New Nanoreefer with "Puckered" Softies

[SnappyShrimp]

Hi everyone,

New reefer here (been keeping freshwater planted/shrimp tanks for ~20 years though) and I finally bit the bullet to try my hands with a nanoreef after years of research and scouring the forums. I ended up getting the IM15 AIO and read through multiple build threads here to try and piece together something that works for me. It's been up and running for ~3 months now, with the first 2 months being a "fishless" cycle using various seafood parts. I started stocking about 3 weeks ago with inverts, easy corals, and finally fish. Things seemed to be going alright until a few days ago when my zoanthids and clove polyp corals started "puckering." They all used to open fully and the cloves would sway in the flow well but it all stopped after a feed with reefroids a could days ago. I also have an acans, a small frag of 3 mushrooms, and a ricordea that all look normal, fully extended, and also have good feeding responses. I'm not sure what info would be helpful or if anyone has any suggestions for what to do but I'll provide parameters and livestock info below. Any help would be appreciated as I try to problem solve for my corals!

Parameters:

Salinity: 34 ppt
Temp: ~77.5-78.5

API Test Kits:
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 10-20ppm
pH: 8.0-8.2

Salifert Test Kits:
Alk: 10.9 (is this too high?)
Calcium: 440-450
Mg: 1110-1140 (is this too low?)

Livestock:
CUC: 2 nassarius snails, 2 astraea snails, 2 trochus snails, 2 blue legged hermits, 1 red legged hermit (I just asked for the smallest hermits and this was the batch my LFS picked)
2 Blood shrimp
1 Candy cane pistol shrimp
1 Hifin goby
1 Purple firefish
Corals:
4 zoanthid frags
3 mushrooms (1 frag)
1 ricordea mushroom
1 acans frag
1 clove polyp frag

Lighting wise, I'm running a Noopsyche K7 Mini using Erikinsac's lighting schedule

Filtration wise, I have an inTank media basket with filter floss in the first chamber, activated carbon/purigen in the second, and seachem matrix in the last chamber. I'm running a Jecod EP-2000M smart pump with a VCA random flow generator and flow seems to be pretty good overall in the tank. The pump is rated at 528gph and I'm running it at near the lowest setting.

If there's any other info that would be helpful, please let me know! I'm hoping I can figure out what's happening to my softies and turn it around as they seemed to be doing so great before. Thanks for all your help!

 

[Rocks reef]

What are your phosphates at?
Also, do you have a picture of how the corals look?

 

[SnappyShrimp]

Sorry, took a while to get my phosphate test kit but I got a Hanna Phosphorous ULR test kit and I got a reading of 23 ppb or ~.07 ppm for phosphates with the conversion

Picture-wise, I don't have an orange filter but here are pictures I have for now.

Clove polyps (used to be more extended and "fluffy" looking)

Acans frag that seems to be doing alright

Mushrooms, ricordea (trying to split as it has 2 mouths), and some of the "puckered" zoas

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

It looks like your corals are stretching up for more light, start turning up the intensity a bit every week until they stop stretching (or rent a par meter from your LFS)

Also wonder about the flow, the cloves standing straight makes me wonder if they have enough water movement.

 

[SnappyShrimp]

Thanks for the suggestions! I'll start increasing the light intensity a bit, I'll go and increase by 2% for this week and see if that produces any positive results. I'll also increase the flow a bit and see how they all react. I hope they return to their full lush selves soon.

 

[SnappyShrimp]

Thanks for your help everyone! It seems my zoas have returned to their fully opened selves and the cloves look fluffier as well. Their coloration is not as bright as they were but hoping that’ll come back with time as well. Not really sure what helped (lighting or flow or time).

I did get some PAR measurements as well and the sandbed by my zoas is ~60, my cloves are up a bit around 80, middle tank is about 100 and top right under the light gets to about 200 but the areas I might place corals in the future are closer to 150.