Keeping Zoas alive in SPS dominant tank

[jx.reef]

I’m struggling to keep my zoas alive in my nuvo 20 since switching from a XR15 g4 (25% ab+) to XR30 g5 blue (75% ab+). I grew out a bunch of colonies from single polyps over 3 years but have lost nearly all of them since changing my lights to focus on SPS. They would bleach, close up and very slowly shrink away. My acros on the other hand have never looked better.

I’m down to my last 3 colonies and want to try to save them. I suspect the bottom of the tank gets 200-250+ PAR and I can’t dial it down without upsetting my acros.

Params:
Alk 8.3
Nitrate 5-10 (I dose potassium nitrate occasionally to bump it up)
Phosphate 0.07

Any ideas on how I can save these guys without having to setup another tank?

 

[footgal]

Hi! I would suggest moving them under an overhang or underneath a clear frag rack so they don’t get such direct light. The lighting is the only changed factor here correct?

Shade the zoas, allow acros to grow outwards from the rock to create shaded areas on the bottom. Your zoas should start thriving again if the nutrient levels are still correct since this is an sps tank. Best of luck! That’s a very beautiful colony! Maybe you should look into some of the zoas that prefer high light

 

[jx.reef]

Appreciate the advice! I have them underneath an IM frag rack already but may need to just try completely shading them.

My nutrients are a tad lower than before but nothing that should be killing my softies. Maybe I’ll just bite the bullet and setup a separate tank with my old nanobox light.

 

[footgal]

Appreciate the advice! I have them underneath an IM frag rack already but may need to just try completely shading them.

My nutrients are a tad lower than before but nothing that should be killing my softies. Maybe I’ll just bite the bullet and setup a separate tank with my old nanobox light.

Zoa dominant tankkkkk always beautiful! Get some sexy shrimp in there and and you’re set!

 

[jda]

If you have SPS thriving, then Z&P should be easy... they grow like weeds in my SPS tank with tons of lighting and NSW type of parameters. Do you change water or otherwise appropriately dose traces (not just dump them in)? I only ever had problems getting Z&P to grow after long periods of getting busy and not changing water... some would melt and others not care at all, so it makes it tricky since some thrive with others suffer so people don't think that they matter since some are doing well.

All of this said, a xr15 at 25% is a lot less light than xr30 at 75%.

Positive that you don't have any nudibrach that eat zoas?

 

[jx.reef]

That’s been the confusing part for me. These guys all used to grow like weeds for me (single polyps to 100+ colonies) but now they just keep shrinking until they disappear. I spend too much time staring at the tank everyday and am 99% sure there aren’t any nudis.

I do a water change about every 1.5 weeks using tropic marin pro but did experiment with a bunch of Zeo trace elements a few months ago. An ICP came back with elevated iodine and potassium so I backed off on the dosages (cut it to 1/4 the recommended) and haven’t had issues since. The zoas were struggling before any of the extra trace additions though.

Is it possible they have some sort of bacteria infection? I picked up some chemiclean but am hesitant to use it.

 

[footgal]

That’s been the confusing part for me. These guys all used to grow like weeds for me (single polyps to 100+ colonies) but now they just keep shrinking until they disappear. I spend too much time staring at the tank everyday and am 99% sure there aren’t any nudis.

I do a water change about every 1.5 weeks using tropic marin pro but did experiment with a bunch of Zeo trace elements a few months ago. An ICP came back with elevated iodine and potassium so I backed off on the dosages (cut it to 1/4 the recommended) and haven’t had issues since. The zoas were struggling before any of the extra trace additions though.

Is it possible they have some sort of bacteria infection? I picked up some chemiclean but am hesitant to use it.

I would double check for pests before dosing chemiclean. An H202 dip (1:1 tank water to H) for 1-2 minutes should knock off any uglies in there. Just really inspect the dipping container after the dip to see if anything falls out, I like placing it on a piece of paper so the background is nice and white. It’ll take 2-4 days for the zoas to reopen from the dip so don’t freak out

 

[jx.reef]

Ah I forgot to mention that my mushrooms are struggling as well. Same issues with shrinking and overall look unhappy.

Here’s my OG bounce before and now.

 

[footgal]

Ah I forgot to mention that my mushrooms are struggling as well. Same issues with shrinking and overall look unhappy.

Here’s my OG bounce before and now.

Oh that’s not good, when my mushrooms struggle I usually find that it’s an alk issue

 

[jx.reef]

My alk has been pretty rock solid between 7-8.5 for the past 5 months. I test almost daily with Hanna alk checkers lol.

I’ve seen some giant amphipods since dosing phyto. Never heard of them munching on corals before. About 1cm. Could those be an issue?

 

[jx.reef]

My alk has been pretty rock solid between 7-8.5 for the past 5 months. I test almost daily with Hanna alk checkers lol.

I’ve seen some giant amphipods since dosing phyto. Never heard of them munching on corals before. About 1cm. Could those be an issue?

Looks exactly like this but golden brown

 

[blasterman]

Second picture shows some pretty thick nuisance algae and that's your issue. Its competing with nutrients in the water and starving your zoas.

If you cut the source of the nutrients you will just make the problem worse, so you are in a reinforcing loop.

I would try a bottle of Vibrant to get that turf algae under control.

I've had many solid SPS tanks with healthy zoa and paly colonies but they have to be nuisance algae free. You usually need to export nutrients via a fuge or other method to keep both SPP and softies happy.

 

[jx.reef]

I think you hit the nail on the head! I did not have these strange moss balls back when zoas were doing well. I’ve been pulling out these clumps every 2 weeks but they grow back crazy fast.

I’ll try manual removal daily first to see if the situation improves. Thanks everyone for your help!

 

[jx.reef]

Small update: I pulled out fistfuls of algae and dosed some extra nitrate/phosphate.

Zoas might be too far gone but my mushrooms are turning around!

 

[footgal]

Small update: I pulled out fistfuls of algae and dosed some extra nitrate/phosphate.

Zoas might be too far gone but my mushrooms are turning around!

The Shrooms looks great! If a zoa isn’t melted, don’t lose hope