Sps receding at tips- help

[Whasmack]

I also saw the stringy effect coming off of the affected areas of tissue recession -
It was very apparent when I was dosing Koral Recover from Brightwell (thinking it was a bacterial / pathogenic issue). All the spots that had tissue recession would string up like crazy during each treatment. Also, I wouldn't consider that stuff 100% reef safe. When I noticed a couple of large snails & an urchin suddenly die (after ~ 5 days) I stopped this treatment.
I never trimmed off the dead parts on mine - I wanted to see if I could find a solution. My Monti almost got completely wiped out - but it was the first to show signs of recovery. Now the tissue is super vibrant with color & rapidly growing back.
Also, after adding some aminos, Coraline algae started growing on everything rapidly.

I tried a ton of stuff - Antibiotics from Seachem (Metroplex, Neoplex), Chemiclean, Brightwell Restor, Brightwell Koral Recover, Dr Tim's Eco-Balance bacteria, Raising Mag from 1300 to 1450, dosing Potassium, dosing Strontium, (I have test kits for both), raising salinity (1.024 to 1.027), calibrating refractometer, doing lots of water changes (This seemed to make it worse....), changing out everything in my RO/DI unit, adding Cation, Anion DI resin, testing water for chlorine (per BRS), switching fish food, feeding fish more, etc......
If I sit & think about it, I can probably make a huge list, but everything was done slowly. Honestly it probably took longer than 2 months....
Here's what my ICP test showed right before I dosed Reef Energy.

I also noticed that not all SPS had tissue recession. The ones it didn't affect - grew very slowly. I do have a bottle of Restor from Brightwell that I started dosing before Reef Energy - I didn't see positive results from that compared to Reef Energy.
I hope this works for you! I showed signs of turn-around in about a week.

 

[mfollen]

This is very helpful. Thank you so much for all the context and background...

The stringy-nes I thought was very unique and not what I’ve seen in other STN’d coral.

For the acros that recovered, did they recede back and recovered with no cutting of the remaining healthy tissue?

I have some acros that are goners and some that look like they can make it (like the pictured Mille).

Thanks again so much.

 

[Whasmack]

So things are still recovering, I have been dosing reef energy for about 2 weeks. I have a pro corals rainbow that had similar recession to your 1st pics - it's regrowing tissue in the exposed skeleton. I expect that to grow back completely.
There's a green slimer with far more damage to it - it hasn't regrown yet, but the existing tissue looks more vibrant & polyp extension has improved greatly.
My pink lemonade faded to grey & no polyp extension - the rear part of the colony has already grown, & the faded parts are now showing polyps again. Time will tell!
My Monti faded to grey & about 90% of the colony died. Now it's bright orange, polyps are coming out again & showing growth.
Ill see if I can find some pictures to post though

 

[Whasmack]

Here's the Pro Corals Rainbow - you can see the recession on the tips. You can see a little on the base from this angle. There's 2 big spots (where the arrow is) but you can't really tell from this shot.
There's the slimer behind it - you can see some of the recession.

 

[Whasmack]

Here's a good one of the slimer, and that side of the Rainbow.

 

[ccurnick]

I am experiencing this same thing with the stringy-ness, and unexplainable recession. Cutting didn’t do much for all but one coral. Params are all in line, ICP came back only with a tad high salinity and low iodine, both of which have been di.Cedric but nothing’s changed. Been dealing with it for a few mo this now and have lost quiet a few very nice corals.

It’s so infuriating.

 

[Whasmack]

Yeah it is - I know the feeling!
I'd try what I suggested with feeding the corals. I usually shut off my return pump and let it circulate in the tank for like 2 hours.
I don't think nitrates is a good way to judge available coral nutrition.
The only time I cut up coral is if I see sudden onset RTN; where the acro will be dead in 1-2 days anyway. And you gotta do what others say - cut way ahead of the necrosis or it'll just continue where you cut it. This only happened to a blue tort randomly I lost probably 1/2 the colony; but now I have 5x colonies the same size it was back then.

 

[mfollen]

Yea your pictures are eerily similar to the recession I’m seeing.

I’ll document as I move forward. And hopefully we reverse this in our corals.

 

[mfollen]

Another shot of the “stringy” areas

 

[IslandLifeReef]

Something you can try -
I just went through something similar - all hard corals were affected, very similar to yours.
Took me about 2 months to solve, but I ended up dosing Red Sea Reef Energy A+B every other day & it turned everything around. Even though my nitrates were 5.0, phosphates were 0.21.... (consistently for ~ 2 years).

I went through ICP testing, went down the road of Vibrio / pathogenic bacteria infection, dosing bacteria, raising Mag levels, raising Strontium, potassium & other trace from ICP, dosing a couple things from Brightwell; nothing seemed to work.
I did try nitrate dosing with sodium nitrate, but that didn't help; although it did fuel cyano growth.

So that's my recommendation to try -

Thank you so much @whasmack

I’m going to give it a go. It’s apparent that the corals needs are not being met and I need to reassess nutrition here across the board.

I was battling dino’s (Won that war for now knock on wood) which is why I have been running low coral feedings & aminos.

Thanks.

Reef Energy is amino's. If you are already using amino's, I would stick with what your tank is use to. I use Reef energy every day along with a frozen coral food. I only dose 1 ml of A and B along with 1 cube of coral food in a reefer 170.

I would also recommend not letting the Reef Energy stay in the tank for to long. Red Sea recommends 15-30 minutes with the skimmer off. I have found that if I leave it to long, I get undesirable algae growth. I think it may get absorbed by the rock and then used as food for algae if left in too long. That is just my experience with the product.

 

[IslandLifeReef]

Another shot of the “stringy” areas

That could be algae growing on the tips, or it could be the coral trying to regrow in that area. I have filaments like that on my acro's in areas that are growing. I hope it is the later. I don't think it is the flesh that coming off making those filaments.

 

[mfollen]

Thanks for the tips @IslandLifeReef .

I’ll start along those lines this weekend when A and B arrives. At this point I think things are stabilizing. Hopefully that holds and the corals recover.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Looks to me like new growth. Overall numbers are satisfactory and reduce white and increase blue lighting

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

I also saw the stringy effect coming off of the affected areas of tissue recession -
It was very apparent when I was dosing Koral Recover from Brightwell (thinking it was a bacterial / pathogenic issue). All the spots that had tissue recession would string up like crazy during each treatment. Also, I wouldn't consider that stuff 100% reef safe. When I noticed a couple of large snails & an urchin suddenly die (after ~ 5 days) I stopped this treatment.
I never trimmed off the dead parts on mine - I wanted to see if I could find a solution. My Monti almost got completely wiped out - but it was the first to show signs of recovery. Now the tissue is super vibrant with color & rapidly growing back.
Also, after adding some aminos, Coraline algae started growing on everything rapidly.

I tried a ton of stuff - Antibiotics from Seachem (Metroplex, Neoplex), Chemiclean, Brightwell Restor, Brightwell Koral Recover, Dr Tim's Eco-Balance bacteria, Raising Mag from 1300 to 1450, dosing Potassium, dosing Strontium, (I have test kits for both), raising salinity (1.024 to 1.027), calibrating refractometer, doing lots of water changes (This seemed to make it worse....), changing out everything in my RO/DI unit, adding Cation, Anion DI resin, testing water for chlorine (per BRS), switching fish food, feeding fish more, etc......
If I sit & think about it, I can probably make a huge list, but everything was done slowly. Honestly it probably took longer than 2 months....
Here's what my ICP test showed right before I dosed Reef Energy.

I also noticed that not all SPS had tissue recession. The ones it didn't affect - grew very slowly. I do have a bottle of Restor from Brightwell that I started dosing before Reef Energy - I didn't see positive results from that compared to Reef Energy.
I hope this works for you! I showed signs of turn-around in about a week.

Were you carbon dosing, using gfo, or vibrant?

 

[mfollen]

@vetteguy I’ve lost similarity affected acros. It’s not new growth.

@chaswood none of those

 

[Whasmack]

No I don't use GFO, carbon dose or use Vibrant- However - I do add Vit. C in my homemade food, so there's a little bit of a carbon source, but not much.
Good call-out about Vibrant - that stuff works, but I've also had it wipe out SPS before...
Reef Energy is more than just Amino's - vitamins, fatty acids, protein flocks, carbs. Oh - good call about time in tank, I'll dial it back when corals are fully recovered.
I started dosing 40 mL per directions to my system every other day.

 

[ScottB]

A couple questions for you @mfollen :
Are those new stick frags? Like really new? Shipped or from LFS? One thought I had was they just got injured or stung by each other during handling. Doesn't always show up right away. If the sticks come into contact with each other, someone usually gets hurt.
Do you know much about the host tank water parameters? Are they close to yours? Your numbers look safe to me generally, but if those sticks came from a dirty tank with different spectrum they'd be stressed.

I've seen no speculation about pests so far in this thread. Have you ruled out bugs? AEFW, red bugs? Was there a wrasse (or four) on your fish list? (I am a big fan of wrasses; dipping is important but I like wrasses as backup.)
Lastly, no angel fish, right? I had one go rogue just to spite me.

 

[bellasdad0911]

increase your PO4 to .05-.1 dose is you need to. I am willing to bet its stress. When SPS is stressed light burn is very possible as ALK burning too.

 

[Makers Marc]

Yeah it is - I know the feeling!
I'd try what I suggested with feeding the corals. I usually shut off my return pump and let it circulate in the tank for like 2 hours.
I don't think nitrates is a good way to judge available coral nutrition.
The only time I cut up coral is if I see sudden onset RTN; where the acro will be dead in 1-2 days anyway. And you gotta do what others say - cut way ahead of the necrosis or it'll just continue where you cut it. This only happened to a blue tort randomly I lost probably 1/2 the colony; but now I have 5x colonies the same size it was back then.

How do you shutoff your sump from the system for 2hrs and not kill the good bacteria in your sump? Unless you just leave your skimmer on and let it overflow?

 

[mfollen]

Thank you everyone!

Answers below!
-Affected frags are from 2-3 different systems. Newest ones are two weeks old in my tank. Previous systems highly likely to have more nutrients than mine.
-No contact between frags.
-No pests or angelfish.
-I increased PO4 to .06ppm and no3 to 10ppm and have been holding there.

Since increasing p04 and n03, introducing aminos, beginning to broadcast feed coral and reducing flow the recession has paused.