SPS Help

jk1151 · Dec 3, 2021

Good Afternoon Everyone - Happy Friday!

I was hoping to get some suggestions on what I may be doing wrong with my new SPS corals. I have had my tank going for 2 years now and have lots of softies and some LPS, fish, anemones. They have all one great and after beginning to dose 2 part I decided to try a couple SPS; Encrusting Motis, 1 Acro and 1 Digita.

My anemones all of a sudden don't seem to like something and have moved and seemed a little less full than normal which was my indication they didn't like something. Could that be just new dosing and increase in calcium possible? I accidentally overdosed my calcium and it was up to about 525 so I wondered if that could affect them.

My Monti SPS are just not doing great. Their polyps are closed up, one seems to have bleached out (?), and my scroll coral also has its polyps sucked in. I got these one about a week ago.

My parameters are:

temp 77.8
nitrates 8ppm
phosphates .17
dkh 8.62
ca 479
mg 1461
ph 8.28
Lights are 2 AI hydra 26hd and I set the acclimation mode to 65% to hopefully not over light while they are acclimating.
salinity 1.025

Anyways, I was keeping my dkh, ca and mg at numbers WWC keeps and they have been really stable except the one accidental overdose of CA this weekend. Maybe just that is it? I keep thinking it is my lights since they are so closed up but all softies and others corals look really good and like I said I have acclimation mode.

I can't get very good pics but here is what I have in case that helps. I have before and afters so obviously the before look way better. That was like day 2 they were in my tank.

T-J · Dec 3, 2021

I doubt the introduction of the SPS had an effect on your nems.
I'm curious: You say your tank is 2 years old, yet I don't see any coralline algae on the glass. Do you scrape it, or do you not have any growing? That's always a good indicator on whether your tank is ready for SPS.
Flow, lighting and parameters all have to be in tune for SPS success. Considering you're losing a monti (one of the easier SPS), something isn't quite right.
Do you know what the PAR values are where the corals are sitting? The pics make it look like they might be bleaching, which can come from too much light. Or, it could be not enough light.
How big is the tank?
What kind of flow are they getting?

jk1151 · Dec 3, 2021

T-J said:
I doubt the introduction of the SPS had an effect on your nems.
I'm curious: You say your tank is 2 years old, yet I don't see any coralline algae on the glass. Do you scrape it, or do you not have any growing? That's always a good indicator on whether your tank is ready for SPS.
Flow, lighting and parameters all have to be in tune for SPS success. Considering you're losing a monti (one of the easier SPS), something isn't quite right.
Do you know what the PAR values are where the corals are sitting? The pics make it look like they might be bleaching, which can come from too much light. Or, it could be not enough light.
How big is the tank?
What kind of flow are they getting?

I have had some coralline growth but it isn't my favorite look so I scrape it off if I can. I have seen it mostly on back wall and powerheads. Maybe on the rocks but they are purple so not too sure. Maybe I am still not ready since I don't see the coralline taking over or anything?

Tank is a Reefer 425XL so 88 gallons in display and like 112 overall I think are its specs. I don't know PAR but I have the Neptune PAR meter coming today (hopefully) as I was hoping that would help me understand what might be going on. So with lighting either too much or too little can cause bleaching?

I have 2 max spect gyres 350 on each side of tank and 2 icecap gyres on back of tank. Maxspects max out at 80% right now and just doing their presses Oceanic Gyre mod and Icecaps maxout at 50-55% with their preset of LPS flow I think it is.

T-J · Dec 3, 2021

Hmmm, sounds like you're doing everything right. A 2 year old tank should be plenty mature for SPS. Many reefers, like myself, have SPS growing under 6 months.
You said you had a lot of softies. Any chance too many toxins in the water? Do you run carbon?
How stable are your parameters?
Also, have you checked out this video regarding your lights?:

jk1151 · Dec 4, 2021

T-J said:
Hmmm, sounds like you're doing everything right. A 2 year old tank should be plenty mature for SPS. Many reefers, like myself, have SPS growing under 6 months.
You said you had a lot of softies. Any chance too many toxins in the water? Do you run carbon?
How stable are your parameters?
Also, have you checked out this video regarding your lights?:

Thank you for sharing the video. I have watched it. I do have carbon and parameters have been very stable, other than my accidental calcium overdose which took me over 500 for calcium. Maybe I shouldn't have but I did a water change and moved corals down to sand to see if it was the lighting. Perhaps I should think of the flow as well? Anyways, thanks for the input and information!

ScottB · Dec 17, 2021

jk1151 said:
Thank you for sharing the video. I have watched it. I do have carbon and parameters have been very stable, other than my accidental calcium overdose which took me over 500 for calcium. Maybe I shouldn't have but I did a water change and moved corals down to sand to see if it was the lighting. Perhaps I should think of the flow as well? Anyways, thanks for the input and information!

Hmmm. Seems that things are in order for SPS -- parameters, light, flow. A touch high on phosphates but not bad.

Two things I don't see: algae or many fish. Got any algae? What is your fish population like? Feeding schedule and amount?

Are you dosing Vibrant or fluconazole? Or done so recently? Have you had dinoflagellates before?