Melting Zoas and Salinity

[Jessica_canuck]

Hello everyone
first post here
would a salinity spike cause zoas / palys to melt ?
my stupid brother forgot to add RODI while I was away for a few days and the salinity jumped up to 1.028

I brought it back down to 1.025 but almost all the zoas melted (only had 5 types) in my tank melted

Could the salinity have caused this ? Searched online and seems like they should be more resilient

 

[Crabs McJones]

Hello everyone
first post here
would a salinity spike cause zoas / palys to melt ?
my stupid brother forgot to add RODI while I was away for a few days and the salinity jumped up to 1.028

I brought it back down to 1.025 but almost all the zoas melted (only had 5 types) in my tank melted

Could the salinity have caused this ? Searched online and seems like they should be more resilient

Welcome to R2R!!

While I agree that is a higher then desired salinity, 1.028 should not cause zoas to melt. Do you know what the rest of your parameters are? And what lighting do you have them under? Tell us all about your tank
#WelcometoR2R

 

[Jessica_canuck]

thats what I thought
trying to figure out what else my tank baby sitter could have done
maybe overfeeding? nitrates are around 15 they are usually around 10 ( I test with salifert)

its a 32 gallon biocube
2 years old
pulled the hood off and got ai prime
skimmerless
pair of clowns
2 small sicce powerheads

everything was fine until I left

 

[Crabs McJones]

thats what I thought
trying to figure out what else my tank baby sitter could have done
maybe overfeeding? nitrates are around 15 they are usually around 10 ( I test with salifert)

its a 32 gallon biocube
2 years old
pulled the hood off and got ai prime
skimmerless
pair of clowns
2 small sicce powerheads

everything was fine until I left

What about the rest of your parameters? Ammonia, nitrite, calcium, alk ect..

 

[Grey Ghost]

Welcome to the forum!
Do you use a timer for your lighting? Extreme light exposure could be a culprit for zoa melt if the lights were left on permanently while you were away.

 

[SEMA]

Salinity of 1.028 shouldn't bother to much. If you run high alkalinity at a low specific gravity, alkalinity can creep up high when a 1.028 SG is achieved.

Test alkalinity. Also is this tank very stable in water temp? Nitrates are fine IME at 15ppm and mine love it. Did you inspect them for pests like nudibranchs? Did you recently add any fish?

 

[Finhead]

HOw fast did yuo drop the salinity, Not sure it would melt Zoas but it would def stress them if you dropped it too fast.

 

[Lovemyreef2015]

Welcome to R2R

 

[Jessica_canuck]

alkalinity 7.9 (salifert)
calcium 420 (aquaforest)
ammonia undetectable
nitrite undetectable

salinity spiked over the course of 3-4 days

ai prime has built in light timer, have them running 9 hours / day

no new fish additions
dip the crap out of all new additions they were doing well, no new coral additions
almost positive not pest related because they melted fast, I had nudibranch in a tank years ago; I found they kill them slow and pretty easy to spot at night


Im thinking its the salinity spike but I still find it hard to believe wiped them all out (even my sunny D which have been through hell

oh well it gives me an excuse to get the tunze 3155 I have been dreaming about

 

[John3]

What did they look like melting? Just white or did they appear to be coated in a brown film? Any pics?