Help! Corals Dying

[5280Reef]

I missed the tank size, how many gallons total (including sump)?

Red Sea Reefer 250 is the tank. 65 gal. total

 

[living_tribunal]

Red Sea Reefer 250 is the tank. 65 gal. total

So if I were in this situation, these would be the first two things I would do:

1.) Address the phosphates. Phosphates are criminally misunderstood in the reef world and I believe them to be the number 1 coral killer on this forum. While both nitrate and phosphate are essential for coral growth, corals do not tolerate an under supply of phosphates what so ever. Corals will however tolerate an under supply of nitrate.

Read this: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5441187/


At 6 months in, there is a chance that it's possibly the dry rock. Dry rock binds a tremendous amount of phosphates. It acts as a buffer: binding phosphates when levels are high and leaching them when levels are low. This is not the easiest situation to handle. To properly assess and manage this, you will need to remove all chemical filtration, or anything else that could be consuming the phosphates, and start feeding more. You will then need to start testing phosphates once every two days to see the rate of consumption. I personally found dosing phosphates easier to manage and measure when I was in a similar situation. That's not completely necessary but you overall just need to verify that, ceterus paribus, your dry rock is consuming the phosphates and the relative degree.

Once confirmed, you either feed more, both your fish and corals, or dose. It's up to you. Just continue to measure until you see detectable phosphates and then you'll know you can resume a normal feeding schedule.

I would personally invest in a better phosphate test kit. If there was any parameter to invest in a high quality test kit, it would be phosphates. Most phosphate test kits are absolutely terrible. If you have the means, the hanna phosphourus (not phosphate) ulr is the best consumer phosphate kit. I love mine and it's saved me on many occassions.

2.) Alkalinity. Alkalinity is most likely not the issue here unless these corals were temporarily stressed by the massive drop going from the sellers tank with higher alk to yours in a day. If the corals have been in there for a while however, they will gradually adjust to slowly diminishing alk levels. 6.8, while on the low side, is not completely out of the ordinary and corals would have slowly adjusted to it.

I would personally perform a large water change at only 65G, something like 25G, to also ensure it's not an under-supply of trace elements bothering the corals. You then need to start testing alk once a week. You'll know when you need to dose (when they start pulling like .1-.3ppm alk a day). Shoot for a nice alk number, something like, 8-10 and keep it consistent (+-.5) every week.

 

[5280Reef]

So if I were in this situation, these would be the first two things I would do:

1.) Address the phosphates. Phosphates are criminally misunderstood in the reef world and I believe them to be the number 1 coral killer on this forum. While both nitrate and phosphate are essential for coral growth, corals do not tolerate an under supply of phosphates what so ever. Corals will however tolerate an under supply of nitrate.

Read this: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5441187/


At 6 months in, there is a chance that it's possibly the dry rock. Dry rock binds a tremendous amount of phosphates. It acts as a buffer: binding phosphates when levels are high and leaching them when levels are low. This is not the easiest situation to handle. To properly assess and manage this, you will need to remove all chemical filtration, or anything else that could be consuming the phosphates, and start feeding more. You will then need to start testing phosphates once every two days to see the rate of consumption. I personally found dosing phosphates easier to manage and measure when I was in a similar situation. That's not completely necessary but you overall just need to verify that, ceterus paribus, your dry rock is consuming the phosphates and the relative degree.

Once confirmed, you either feed more, both your fish and corals, or dose. It's up to you. Just continue to measure until you see detectable phosphates and then you'll know you can resume a normal feeding schedule.

I would personally invest in a better phosphate test kit. If there was any parameter to invest in a high quality test kit, it would be phosphates. Most phosphate test kits are absolutely terrible. If you have the means, the hanna phosphourus (not phosphate) ulr is the best consumer phosphate kit. I love mine and it's saved me on many occassions.

2.) Alkalinity. Alkalinity is most likely not the issue here unless these corals were temporarily stressed by the massive drop going from the sellers tank with higher alk to yours in a day. If the corals have been in there for a while however, they will gradually adjust to slowly diminishing alk levels. 6.8, while on the low side, is not completely out of the ordinary and corals would have slowly adjusted to it.

I would personally perform a large water change at only 65G, something like 25G, to also ensure it's not an under-supply of trace elements bothering the corals. You then need to start testing alk once a week. You'll know when you need to dose (when they start pulling like .1-.3ppm alk a day). Shoot for a nice alk number, something like, 8-10 and keep it consistent (+-.5) every week.

This is exactly what I was looking for and incredibly helpful! Truly appreciate you spending some time to provide all of this insight and direction.

A couple quick questions come to mind.

1. By all chemical filtration - Are you just referring to the skimmer and the carbon reactor? I don't believe I have any other chemical filtration, but just want to confirm.

2. I will head to the LFS today to pick up a Hannah checker, but in regards to measuring consumption... Does timing matter? I'm wondering how I create a baseline to determine consumption here. Should I test right after I feed, then right before I feed the next day? You suggest I test every two days, so if I am increasing my feeding to once a day, how am I creating a baseline to determine my consumption. Or are you suggesting that I continue to feed every other day and measure right after I feed to start and right before I feed again the following day?

3. The only reason I am pointing my finger at ALK right now is that I had a birds nest that was one of the first that went into my tank and has slowly died a slow death. It grew, but it lost its color and has now stalled growing and no longer extends it's polyps. I believe I saw a ALK drop after swapping salts, but I can't confirm that although I can confirm a gradual drop in ALK since April.

4. You mentioned shooting for a nice ALK number. Wouldn't I have to start doing to increase my ALK to 8-10? Tropic Marin Pro Reef is at 7. Would it cause any harm to perform all of your steps and start slowly dosing ALK as well to start getting it up? My thought is to do the large water change per your recommendation, pick up a dosing pump and ALK today and start after the water change.

 

[anthonygf]

Is an ICP worth it? How fast could my new corals die if I don't start dosing? They have been in the tank for 3 days and haven't opened up much. I just turned off my skimmer also.

My Duncans have been closed up now going on six months and just now started to emerge

I thought that would be the case with the ATO. I'm going to measure the ALK again today at 5p (same time I tested yesterday to see if there was any uptake). I did just add 6 new corals, so uptake could have increased now. I don't want him to eat my shrimp! I'll pass on the wrasse - So good feedback there. So sounds like I should just start dosing Kalkwasswer? My LFS also sold me a bottle of Acropower. Should I start with that too?

Acropower is just vitamins I believe and would be ok, you need phytoplankton; food for most living creatures in the sea. My Duncan is just started coming out after a 6 month hibernation

 

[anthonygf]

So if I were in this situation, these would be the first two things I would do:

1.) Address the phosphates. Phosphates are criminally misunderstood in the reef world and I believe them to be the number 1 coral killer on this forum. While both nitrate and phosphate are essential for coral growth, corals do not tolerate an under supply of phosphates what so ever. Corals will however tolerate an under supply of nitrate.

Read this: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5441187/


At 6 months in, there is a chance that it's possibly the dry rock. Dry rock binds a tremendous amount of phosphates. It acts as a buffer: binding phosphates when levels are high and leaching them when levels are low. This is not the easiest situation to handle. To properly assess and manage this, you will need to remove all chemical filtration, or anything else that could be consuming the phosphates, and start feeding more. You will then need to start testing phosphates once every two days to see the rate of consumption. I personally found dosing phosphates easier to manage and measure when I was in a similar situation. That's not completely necessary but you overall just need to verify that, ceterus paribus, your dry rock is consuming the phosphates and the relative degree.

Once confirmed, you either feed more, both your fish and corals, or dose. It's up to you. Just continue to measure until you see detectable phosphates and then you'll know you can resume a normal feeding schedule.

I would personally invest in a better phosphate test kit. If there was any parameter to invest in a high quality test kit, it would be phosphates. Most phosphate test kits are absolutely terrible. If you have the means, the hanna phosphourus (not phosphate) ulr is the best consumer phosphate kit. I love mine and it's saved me on many occassions.

2.) Alkalinity. Alkalinity is most likely not the issue here unless these corals were temporarily stressed by the massive drop going from the sellers tank with higher alk to yours in a day. If the corals have been in there for a while however, they will gradually adjust to slowly diminishing alk levels. 6.8, while on the low side, is not completely out of the ordinary and corals would have slowly adjusted to it.

I would personally perform a large water change at only 65G, something like 25G, to also ensure it's not an under-supply of trace elements bothering the corals. You then need to start testing alk once a week. You'll know when you need to dose (when they start pulling like .1-.3ppm alk a day). Shoot for a nice alk number, something like, 8-10 and keep it consistent (+-.5) every week.

I have a question for you. I have both the hanna phosphourus ulr and phosphate kit. Can you explain the difference? One day I tested Po4 at 0.48 and phos at 178, another day Po4 was 0.32 and phos was 108. I know they are related.

 

[anthonygf]

Just for reference, I just ran up and took pics of all the new corals and the entire tank for everyone to take a look at. As you can see, they don't all look incredible just yet

They will grow like crazy once you take care of nutrients like fish waste, phyto, feed fish twice a day. Raise P04, dkh around 8.3, I know lower dkh will also be ok for some have proven it, I think maintaining middle of the road is safest. Your corals are hungry.

 

[anthonygf]

So should I just feed more? Or get coral food to increase phosphate? I did just shut off my skimmer also. Probably a good idea to get a Hannah ULR checker?

Feed your fish twice a day and corals a couple times a week.

 

[anthonygf]

RC and TM pro reef is pretty close to the same as far as DKH. I used both and switched just under a year ago. for me they both mixed up about 7.2-7.5 DKH

My Fritz mixed at 11dkh.

 

[anthonygf]

I'm not sure about reef chili but get the refrigerated phytoplankton at your LFS, Phyto Feast is the one I use.

I forgot about zooplankton.

 

[living_tribunal]

This is exactly what I was looking for and incredibly helpful! Truly appreciate you spending some time to provide all of this insight and direction.

A couple quick questions come to mind.

1. By all chemical filtration - Are you just referring to the skimmer and the carbon reactor? I don't believe I have any other chemical filtration, but just want to confirm.

2. I will head to the LFS today to pick up a Hannah checker, but in regards to measuring consumption... Does timing matter? I'm wondering how I create a baseline to determine consumption here. Should I test right after I feed, then right before I feed the next day? You suggest I test every two days, so if I am increasing my feeding to once a day, how am I creating a baseline to determine my consumption. Or are you suggesting that I continue to feed every other day and measure right after I feed to start and right before I feed again the following day?

3. The only reason I am pointing my finger at ALK right now is that I had a birds nest that was one of the first that went into my tank and has slowly died a slow death. It grew, but it lost its color and has now stalled growing and no longer extends it's polyps. I believe I saw a ALK drop after swapping salts, but I can't confirm that although I can confirm a gradual drop in ALK since April.

4. You mentioned shooting for a nice ALK number. Wouldn't I have to start doing to increase my ALK to 8-10? Tropic Marin Pro Reef is at 7. Would it cause any harm to perform all of your steps and start slowly dosing ALK as well to start getting it up? My thought is to do the large water change per your recommendation, pick up a dosing pump and ALK today and start after the water change.

1.) Just any filtration that can remove phosphates. Keep your skimmer running however.

2.) Very good question. Yes, timing does matter. You want to test ~2 hours after dosing phosphate. You can then even do a follow up 2 hours later depending on how fast the phosphates are being bound to the rock. Once you develop a baseline, which is easy to do with phosphate dosing, you can dose accordingly.

A word of caution, there is a tipping point so this does require daily phosphate testing until the rock becomes bound. Otherwise, you’ll be adding a ton of phosphate to your tank that will remain in the column.

3.) Thats possible and best not to rule it out. Something tells me you haven’t been doing wc or dosing trace elements. So be sure to stick to weekly water changes. They aren’t to export nitrate or phosphate, or maintain alk/calc, they are to maintain the elements we don’t actively test for. If you hadn’t provided mag I would have been suspect of that but your mag levels seem good.

4.) I see no harm to dose to get levels up, and if your alk is not able to keep up from wc, then you’ll have to. I would recommend doing wc for the trace elements however. If not, you’ll have to dose them which is tricky.

So that’s up to you. You need to develop your alk baseline at this point. Start doing weekly alk tests.

Hope that helps.

 

[living_tribunal]

I have a question for you. I have both the hanna phosphourus ulr and phosphate kit. Can you explain the difference? One day I tested Po4 at 0.48 and phos at 178, another day Po4 was 0.32 and phos was 108. I know they are related.

So the phosphorus ulr is really just a marketing ploy but it is more accurate. Phosphate ulr is +-.03 accuracy, phosphorous ulr is +-.01. So it’s very accurate and has saved me time and time again.

With all hanna kits you have to really perfect your procedure. So never touch the cuvette with your fingers, fill the meniscus precisely to the line, get rid of all air bubbles before performing c1 and after shaking for c2.

If you can maintain the exact procedure each time, the readings will be very accurate and reliable.

Regarding the math, phosphorous is in ppb. To convert ppb to ppm, use this equation: ppm = 3.066 * ppb /1000

So for 178 (when po4 was .48) we do 178 * 3.066 / 1000 = .54

 

[living_tribunal]

I have a question for you. I have both the hanna phosphourus ulr and phosphate kit. Can you explain the difference? One day I tested Po4 at 0.48 and phos at 178, another day Po4 was 0.32 and phos was 108. I know they are related.

killer phosphate levels btw I’ve purposefully ran a ultra low nitrate and ultra high phosphate tank for a while now. I have gotten close to those levels but not quite. If you don’t have algae, share your secrets.

 

[living_tribunal]

Feed your fish twice a day and corals a couple times a week.

In my experience, it takes ages binding the rock with just that. I initially had to dose upwards of .1 phosphate a day broken into ten doses a day to get my rocks bound in a month or so.

 

[anthonygf]

So the phosphorus ulr is really just a marketing ploy but it is more accurate. Phosphate ulr is +-.03 accuracy, phosphorous ulr is +-.01. So it’s very accurate and has saved me time and time again.

With all hanna kits you have to really perfect your procedure. So never touch the cuvette with your fingers, fill the meniscus precisely to the line, get rid of all air bubbles before performing c1 and after shaking for c2.

If you can maintain the exact procedure each time, the readings will be very accurate and reliable.

Regarding the math, phosphorous is in ppb. To convert ppb to ppm, use this equation: ppm = 3.066 * ppb /1000

So for 178 (when po4 was .48) we do 178 * 3.066 / 1000 = .54

Thank you for your reply.

 

[anthonygf]

killer phosphate levels btw I’ve purposefully ran a ultra low nitrate and ultra high phosphate tank for a while now. I have gotten close to those levels but not quite. If you don’t have algae, share your secrets.

I do have some algae but does not over run my tank. So what are you nitrate and phosphate levels? Are you saying my phos levels are too low?

 

[anthonygf]

In my experience, it takes ages binding the rock with just that. I initially had to dose upwards of .1 phosphate a day broken into ten doses a day to get my rocks bound in a month or so.

I started my reef four years ago with all live rock and sand, had no new tank syndrome.

 

[Casket_Case]

You need some nitrate and phosphate...

 

[living_tribunal]

I do have some algae but does not over run my tank. So what are you nitrate and phosphate levels? Are you saying my phos levels are too low?

Levels of .48 are huge! Most have their levels under .05-.1

 

[anthonygf]

Levels of .48 are huge! Most have their levels under .05-.1

I have my levels now around .1-.05. The numbers I gave you was in July when I started to get algae, I then started dosing Phosphate Rx to get Po4 down, now I just dose 4-6 drops every week or so to maintain those levels and make sure it doesn't bottom out. When I started the first dose at the min dose was recommended in the directions Po4 dropped to zero, now it has been steady in decent numbers.

 

[living_tribunal]

I have my levels now around .1-.05. The numbers I gave you was in July when I started to get algae, I then started dosing Phosphate Rx to get Po4 down, now I just dose 4-6 drops every week or so to maintain those levels and make sure it doesn't bottom out. When I started the first dose at the min dose was recommended in the directions Po4 dropped to zero, now it has been steady in decent numbers.

Ah, ok. Was about to say.