Please Help - Everything is Bleaching

[johnbr]

Hi Guys,

I had a nano tank for 8 months and 2 months ago I've migrated to a brand new 120G. After waiting all the cycle process (the initial one) I putted all my corals in the new tank. They were doing fine until last week around Wednesday I noticed they turning white. Today all of them were pale, transparent and I have no clue what to do to save them. I'm really picky with this tank. I do 10% water change every Friday without skipping a single step while testing the water but for some reason they're bleaching.

I have a ATO so salinity is always where it was suppose to be. My water I make it myself and the RO/DI tds meter is still showing 0 (no impress since the DI resin is brand new).

I will take some pictures.

Here my last water parameters: (I use 2 sometimes 3 different test brands to achieve better accuracy)

Salinity 1.024
Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 8-12 (Red Sea and Salifert)
PO4 - 0.06-0.08
Calcium - 512
Mag - 1380-1440
Alkalinity - 8.7
PH - 8

What else can I do please? Also to make things even worse I started a refugium and even my chaeto is dying (turning brown).

Thanks a lot guys

 

[Daniel Waters]

Hard to say what the exact cause might be. Bleaching typically leads me to believe an alkalinity drop / spike or lighting (typically too much).

You basically moved corals from an established eco system to a new tank that has recently cycled. One of the reasons you hear so many people recommending for people to wait 6 months (or even a year) to add corals to a new tank is to give a tank time to really develop and mature. I'm sure you're very diligent in your husbandry and water chemistry but it's hard for us to truly understand all the biological processes that probably go on in our tanks.

Unfortunately, I don't have much advice to help. Some bleached corals can recover given time and tender loving care.

 

[johnbr]

Hard to say what the exact cause might be. Bleaching typically leads me to believe an alkalinity drop / spike or lighting (typically too much).

You basically moved corals from an established eco system to a new tank that has recently cycled. One of the reasons you hear so many people recommending for people to wait 6 months (or even a year) to add corals to a new tank is to give a tank time to really develop and mature. I'm sure you're very diligent in your husbandry and water chemistry but it's hard for us to truly understand all the biological processes that probably go on in our tanks.

Unfortunately, I don't have much advice to help. Some bleached corals can recover given time and tender loving care.

Thanks a lot for taking time to answer my thread.

One thing that I forgot to mention is that I was already fighting this issue in the older tank as well. I think my corals hate me honestly. Is so frustrating when you take so much care of the hole tank and nothing seems to work.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

How long has the tank been up?

What corals are effected?

All the corals?

What’s you’re tds? Do you have claomines in your city water ?

How are the fish?

It’s possible it’s been happing for a while, but If it’s sudden , it sounds like contamination.

 

[johnbr]

How long has the tank been up?

What corals are effected?

All the corals?

What’s you’re tds? Do you have claomines in your city water ?

How are the fish?

It’s possible it’s been happing for a while, but If it’s sudden , it sounds like contamination.

Thanks has been running for 2 months now. The corals were dealing with this since last tank. The fish are perfect eating swimming and happy. TDS showing 0 and I never wait until the TDS to tell me when to change the resin I change it as soon the color change hits the middle of it. The old tank was running my LFS ( world wide corals).

Regarding cloamines I'm not sure. My ro/di is a 5 stage 100 gallon day.

Thanks

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Dang. Trying to find a commonality in the two tanks.

Sounds mostly like a contaminant in a way.
Are there similar foods?
Pump or magnet?

 

[jsker]

Alk is a little high, Ca need to come down to 400 to 450.

A good range for the phosphates is between a .02 and .03, and nitrates 3 to 5 ppm. I run a little dirtier water with phosphates at .03 to .05 but anything higher is start see all kinds of algae and nitrates around 8

What type of light are you using? That could be an issue also, with the light being to high of intensity

 

[JoshH]

What type of light are you using? That could be an issue also, with the light bring to high of intensity

+1 On lighting probably being the issue

 

[Daniel Waters]

One thing that I forgot to mention is that I was already fighting this issue in the older tank as well. I think my corals hate me honestly. Is so frustrating when you take so much care of the hole tank and nothing seems to work.

Well, a larger system I think will help provide better stability than a smaller system. You do have a few parameters that could be tweaked, but I think we need more information. What corals are you having issues with exactly? When you were having problems before, was it bleaching issues, RTN / STN, corals not expanding, corals looking faded?

I feel your pain. I could never keep acros up until 6 months ago. I finally narrowed down my issue to inadequate lighting (and I increased my flow). Haven't had an issue since then. So you might be surprised that one thing you haven't examined might be causing a problem. A Triton test is also a good idea just to help rule out some unknown imbalance you might not be aware of.

 

[johnbr]

Alk is a little high, Ca need to come down to 400 to 450.

A good range for the phosphates is between a .02 and .03, and nitrates 3 to 5 ppm. I run a little dirtier water with phosphates at .03 to .05 but anything higher is start see all kinds of algae and nitrates around 8

What type of light are you using? That could be an issue also, with the light being to high of intensity

+1 On lighting probably being the issue

Lights are two radions 30 with diffuser. Running for 10 hours and brightness is not even 35%.
All corals. Torch, blastoff, hammers, acans and even my zoas lost all colors. They are fading, getting white, turning translucent.

Food is only frozen lots, rods. For flow 2 mp40s in each side of the tank.

How can I tweak the parameters that are little bit of? One thing th as t I would like to point is that even when I had 2 nitraes and 0 phosphates the corals were doing the same way.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

That’s not much Light.

 

[Jose Mayo]

There are two important factors, already defined, as causes of coral bleaching: iron deficiency and high temperature; this seems to be the most important association of factors in the occurrence of bleaching in natural reefs.

Another, less publicized, is this:
Phosphate deficiency promotes coral bleaching and is reflected by the ultrastructure of symbiotic dinoflagellates

Regards

 

[Daniel Waters]

Lights are two radions 30 with diffuser. Running for 10 hours and brightness is not even 35%.
All corals. Torch, blastoff, hammers, acans and even my zoas lost all colors. They are fading, getting white, turning translucent.

Food is only frozen lots, rods. For flow 2 mp40s in each side of the tank.

How can I tweak the parameters that are little bit of? One thing th as t I would like to point is that even when I had 2 nitraes and 0 phosphates the corals were doing the same way.

The corals you listed are not high light demanding corals. Since you have plenty of nutrients, I'm going with too much light being the issue.

Are you running a preset program on your radions (like AB+)? Have you actually used a par meter to give you an idea of the par values you are getting? With the diffusers and your brightness at 35%, it doesn't seem like too much light, but your corals are telling you otherwise in my opinion. It's possible you are simply running your white, green, and red channels too high (with white being the main one I'd look at).

As far as tweaking your parameters, I think your parameters are not bad. Lowering calcium some and lowering alk and phosphates a bit might help some, but I think your issue is lighting.

Were you using radions or other LEDs or T5 / metal halide in your nano tank?

 

[jsker]

The corals you listed are not high light demanding corals. Since you have plenty of nutrients, I'm going with too much light being the issue.

Are you running a preset program on your radions (like AB+)? Have you actually used a par meter to give you an idea of the par values you are getting? With the diffusers and your brightness at 35%, it doesn't seem like too much light, but your corals are telling you otherwise in my opinion. It's possible you are simply running your white, green, and red channels too high (with white being the main one I'd look at).

As far as tweaking your parameters, I think your parameters are not bad. Lowering calcium some and lowering alk and phosphates a bit might help some, but I think your issue is lighting.

Were you using radions and / or LEDs in your nano tank?

Radions are LED's

 

[jsker]

I run my Hydra 26hd's for 12 hrs. Same company different brand of lights. I run my blues, Royal Blues at %100 my white at no higher than %30

As far as parameters you could skip a week with a water change and let the Ca and alk dissipate. May I ask what salt you are using?

 

[Daniel Waters]

Radions are LED's

Yes, I'm aware. I should have said "radions or other LEDs or ?". I was simply trying to determine if the original poster was using radions in the previous tank or a different LED (or T5s). Radions are very different from say Kessils for example, since you have control over each color channel.

 

[jsker]

Yes, I'm aware. I should have said "radions or other LEDs or ?". I was simply trying to determine if the original poster was using radions in the previous tank or a different LED (or T5s). Radions are very different from say Kessils for example, since you have control over each color channel.

Rightly so, good question

 

[Coronus]

I read through some comments but wanted to write directly to the OP.
How many fish are in your tank currently?
Also, how old is the tank?

 

[TexasTodd]

Are the lights at 35% for 10 hours? It is more than likely your lights. The corals you list don't need much. Full tank shot?

 

[johnbr]

There are two important factors, already defined, as causes of coral bleaching: iron deficiency and high temperature; this seems to be the most important association of factors in the occurrence of bleaching in natural reefs.

Another, less publicized, is this:
Phosphate deficiency promotes coral bleaching and is reflected by the ultrastructure of symbiotic dinoflagellates

Regards

The corals you listed are not high light demanding corals. Since you have plenty of nutrients, I'm going with too much light being the issue.

Are you running a preset program on your radions (like AB+)? Have you actually used a par meter to give you an idea of the par values you are getting? With the diffusers and your brightness at 35%, it doesn't seem like too much light, but your corals are telling you otherwise in my opinion. It's possible you are simply running your white, green, and red channels too high (with white being the main one I'd look at).

As far as tweaking your parameters, I think your parameters are not bad. Lowering calcium some and lowering alk and phosphates a bit might help some, but I think your issue is lighting.

Were you using radions or other LEDs or T5 / metal halide in your nano tank?

I run my Hydra 26hd's for 12 hrs. Same company different brand of lights. I run my blues, Royal Blues at %100 my white at no higher than %30

As far as parameters you could skip a week with a water change and let the Ca and alk dissipate. May I ask what salt you are using?

I read through some comments but wanted to write directly to the OP.
How many fish are in your tank currently?
Also, how old is the tank?

Are the lights at 35% for 10 hours? It is more than likely your lights. The corals you list don't need much. Full tank shot?

Thanks a lot guys,

I'm using a schedule that I work together with the team responsible for the farm at world wide corals. My white is 10% red and green 6% for 4 hours and then only blues.

The salt is the instant ocean (purple bag).

I have 6 fish ( 2 clowns, 1 wrasse, 3 tangs)

I gonna attach some pictures.