Office Tranquility (75g)

[madweazl]

This acropora has always browned out at the drop of a hat but has taken it to a new level. The tank move and two changes to lighting in the past two months didn't do it any favors.

What it looked like in March.

 

[madweazl]

Some natural light was hitting the tank yesterday morning.

 

[madweazl]

 

[madweazl]

Finally figured out what has been happening to the monti undata! I've been racking my brain for months and it turns out, the tailspot blenny is eating it! Little turd just took two or three bites while I was refilling the ATO.

 

[madweazl]

It just went after the monti cap as well but it doesn't seem to rip the flesh off of it like the undata.

 

[DesertReefT4r]

I had a blenny doing the same thing to my montis.

 

[madweazl]

Every time I go out of town, there has to be a little drama with the tank regardless of how well I prepare. For the most part, things seemed to be going pretty well until about a week into the trip, my wife noticed that the ATO wasnt working properly. She noticed one of the brackets for the float switch had broken so she started maintaining the water level by hand. A couple days after that, the storm came through and knocked out the power. She let me know it was out and asked what to do? I told her to fire up the generator if it lasted more than about two hours and she did so (was about about 4.5 hours). I got home yesterday and most everything looked pretty good. The acroporas that were looking back still looked bad but the monti undata is in really bad shape now.

I started cleaning everything up, checking everything out, and ordered replacement brackets for the float sensors. Then I pulled the broken bracket out of the sump...

And what they should look like

I had an ICP completed about two months ago and there wasn't anything out of the norm (slightly elevated aluminum but nothing to cause concern). Not sure when the magnet enclosure ruptured but I'll be doing a couple larger water changes this week regardless.

Just a friendly reminder to check everything and often.

 

[RichtheReefer21]

Did that magnet side ever come in contact with acid or vinegar during prep?

That's crazy

 

[madweazl]

Not by me; my guess is that it just wasn't sealed completely when it was made. The other one is still in the tank and looks fine but I have replacements arriving this week.

 

[RichtheReefer21]

might wanna run another ICP

 

[madweazl]

Been a while since I've posted any pictures of the acroporas. Despite the above issue with the magnet (and whatever impacted the corals), it looks like everything is going to make it.

This one is extremely durable and never showed any signs of stress; the only issue here was my wife breaking a large branch off the back during a power outage.

This demonstrated some odd behavior; the new growth (back left) remained an intense yellow while the main body started to brown out. Once I got a handle on the problem, the main body colored back up and the new growth lost all of its color.

I had lowered the lighting intensity a bit during while things were wonky and the rainbow delight wasn't a fan; it remained otherwise healthy the entire time and showed no signs of stress (this is one of the few times it hasn't shown good polyp extension actually).

The Tyree's pink lemonade acted like nothing happened; apparently this one is tough.

This unknown acro had a few small brown spots but colored right back up. Always has crazy polyp extension.

Another unknown that faired well; it lost a bit of color in a few spots but remained largely unchanged. It is an extremely slow grower for me.

The strawberry shortcake actually grew quite a bit during this mess and looked great (go figure).

The yellow tip had some color shifts during this period but continued to grow. It is starting to color back up now.

Reef Raft wolverine started to turn green out (with some brown as well) but made it through relatively unscathed. This one has also been an extremely slow grower; in all fairness it has been moved a number of times as.

The SC orange passion's polyps turned green and it lost some of the intense purple but otherwise remained good. The polyps have really started to show some orange the past week and a half, though it didn't photograph well.

This unknown green tenuis was hit extremely hard and I thought it was a total loss but left it in there just in case. After about two weeks, I started seeing some polyps popping back out. Though it bleached completely and did have some die off, about 75% of it remains alive and is starting to get some green back in it.

"Problem child" (unknown acropora) was hit the hardest with about 85% die off. I figured it was a goner as well but a few polyps remained. It browned out completely before STNing but the color has started to return rapidly and polyp extension is once again, fantastic. It is one of my favorites and I'm very happy it survived. I didn't trim it back because there are lone polyps on many of the branches so I'll just let it re-encrust on its own.

This unknown browned out but always looked pretty good and has been coloring back up pretty quickly.

The little smooth skin turned completely white and looked rough but returned to normal within a week and has some new growth.

Another unknown that was hit really hard. It browned out and then started to STN; it looks like the STN stopped about a week ago and it's starting to get some color back.

This monti cap was hit pretty hard, losing about 70% of it's tissue and bleached out. Most of the polyps remained (though retracted) so I figured it would rebound pretty quick; it didn't disappoint. Of interest, a bunch of flatworms took up residence and have remain on even after healing up (all the light spots you see). There have always been a number of them on the purple scroll but I never observed them on the monti. They dont seem to bug it and I have no intention of removing them unless they start (these are the things I love about the hobby).

Though polyp extension was reduced, the tubinaria was largely unharmed.

 

[madweazl]

Added an ORA Hawkin's blue echinata; was in fairly low light but had decent color (not as brown as shown in the picture though).

 

[madweazl]

Some interesting observations today (well, the past two or three days actually). Phosphate levels went way up about a month (right after I went out of town oddly enough...) and nitrates have been higher than typical for a few months now (generally <1 previously and now running 4-5ppm).

Some of the acropora have shown stress; most of the affected corals started to bleach out. The SC Orange Passion was the worst hit and actually some STN (hopefully I can still save it). Others (e.g. Vivid Rainbow Delight and Tyree's Pink Lemonade) showed no negative symptoms and actually put on some growth. The Strawberry Shortcake actually grew quite a bit.

I pleaded with my wife to cut the morning feeding (LRS Reef Frenzy) in half and I eliminated the feeding of LRS in the evening (they still received a whole clam in the evening) to try and tackle the phosphate levels. I also switched the refugium lighting over to a 24 hour photo-period (from 16 hours) to speed up consumption of nitrates and phosphates. I'm definitely removing substantially more macro-algae from the refugium now but it's hard to say it's done much for the phosphate levels (i.e. I dont know if my wife is actually less).

I started carbon dosing a couple months ago to get the nitrate levels under control and ultimately stopped at 20ml twice a day (40ml total) recently. In the past couple of days, colors on the bleached acroporas have started to come back pretty rapidly. Phosphate levels on the other hand, have increased a small amount.

While it's pretty early to draw any conclusions, it would seem the nitrate levels of 4-5ppm have had a more pronounced negative affect on acropora health while the phosphate levels haven't amounted to much of anything at this point.

An unknown variable could be something in the tank or a lack of macro/micro-elements in the water. I've been completing 15g water changes the past month (I do weekly water changes) vice 10g which may be eliminating something "bad" that I cant find in test results (my typical kits in addition to ICP results) and/or adding something that has been lacking. I increased the water change amount because magnesium levels were starting to fall lower than I wanted (from about 1330-1290) over the course of a week. I figured this would likely be the case for other macro/micro-elements as well. I'm not much of a believer that other macro/micro-elements are essential but this may compound the nitrate theory.

I'll stay the course and observe for a couple more weeks and I'll order another ICP just for a sanity check.

Current levels:

Alkalinity 6.8 dKh
Calcium 405
Magnesium 1305
Nitrate 2.5ppm
Phosphate .187ppm

 

[smoothmove]

Very nice.

Now I have tank envy.

 

[madweazl]

 

[LUKER]

Looks great!

 

[Clayton Jessup]

Wow @madweazl , you have made this aquarium look absolutely beautiful !!! It looks amazing. Keep up the great work!!!

 

[madweazl]

This little yellow austera has done really well the past year.

14 Jan 2018

19 Jan 2019

 

[madweazl]

We were starting to get some undesirable algae in hard to reach spots of the tank...

so we contracted a hired gun. After about four hours in the tank, it has started going to town on the algae (bryopsis, whatever).

 

[madweazl]

Looks like our tiger pistol shrimp has croaked; it was pretty good size when we picked it up and survived 32 months here. Havent found much on the subject but 2-3 years is reportedly average for other alpheus species. Poor goby is homeless.