Help!! Bleached Birds Nest!!

[Plandauesq]

My birds nest colony that was doing amazing for two years has suddenly completely bleached white. Will it ever come back or should I just pull it out and throw it away? Anything I can do here?

 

[Tuan’s Reef]

Did this happen overnight? Any other details we may be missing? With growth of that size I’m inclined to think you have reef keeping skills and did all you could to save it. Bummer man, looks like it was a beauty

 

[Plandauesq]

This has happened over about a week. I am mad at myself, maybe I should have fragged it.

 

[ca1ore]

Depends on whether it is bleached or dead - they are not the same thing.

 

[Plandauesq]

Did this happen overnight? Any other details we may be missing? With growth of that size I’m inclined to think you have reef keeping skills and did all you could to save it. Bummer man, looks like it was a beauty

Will it grow back?

 

[Plandauesq]

Depends on whether it is bleached or dead - they are not the same thing.

How do you know if it is bleached vs. dead?

 

[Justfebreezeit]

Bleached it will still have flesh/polyps

Dead it will just be skeleton

 

[Sailfinguy21]

If its bleached i found algae wont grow on it... if itsi dead algae will soon grow on the skeleton

 

[vetteguy53081]

I had the same after changing light and settings.
Too much light, inadequate water flow and nutrients will cause this as well as high alk , low ph and low salinity. I would check all mentioned

 

[Plandauesq]

If its bleached i found algae wont grow on it... if itsi dead algae will soon grow on the skeleton

Interesting. Just noticed algae growing. Thanks.

 

[Plandauesq]

I had the same after changing light and settings.
Too much light, inadequate water flow and nutrients will cause this as well as high alk , low ph and low salinity. I would check all mentioned

I just got a new pump, so now there’s more flow than before. Could too much flow cause this?

 

[Pennywise the Clown]

I just got a new pump, so now there’s more flow than before. Could too much flow cause this?

I was under the impression that if a birdsnest wasn't getting blown off the rock work, then there wasn't too much flow.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I just got a new pump, so now there’s more flow than before. Could too much flow cause this?

Absolutely. Moderate flow is favorable

 

[ca1ore]

Bleached means that the polyps are still present, but they have expelled the zooanthelle. Bleached can recover if the conditions that caused the loss of the zooanthelle are corrected. In most cases bleached is used synonymously and incorrectly with dead. Bare skeleton with no remaining tissue is dead.

As to what caused colony death (more likely that than just bleached), hard to say. I’ve had large colonies do well for years and then suddenly go RTN and die. Fragging generally doesn’t help. Some kind of infection perhaps, or just heightened stress levels that just got to be too much and the colony died. Unless you had changed something recently, it unlikely to be light, flow, etc. I would check water chemistry, could be something like fluctuating alk levels that added to stresses. You want to avoid strong constant flow; otherwise variable strong flow is fine.