Is this new growth or dying?

[Brad Coughlan]

Are these white tips new growth or signs of death in this birdsnest?

 

[Formulator]

Kinda hard to tell for sure with the blurry photo, but I’m leaning towards them being growth tips. My birds nest corals in the past have had similarly pronounced bleach white growth tips. They are kinda scary compared to the tips of some other corals.

 

[19Mateo83]

Pics are blurry, I don’t see a whole lot of polyp extension on that one. Generally, as long as the white is just on the tips it’s probably new growth.

 

[Gribbles]

Kinda hard to tell for sure with the blurry photo, but I’m leaning towards them being growth tips. My birds nest corals in the past have had similarly pronounced bleach white growth tips. They are kinda scary compared to the tips of some other corals.

Phew, I'm glad you say that. My birdsnest has similar and I'm still new to keeping them. Especially about then compared to other sps

 

[Brad Coughlan]

Pics are blurry, I don’t see a whole lot of polyp extension on that one. Generally, as long as the white is just on the tips it’s probably new growth.

I also notice some white on inner parts of the skeleton

 

[Biff0rz]

How old is the tank and how old is the frag? Is this your first sps?

 

[Brad Coughlan]

How old is the tank and how old is the frag? Is this your first sps?

Tank age is 1 and a half years

Frag about 5 months old

First sps was about 7 months ago

 

[Biff0rz]

Tank age is 1 and a half years

Frag about 5 months old

First sps was about 7 months ago

without a better picture and the above info, and assuming there's been no stability issues, looks like growth.

 

[Brad Coughlan]

without a better picture and the above info, and assuming there's been no stability issues, looks like growth.

Lights are off currently, so I'll send a better picture tomorrow.
Stability is currently questionable, as I recently began dosing nopox due to nitrate being 16, and phosphate being 0.1. After doing that, my GSP seemed to not appreciate it. could have been due to a lighting change I did, but I assumed it was due to the nutrients decreasing quickly. So I stopped the dosing, skipped a weekly water change and fed heavier, if it is dying this might be why - I have resumed dosing the nopox and the GSP is coming back slowly anyway

 

[Gribbles]

Lights are off currently, so I'll send a better picture tomorrow.
Stability is currently questionable, as I recently began dosing nopox due to nitrate being 16, and phosphate being 0.1. After doing that, my GSP seemed to not appreciate it. could have been due to a lighting change I did, but I assumed it was due to the nutrients decreasing quickly. So I stopped the dosing, skipped a weekly water change and fed heavier, if it is dying this might be why - I have resumed dosing the nopox and the GSP is coming back slowly anyway

GSP probably loves that nutrient level. Also I believe nopox and other carbon dosing methods need some time to take noticeable effect...days perhaps? A week?

 

[Formulator]

Lights are off currently, so I'll send a better picture tomorrow.
Stability is currently questionable, as I recently began dosing nopox due to nitrate being 16, and phosphate being 0.1. After doing that, my GSP seemed to not appreciate it. could have been due to a lighting change I did, but I assumed it was due to the nutrients decreasing quickly. So I stopped the dosing, skipped a weekly water change and fed heavier, if it is dying this might be why - I have resumed dosing the nopox and the GSP is coming back slowly anyway

Why on earth would you dose nopox at 0.1 PO4 and 16 NO3? Those parameters are near perfect…

 

[Brad Coughlan]

Why on earth would you dose nopox at 0.1 PO4 and 16 NO3? Those parameters are near perfect…

A few weeks before that test no3 was sitting at 5ppm and po4 at 0.03, so the trend of the nutrients were just going up and up, likely as a result of me stepping up my feeding

 

[Brad Coughlan]

GSP probably loves that nutrient level. Also I believe nopox and other carbon dosing methods need some time to take noticeable effect...days perhaps? A week?

I was dosing it for about a week before I paused as I could notice negative effects on the GSP, I'll do another no3 and po4 test tomorrow and see where things are

 

[tbrown]

What's your alkalinity?

 

[Brad Coughlan]

What's your alkalinity?

I tested that today, it was around the 7-7.5 dkh mark

 

[tbrown]

I tested that today, it was around the 7-7.5 dkh mark

SPS tend to be intolerant of low phosphates especially with higher alkalinity. The evidence of that often starts at the tips of the branches. Your alkalinity is lowish so you should be good there.

 

[Brad Coughlan]

SPS tend to be intolerant of low phosphates especially with higher alkalinity. The evidence of that often starts at the tips of the branches. Your alkalinity is lowish so you should be good there.

Should I try and lower the po4?

 

[tbrown]

Should I try and lower the po4?

No. Bottoming out PO4 creates it's own problems. I try to run mine between 0.1 and 0.2 just in case Alk creeps up on me.

 

[tbrown]

You might keep an eye on the Alkalinity though. 7 isn't bad but I know a lot of people shoot for closer to 8-8.5. If it drops too much lower corals can start getting grumpy.

 

[Rappa]

It looks kinda brown'd out and not well in that picture... It may just be the pic, but I don't see much life on that... again, maybe bad pic.