Hi all,
I've been trying to find instances where tanks have SPS with good polyp extension but poor growth, poor coloring and (more recently) white tips (coral is dying - definitely not new growth). Quick background of my tank and parameters below:
I had some decent color and growth with my SPS up until about a month ago, then the growth slowed down and some of the SPS started to pale. A few seem to be dying now.
Only change I made in the past month was to add a bit of activated carbon in a mesh bag for about a week (but then removed it). Could that possibly have caused this?
Here is an example picture; a few of my SPS are starting to look like this:
Any thoughts on what could be causing this would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
I've been trying to find instances where tanks have SPS with good polyp extension but poor growth, poor coloring and (more recently) white tips (coral is dying - definitely not new growth). Quick background of my tank and parameters below:
- Tank is 165g and 2 years old, but I started with 100% dry rock. Completely switched out dry rock for live rock about 6 months ago
- Cal 480
- Mag 1290
- Alk 7.6 dKH steady as a rock
- NO3 5-10ppm, but it dropped to ~0.5-1ppm recently. Started dosing small amount of sodium nitrate to bump it up
- PO4 anywhere from 0.03-0.1 depending on when I do a water change, dose reef roids, etc
- Lighting is T5/LED hybrid: 4x ATI T5 (2x Blue Plus, 2x Coral Plus), 4x Radion XR15 G4 Pro on SPS AB+ setting. 10am-6pm daily with blue LED in early morning and evening
- Par is generally 250-400 for all my SPS
- Bubble King Mini 180 skimmer 24/7
- Fuge with chaeto
- Maxspect Gyre 250's on each side of the tank - solid flow
- Roughly 20 fish - feed them pellets 2x daily, 2 cubes of PE Mysis shrimp 1x daily
- Most recent ICP tests from Triton and ATI show pretty solid levels across the board:
I had some decent color and growth with my SPS up until about a month ago, then the growth slowed down and some of the SPS started to pale. A few seem to be dying now.
Only change I made in the past month was to add a bit of activated carbon in a mesh bag for about a week (but then removed it). Could that possibly have caused this?
Here is an example picture; a few of my SPS are starting to look like this:
Any thoughts on what could be causing this would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
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