Normal behavior - torch

[kilnakorr]

Hi

I have a small gold torch, that daily looks like life is to much, and has decided to die:

It closes every night like most of my other euphyllias, and comes out in the morning.
It has a bit shorter and fatter polyps than my two other torches.

A picture of the torch, during the first many hours of the day:

Sometimes it opens up again during the evening, sometimes not until next morning.
Been going on for weeks.

Is it 'normal' or is something not right?
Could it be a mix of a few things like, too much light compared with low nutrients, that makes it tired after some hours?

 

[Sharkbait19]

I’m not entirely sure why, but mine will do that from time to time. Usually in evenings. Often if something is annoying it it will do that. It’s also possible to be splitting, but yours seems too young for that. It still does seem to just be a normal occurence, nothing too concerning.

Looks healthy!

 

[noobreefer2]

How much flow is it getting?

 

[mwil79]

I find that when mine are trying to split they tend to not open as much.

 

[kilnakorr]

How much flow is it getting?

I have been changing the flow quite a bit, as my 2 gyres are a bit to much.
However, it comes out fine and looks great for hours, the it suddenly looks like some sea vampire creature, just sucked it dry.

 

[kilnakorr]

How much flow is it getting?

If it opens and inflate a bit, I can shoot a short video. Right now, it won' give any idea of how the flow is.

 

[kilnakorr]

How much flow is it getting?

Not sure how difficult it is to judge the flow, but I doubt it's to much.

 

[Sharkbait19]

Seems to be more than what I have mine under. I used to keep it in somewhat high current, then found it prefers being away from flow where it only slightly sways.

 

[noobreefer2]

Thanks, the flow doesn't look like that's a problem, do you know your water parameters? Has anything changed? How old is your tank? When did you get it? How much light do you have on it?

 

[kilnakorr]

Thanks, the flow doesn't look like that's a problem, do you know your water parameters? Has anything changed? How old is your tank? When did you get it? How much light do you have on it?

Sure. Here's the additional info.
Tank is just 4 months old.
Par at torch is measured at 90-100 PAR.
Ramping up 3 hrs. 6 hrs 'full', then just blues for 2 hrs and 1hr ramp down.
Running more blues and lower white, and reds for the last 2 weeks to slow some algae (worked perfectly). I still have some green layer on rocks, but not really growing.

Temp: 25 celcius
Ph: 7.8-7.9x (a little low do to CO2in house-tested)

Kh: 9.0 (steady with hourly dosing, even though consumption is less than 1 per week)

Ca: 450
Mg: 1350
NO3: 1
PO4: 0.04

I would like to increase NO3, but don't want to feed the algae.

Let me know if I missed something.

 

[noobreefer2]

Thanks for the info, everything looks good, how was the torch when you received it? Did you dip it? Where did you get it?

 

[kilnakorr]

Thanks for the info, everything looks good, how was the torch when you received it? Did you dip it? Where did you get it?

It was fine, but newly added at a small local store (a person with a small reef store as part time). It was slow to open, but probably because of low light when first placed in the tank. After I moved it to it's current place it opened up more.
Been in the tank for roughly a month and a half.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Did you dip the torch when you received it or since to ensure no parasites are irritating it?

I dipped a healthy torch next to a new torch and both of them had little creepy crawlies come out and both looked much better after the fact.

 

[kilnakorr]

Did you dip the torch when you received it or since to ensure no parasites are irritating it?

I dipped a healthy torch next to a new torch and both of them had little creepy crawlies come out and both looked much better after the fact.

Sorry. Yes I did dip it, like all other corals.
I saw no nasties.
All my corals are from the same place, and I've only seen a few pods afterwards.
If it was pests or similar, I wouldn't expect it to look fine for the most part and look like day old lettuce at the end of the day.

 

[Pkunk35]

Mine will occasionally do the same and I have mine in much higher flow although they will shrivel up much more. I always thought it was related to flow adjustment as in a couple hours they are always plump again.

 

[kilnakorr]

Just to update.
I tried lowering the flow a bit, but it looks exactly the same when I got home;Flat and tired polyps.
Tomorrow, I'll be home all day and I'll take a picture every hour to document how it starts out and when it starts looking sad.

 

[kilnakorr]

An update.

I took pictures every hour from 8 am today.
The below six pictures shows it from 8 am to 3 pm today, which is around when I noticed it starting to deflate:

What I noticed, and is clear on the pictures, is that there is lots of ambient light until around 2-3pm when the sun has moved enough so the angle isn't hitting the room much.
It might be the spectrum (lack of white and or red light) that is the problem.
I just tried increasing the white and reds, and took a few percentages of the blues, to see how it reacts.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Looks like lighting to me. Many of my euphylia and anenome plus some duncan's all react to light ramp down in some manner. There's one head of a duncan colony that closes when whites turn off and doesn't reopen until they come back on. The other 7 heads shrivel a bit then open right back up.

 

[kilnakorr]

Looks like lighting to me. Many of my euphylia and anenome plus some duncan's all react to light ramp down in some manner. There's one head of a duncan colony that closes when whites turn off and doesn't reopen until they come back on. The other 7 heads shrivel a bit then open right back up.

It must be.
It is wierd how the polyps deflates. Some look like they were sucked dry:

Guess I'll have to experiment with light settings.