Help! Red Monti is turning light pink FAST!

Mattie H.

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I have a huge plating red Monti colony, about four years old or so. In the past week or so it has begun bleaching, turning more and more light pink. I hadn't checked my levels in a while, so I tested and found that I had no nitrates, low alk, low ph. I've dosed over the past few days, and added flourish to raise nitrates to 10. Everything is at proper levels now, but the Monti is still bleaching, worse every day. I have a bunch of big frags separate from the colony which are also lightening. Nothing else in the tank is having any problems. I have colonies of birdsnests, duncans, trumpets, a huge stunner challace, green branching Monti, several other plating stuff that looks monti-ish, and lots of other misc corals, plus some polyps and other soft stuff. All in perfect health. What could this be? I'm afraid I'm going to lose the whole thing if I don't figure this out fast! It's an emergency! Any ideas much appreciated.

Stats, JIK you need em:

5 year old tank - 75 gal plumbed in with a small 15 gal display and a 20 gal sump.

Ammonia 0
Nitrites 0
Nitrates 10 (was 0)
Phosphates .018
Mg 1400 (was 1200)
Calcium 480 (was 400)
Alk 6 (was 3) (still dosing up)
Ph 8 (was 7.4)

20210113_222647.jpg
 

LegendaryCG

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Im posting to hear what others think.. to me it sounds like the corals zooxathale are dying causing the color loss. Prob mostly due to low alk and nutrients. Maybe try adding some phyto or aminos as well as your corrective actions.
 
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Mattie H.

Mattie H.

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I actually did find one other type of frag that also seems to be losing color. This one was originally a deep brown with bright green eyes. Now it's sort of a dark tan.
 

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blasterman

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Montipora has an odd habit of adapting to low nutrient conditions like a champ, and then when you correct them they throw a total fit and expel their symbiotic algae. What works as an adaptation on a reef to changing environmental conditions drives you batty. This is why some reefers can claim sub 7 dKH values and show perfectly healthy looking tanks.

Caps also acclimate to lower dKH conditions better than raising them. A guy on my local reef forum has many large caps over a foot in diameter of several different varities. He prefers to run dKH no higher than 7 because of this.

I would honestly leave alk at 6 for awhile and stop raising nitrate. The coral's zooxanthellae algae were in a low / energy conserving state / clade and then all of a sudden they get nutrients and alk dumped on them. So, the coral starts expelling zooxanthella . More importantly cut your lighting for awhile.
 

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