
Tank started to cycle on 19/04/22, dry rocks with bacterias (prodibio & daphbio).
When introducing the Hammer, parameters were :
Ammonia : 0
Nitrite : 0.1
Nitrate : 5

When we bought the coral some heads were dead already but it looked overall healthy :

I did a light acclimation by limiting the output of the light at 50% and then increased by 5-10% per week.
After a couple of weeks I felt like the coral was loosing his colors and was getting whiter (bleaching?), it's getting worse to the point where I think we're loosing it quickly.
I'm target feeding it with RedSea AB+ - I've reduced the max output of my light to 75% but it seems to continue to lose and I see more and more of the skeleton.

Here are the picture took today :

On the last picture I noticed something organic growing on the skeleton (circled in red), could it be pest ?

Here is a video to in case there's something I don't see : https://www.youtube.com/shorts/7I3N6LPB3kc

Thanks again for your support, always super appreciated - please let me know if there are information I'm missing in the post!

Nico

Your tank is too new to support a hammer coral.
Euphillia can be tricky corals and they work best in an established tank

You could try feeding more, to increase the nutrients available to the coral.

 

[vetteguy53081]

A lot of polyp bailout. While they can thrive in a newer tank, it will require a bit of monitoring and a reliable test kit (No Api brand). Euphyllia coral require stable tank conditions, and is intolerant to major swings in water quality in which your tank is subject to, and is sensitive to almost any level of copper in the water. Since they are a large polyp stony coral, calcium and alkalinity are two very important water parameters that will affect the growth of your coral. This coral will start to die off if the calcium levels are too low. A calcium level of about 400 ppm is just right.
This coral species isn’t terribly picky when it comes to the proper placement in your tank. The trick would really be just to avoid the extremes. Avoid extremely bright locations or areas of very high current, and avoid areas that are too dark or with currents that are too low. Fast currents risk damaging the soft, fleshy polyps (and getting an infection). Bright lights will cause bleaching. Insufficient lighting will cause the poor coral to wither away and starve to death.
Hammer corals only require a moderate amount of light for photosynthesis and can grow well in the intermediate regions of your tank. Just about any reef LED lighting should be sufficient for most tanks. Reduce white light intensity and get it off the sand bed which sand can irritate it.
The polyps should sway in the current, but not sustain so much pressure they are constantly bent over their skeleton. Too much flow will tear the polyps (worst case) and cause the polyps do not extend in the first place (best case). So, don’t give them too much flow.

 

[Koh23]

Good luck, things are not looking great, but with little luck, should be ok....