Help with Hammer Coral

[kdtorgy]

Hi everyone,

I'm fairly new to the hobby and need a little help. have a 150 gallon reef tank with mostly softies which are all doing fine. I got a hammer coral about 3 weeks ago that closed up shortly after I added it (dipped first) and has not opened yet. It's in medium flow. I've tired low par (about 50) and higher PAR (about 100) with no luck. I've also got an older frog spawn that regressed due to high nitrates (50-70) that has started coming back after I got my nitrates lower and stable with NoPOx. The hammer was added after nitrate reduction and stabilization. During the last 5 weeks, I've added the following corals, which are all ding fine: gobstopper zoas, Hollywood stunner chalice, burning banana stylo, yellow cyphastrea, green mushroom, green star polyps and an acan. Here are my parameters:

Salinity: 1.025
Temp: 79-80
Alk: 9-10 dKh
Ca: 450-500
Mg: 1400
Ammonia and nitrite: 0
nitrate: 5-10
phosphate 0.05 to 0.1
pH: 7.9 to 8.1

Coral foods are Reef Energy AB+ every other day (25 mL)
Reef Roids/Reef Chili every 2-3 days broadcast feed
Phytyfeast every 2-3 days

I'm also dosing RedSea Trace elements every other day and Chaetogro every other day for my sump fuge. I did an ICP test and everything is in range except the following:

Bromide, Boron and Strontium are a tad low but zinc and iron are pretty high (24 ppm and 17 ppm, respectively). I'm thinking those are elevated because of the ChaetoGro.

Can anyone see anything striking wrong and suggest a fix?

 

[_Jake_Simek_]

Hi everyone,

I'm fairly new to the hobby and need a little help. have a 150 gallon reef tank with mostly softies which are all doing fine. I got a hammer coral about 3 weeks ago that closed up shortly after I added it (dipped first) and has not opened yet. It's in medium flow. I've tired low par (about 50) and higher PAR (about 100) with no luck. I've also got an older frog spawn that regressed due to high nitrates (50-70) that has started coming back after I got my nitrates lower and stable with NoPOx. The hammer was added after nitrate reduction and stabilization. During the last 5 weeks, I've added the following corals, which are all ding fine: gobstopper zoas, Hollywood stunner chalice, burning banana stylo, yellow cyphastrea, green mushroom, green star polyps and an acan. Here are my parameters:

Salinity: 1.025
Temp: 79-80
Alk: 9-10 dKh
Ca: 450-500
Mg: 1400
Ammonia and nitrite: 0
nitrate: 5-10
phosphate 0.05 to 0.1
pH: 7.9 to 8.1

Coral foods are Reef Energy AB+ every other day (25 mL)
Reef Roids/Reef Chili every 2-3 days broadcast feed
Phytyfeast every 2-3 days

I'm also dosing RedSea Trace elements every other day and Chaetogro every other day for my sump fuge. I did an ICP test and everything is in range except the following:

Bromide, Boron and Strontium are a tad low but zinc and iron are pretty high (24 ppm and 17 ppm, respectively). I'm thinking those are elevated because of the ChaetoGro.

Can anyone see anything striking wrong and suggest a fix?

Your levels are mostly spot on. I run fairly similar levels at spot on constancy. I have 3 hammers and a torch and they are doing great. Maybe its not a question of the level as much as it is consistency? Stabilizing alkk and temp made a big difference for me.

 

[kdtorgy]

Your levels are mostly spot on. I run fairly similar levels at spot on constancy. I have 3 hammers and a torch and they are doing great. Maybe it’s not a question of the level as much as it is consistency? Stabilizing alkk and temp made a big difference for me

Your levels are mostly spot on. I run fairly similar levels at spot on constancy. I have 3 hammers and a torch and they are doing great. Maybe its not a question of the level as much as it is consistency? Stabilizing alkk and temp made a big difference for me.

How stable? dKh within 0.5 units and temp within a degree or tighter than that?

 

[Lavey29]

Lot of skeleton showing there. How old is the tank? What dip did you use? If you are dosing red sea trace daily then why dose chaeto gro? That's just more trace being added in. How often do you water change? Unless you have a heavily stocked tank of corals, weekly water changes suffice for replenish of trace elements. Do you dose alk, cal and mag to which gives you the baseline for red sea dosing?

 

[kdtorgy]

Tank is 2.5 years old. I used Coral RX dip and followed instructions. I was told by my LFS to use Chaeto Gro when getting supplies for fuge. At that point, I wasn't dosing Red Sea trace. I could halt dosing Chaeto Gro and see what happens. Do you think the elevated Iron levels from dosing both might be causing the problems with the Hammer? Tank is not heavily stocked LPS or SPS. Lots of softies. I use an autodosrer to dose Alk, calcium and Mg but only need to add about 10-15 mL a day for each. I typically do a 10% water change a week with Tropic Marin Pro salt.

 

[Lavey29]

Tank is 2.5 years old. I used Coral RX dip and followed instructions. I was told by my LFS to use Chaeto Gro when getting supplies for fuge. At that point, I wasn't dosing Red Sea trace. I could halt dosing Chaeto Gro and see what happens. Do you think the elevated Iron levels from dosing both might be causing the problems with the Hammer? Tank is not heavily stocked LPS or SPS. Lots of softies. I use an autodosrer to dose Alk, calcium and Mg but only need to add about 10-15 mL a day for each. I typically do a 10% water change a week with Tropic Marin Pro salt.

Yes on the iron as I found out the same when I dosed red sea and chaeto gro. My levels were elevated also which can contribute to nuisance algae but not really harm that hammer. Are you sure about your par? I have 5 hammers in 150 par now. Euphyllia are also prone to pests or bacteria infection also.

 

[kdtorgy]

Yes on the iron as I found out the same when I dosed red sea and chaeto gro. My levels were elevated also which can contribute to nuisance algae but not really harm that hammer. Are you sure about your par? I have 5 hammers in 150 par now. Euphyllia are also prone to pests or bacteria infection also.

I have very little algae. Some on the glass but none in the sand. I do have a pretty good CUC and two sand sifting starfish. I'll hold off on the Chaeto Gro for a while and see. I did actually buy a PAR meter MQ-510 because I was tired of guessing so PAR readings should be good.

 

[kdtorgy]

Yes on the iron as I found out the same when I dosed red sea and chaeto gro. My levels were elevated also which can contribute to nuisance algae but not really harm that hammer. Are you sure about your par? I have 5 hammers in 150 par now. Euphyllia are also prone to pests or bacteria infection also.

I’ve done some reading lately and lots of people suggest KFC dip I ordered that. Any experience with this?

 

[Lavey29]

I’ve done some reading lately and lots of people suggest KFC dip I ordered that. Any experience with this?

I've not used it personally but reviews have been positive. If I suspect bacterial infection I use ciprofloaxin to treat. Euphyllia are just tricky corals sometimes. One hammer might thrive and one right next to it nose dives. Overall your numbers are decent, you have checked par so that leaves flow. They need low or low moderate flow and if you are satisfied with that then it has to be something not typically like flatworms, bacteria infection, etc... corals are hard to figure out sometimes because they can be struggling inside for weeks or months before they show outward signs of decline.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Hi everyone,

I'm fairly new to the hobby and need a little help. have a 150 gallon reef tank with mostly softies which are all doing fine. I got a hammer coral about 3 weeks ago that closed up shortly after I added it (dipped first) and has not opened yet. It's in medium flow. I've tired low par (about 50) and higher PAR (about 100) with no luck. I've also got an older frog spawn that regressed due to high nitrates (50-70) that has started coming back after I got my nitrates lower and stable with NoPOx. The hammer was added after nitrate reduction and stabilization. During the last 5 weeks, I've added the following corals, which are all ding fine: gobstopper zoas, Hollywood stunner chalice, burning banana stylo, yellow cyphastrea, green mushroom, green star polyps and an acan. Here are my parameters:

Salinity: 1.025
Temp: 79-80
Alk: 9-10 dKh
Ca: 450-500
Mg: 1400
Ammonia and nitrite: 0
nitrate: 5-10
phosphate 0.05 to 0.1
pH: 7.9 to 8.1

Coral foods are Reef Energy AB+ every other day (25 mL)
Reef Roids/Reef Chili every 2-3 days broadcast feed
Phytyfeast every 2-3 days

I'm also dosing RedSea Trace elements every other day and Chaetogro every other day for my sump fuge. I did an ICP test and everything is in range except the following:

Bromide, Boron and Strontium are a tad low but zinc and iron are pretty high (24 ppm and 17 ppm, respectively). I'm thinking those are elevated because of the ChaetoGro.

Can anyone see anything striking wrong and suggest a fix?

The pic on left shows polyp bailout and often euphyllia issues are associated with stress. Hammers are not picky where they are placed but lower third of tank is often the best location due to lower light and flow area
The key is to avoid the extremes. . . . . Extreme light and Extreme water flow. While they need light for production of their energy source known as zooxanthellae, too much light will cause them to expel the zooxanthellae. Moderate light is adequate.
Too much flow causes the flesh to tear off the skeleton or get bacterial issues including brown jelly disease. They should be waving in the current but not bent over the skeleton of bouncing vigorously which leads to bailout.
They require calcium no less than 380 which I see you have met