STN Cant figure out why?

[w2inc]

It hits some corals and others look like they love life. Tank is 2 years old. Over the past two months I had made changed to lights, replaced GFO, and removed one of two overflows. I run a skimmer, GFO, Cheato with a bright light, calcium reactor, 450 par on the top shelf and 100 on the floor. Corals had been growing better than I had ever seen until 3 weeks ago. I upped the light and burned two corals. Dialed it back down and things seemed to mellow. I thought it was just the lights. Feedback on the forum leaned toward low nutrients and High Alk. My Salifert test showed >.1, leaning toward .03 phosphate, Alk 10.5, Cal 450, Mag 1350, Nitrate <.5.

I turned off the GFO for 3 days while waiting for a Hanna tester. Next test showed .27 ppm po4. Big surprise, but great coral color. Dropped it to >.1 over the past 3 days with lanthanum. Having new tissue loss in some Pocillopora, some Monti, but not all, some frags from dying colony are doing fine. Meanwhile great looking polyp extension from the milli and some Acro and encrusting Monti.

All of the changes other than the overflow have been moved back to what it was when the tank seemed to be bulletproof. The extra overflow is still gone. I dont know where to look? Checked the pumps today for broken impellers or some kind of metal exposure. Sent out an ICP test to ATI two weeks ago to see if there was some way off base target, but I haven heard back. It never takes this long.

PH shift from 8.2 day, 7.9 night. Temp shift +- 2 degrees f day to night.

I have an additional 40g tank that doesn't grow things fast but is always stable. I generally ignore it. I throw SPS frags in it some times. It grows Porites and Monti, Does really well on zoa's and mushrooms. Tested po4 and it was at .40. Also totally unexpected. 1 of the 3 sps moved to that tank did not recover.

Any suggestions as to where to look? What to look for ? Any suggestions for faster turn around with ICP testing?

 

[w2inc]

 

[w2inc]

And a big Alk drop 7 days ago. Cal reactor was off for 2 days. Down to 6.5 dkh . It is back up to 9 today. 8dkh two days ago. I will probably hold it under 10 unless new info turns up.

 

[Rick.45cal]

Sounds like you’ve made a lot of sudden changes in a fairly brief time period. The lowering your phosphates with LC may explain the tissue damage in your picture, coupled with the swings in alkalinity. Maybe some other #Reefsquad members can chime in and help out.

 

[w2inc]

Sounds like you’ve made a lot of sudden changes in a fairly brief time period. The lowering your phosphates with LC may explain the tissue damage in your picture, coupled with the swings in alkalinity. Maybe some other #Reefsquad members can chime in and help out.

Thanks for the feedback. I dont know what LC is? Is it something you have experienced personally. Can you share some details about it?

I agree it is bad to move fast, and I agree it is bad to move slow. It just depends on the situation. Massive water changes save people on a regular basis. I feel like I move slow but that is subjective. I checked back in my notes to get some dates and events if it is of any help for people trying to help diagnose. The ALK and PO4 changes went out of norm fast and I felt like it was ok to move them back really fast.

February 4th I got my ICP tests back. The tank looked better than it ever had as far as color and speed of growth. I was excited to see what the magic formula was.

March 10 th was the water flow overflow change. It was the day before the main pump died and had to be replaced. The flow was running at a different speed and I pulled the extra overflow while I was trying to make the flow match the old pump. I accidentally fragged a bunch of corals in the process . They healed incredibly fast and it left me thinking that the change was for the better.

Looks like march 22 was when I decided to pull the light diffusers off of my lights, I dialed them back 20% to accommodate for it and put them on 2 week acclimation mode. April 3rd was the day I decided that the lights may be burning my coral. I put the light diffusers back on, set the light back to -10% of the previous setting and put them on a 5 week acclimation to come back to normal.

March 24 was the first sign of trouble and one of the first days in San Diego that was hot enough to make my chiller Kick on. The issue was with a coral that had popped off the rocks from bubble algae. I moved it over 2 inches to what looked like a better place. I thought that the damage might have been coming from light color shift. I did nothing and waited. It was some time between that and April 4th that I lost the first colony ever in that tank.

April 3 rd I had a Birdsnest taking damage as well as a ponapi. I fragged the Ponapi and have several chunks that made it. I had Cardinal fry on March 1. I had been feeding live brine to the system for two weeks and knew that there was a risk of increasing my copper levels by doing it. When I saw the tissue loss I added Poly filter to mitigate the risk of copper. I the birds nest came back on its own after that and setting the lights to change back. Metal poisoning seems like you act as fast as possible. I sent out for an ICP test that day to ATI and it still hasn't come back so I am in the dark.

I dont know when I had changed the GFO. My notebook was missing at the time. I would guess it was around March 10th. My test kit showed that it was pushing .05 and that was higher than it had been so I wanted to stop it there. Seemed like regular maintenance. I use very little GFO and rely on my Chaeto to take up the majority of it. It was a new brand, so there was a change. I have never seen a reaction to a GFO change but I wanted to throw it in there.

From April 3rd until now I have been making small changes in the light, and GFO to move my tank back to where it was on Feb 4th. The flow stays as it is.

The alk drop was 4/15 down to 6.1 from 10.5. I got the calcium reactor back online and it is back up to 9.9 today. I am holding it there for now. I have run a shift nearly that dramatic on the same set of corals with no damage.

ICP from feb showed po4 at .05. Same as my testing. When I got the Hanna Checker on 4/19 found out that it was possibly up to .23. Salifert still said >.1 more than .05. I didn't believe the hanna, but decided to act as if. Lanthanum won't take your po4 to zero and I feel comfortable with it. I brought it down over the past 4 days. I dont know how long it had been high, so I dont know how dramatic the correction was. I figure the ICP results will help me out there.

The ALK PO4 seem like a lot of changes really fast when I look at it, I just feel that making corrections back to normal need to happen at least as fast as they went wrong. Some things like temp, or ammonia need to happen right now.

I feel like the excess of phosphate was the issue and expected to see improvements from dialing it back. I am totally willing to be wrong about that or any of it for that matter.

Please give me more feedback if you have had some experience with tissue loss related to any of it.

 

[Hemmdog]

Thanks for the feedback. I dont know what LC is? Is it something you have experienced personally. Can you share some details about it?

I agree it is bad to move fast, and I agree it is bad to move slow. It just depends on the situation. Massive water changes save people on a regular basis. I feel like I move slow but that is subjective. I checked back in my notes to get some dates and events if it is of any help for people trying to help diagnose. The ALK and PO4 changes went out of norm fast and I felt like it was ok to move them back really fast.

February 4th I got my ICP tests back. The tank looked better than it ever had as far as color and speed of growth. I was excited to see what the magic formula was.

March 10 th was the water flow overflow change. It was the day before the main pump died and had to be replaced. The flow was running at a different speed and I pulled the extra overflow while I was trying to make the flow match the old pump. I accidentally fragged a bunch of corals in the process . They healed incredibly fast and it left me thinking that the change was for the better.

Looks like march 22 was when I decided to pull the light diffusers off of my lights, I dialed them back 20% to accommodate for it and put them on 2 week acclimation mode. April 3rd was the day I decided that the lights may be burning my coral. I put the light diffusers back on, set the light back to -10% of the previous setting and put them on a 5 week acclimation to come back to normal.

March 24 was the first sign of trouble and one of the first days in San Diego that was hot enough to make my chiller Kick on. The issue was with a coral that had popped off the rocks from bubble algae. I moved it over 2 inches to what looked like a better place. I thought that the damage might have been coming from light color shift. I did nothing and waited. It was some time between that and April 4th that I lost the first colony ever in that tank.

April 3 rd I had a Birdsnest taking damage as well as a ponapi. I fragged the Ponapi and have several chunks that made it. I had Cardinal fry on March 1. I had been feeding live brine to the system for two weeks and knew that there was a risk of increasing my copper levels by doing it. When I saw the tissue loss I added Poly filter to mitigate the risk of copper. I the birds nest came back on its own after that and setting the lights to change back. Metal poisoning seems like you act as fast as possible. I sent out for an ICP test that day to ATI and it still hasn't come back so I am in the dark.

I dont know when I had changed the GFO. My notebook was missing at the time. I would guess it was around March 10th. My test kit showed that it was pushing .05 and that was higher than it had been so I wanted to stop it there. Seemed like regular maintenance. I use very little GFO and rely on my Chaeto to take up the majority of it. It was a new brand, so there was a change. I have never seen a reaction to a GFO change but I wanted to throw it in there.

From April 3rd until now I have been making small changes in the light, and GFO to move my tank back to where it was on Feb 4th. The flow stays as it is.

The alk drop was 4/15 down to 6.1 from 10.5. I got the calcium reactor back online and it is back up to 9.9 today. I am holding it there for now. I have run a shift nearly that dramatic on the same set of corals with no damage.

ICP from feb showed po4 at .05. Same as my testing. When I got the Hanna Checker on 4/19 found out that it was possibly up to .23. Salifert still said >.1 more than .05. I didn't believe the hanna, but decided to act as if. Lanthanum won't take your po4 to zero and I feel comfortable with it. I brought it down over the past 4 days. I dont know how long it had been high, so I dont know how dramatic the correction was. I figure the ICP results will help me out there.

The ALK PO4 seem like a lot of changes really fast when I look at it, I just feel that making corrections back to normal need to happen at least as fast as they went wrong. Some things like temp, or ammonia need to happen right now.

I feel like the excess of phosphate was the issue and expected to see improvements from dialing it back. I am totally willing to be wrong about that or any of it for that matter.

Please give me more feedback if you have had some experience with tissue loss related to any of it.

I think it’s for sure the changes. Mainly the alk swing. Also your nutrients being out of balance. Way to high of phosphate with almost no nitrate. Your feeding reef roids? Cool it with that stuff and just feed good quality mysis to your tank and that will get some nitrate in your system, your corals will thank you.

 

[Dr. Reef]

potassium?

 

[w2inc]

I think it’s for sure the changes. Mainly the alk swing. Also your nutrients being out of balance. Way to high of phosphate with almost no nitrate. Your feeding reef roids? Cool it with that stuff and just feed good quality mysis to your tank and that will get some nitrate in your system, your corals will thank you.

Thanks for the feedback. No reef roids for the past year. Frozen "reef food", Fresh hatched brine for 2 weeks. Occasional Phyto, and the standard fish food delivered with an auto feeder at the same volume as always.

Speaking with other people about the PO4 levels I am feeling a little unsure about that being the smoking gun. I have a 20g tank sitting next to the 120 (we are discussing) that runs on the same lighting system. Same intensity, color, schedule is all the same. I basically ignore it and occasionally put frags in there. Since this thing started I have moved 3 frags over. Two of them had an iodine dip on the way over, one died the other is slowly recovering. Another I moved over is still slowly losing tissue. I checked po4 levels in that tank and they are higher than I have seen in my systems. .54. I am not sure that it is the .23 PO4 levels in the 120 that are causing the problem when the 20 is still managing SPS at .54.

I am not sure that it a rapid shift in PO4 can be blamed either. I watched a video last week of Marc Levenson "Melev" where he basically dumped lanthanum into his system. He said that he took his levels from .75 to .1 with that single dose, maybe he meant to say .075, but I don't think the Elos test kit he uses reads to that detail. I dropped mine from about .23 to .09 with a drip line over the course of 4 days.


I think I mentioned that I dose nitrate to try to keep the PO4 in check. Icp tests normally come in showing zero, and I up the dose slightly each time. I make an effort to keep it readable. .2 to .5, but I have never had perfect control of it.

I feel like the two fast major changes happened in the last week but the tissue loss problem had been ongoing since April 3rd. For some reason only effecting random corals in the 120. I have superman Monti on one side of the tank colored up and growing, on the other side browned out and losing tissue. There are plenty of corals like the milli I posted that are doing really well.

The birds nest in the photo that is losing tissue at the base has a frag sitting about a foot down from it and to the left. It came off April 3rd. Both corals healed and the frag break spot is still healthy on the parent colony. Shortly after that the parent colony started looking burned. The parent colony started to recover after the light correction, but is now dying from the base upward. The lower one still looks good. Adds to the confusion.

Have you ever experienced a rapid PO4 reduction do that to coral? This is my first issue with it. It was a normal problem back in the 90's but we ran systems super clean and water changed religiously to avoid them.

My goal was to just get back to the baselines I had on Feb 4 when things were looking great. I am basically there now, but still seeing slow progressive tissue loss. One coral from the top down, another from the bottom up and the Monti just kind of spotty.

Is there a chance that I should be looking some place other than PO4?
Does phosphate normally effect just two or 4 corals not species specific in the tank and the others look great?

I am left wondering things like:
Aren't birds nest kind of known for being hearty and Acro's being the touchy one?
Is it bad to pull a coral out of an unhealthy environment and drop it in one that has ocean quality levels?
Is there such a thing as correcting a system back to normal too fast?
Doesn't it seem like ALK shifts of 8dkh at the LFS to 10.5 (The previous norm in my tank) in less than 20 minutes should kill off a coral if a shift from 6.5 to 9.9 over a 5 day period causes them to lose tissue?

Thanks for taking the time to post. Everything helps.

 

[MnFish1]

It hits some corals and others look like they love life. Tank is 2 years old. Over the past two months I had made changed to lights, replaced GFO, and removed one of two overflows. I run a skimmer, GFO, Cheato with a bright light, calcium reactor, 450 par on the top shelf and 100 on the floor. Corals had been growing better than I had ever seen until 3 weeks ago. I upped the light and burned two corals. Dialed it back down and things seemed to mellow. I thought it was just the lights. Feedback on the forum leaned toward low nutrients and High Alk. My Salifert test showed >.1, leaning toward .03 phosphate, All 10.5, Cal 450, Mag 1350, Nitrate <.5.

I turned off the GFO for 3 days while waiting for a Hanna tester. Next test showed .27 ppm po4. Big surprise, but great coral color. Dropped it to >.1 over the past 3 days with lanthanum. Having new tissue loss in some Pocillopora, some Monti, but not all, some frags from dying colony are doing fine. Meanwhile great looking polyp extension from the milli and some Acro and encrusting Monti.

All of the changes other than the overflow have been moved back to what it was when the tank seemed to be bulletproof. The extra overflow is still gone. I dont know where to look? Checked the pumps today for broken impellers or some kind of metal exposure. Sent out an ICP test to ATI two weeks ago to see if there was some way off base target, but I haven heard back. It never takes this long.

PH shift from 8.2 day, 7.9 night. Temp shift +- 2 degrees f day to night.

I have an additional 40g tank that doesn't grow things fast but is always stable. I generally ignore it. I throw SPS frags in it some times. It grows Porites and Monti, Does really well on zoa's and mushrooms. Tested po4 and it was at .40. Also totally unexpected. 1 of the 3 sps moved to that tank did not recover.

Any suggestions as to where to look? What to look for ? Any suggestions for faster turn around with ICP testing?

Recently - I had a situation where my alk - which is usually 7-8 rose to 10 (over maybe 5 days). I could have taken the exact pictures that you did. I tend to use high PAR (light wise) - did the light you changed to have a higher PAR level? High light and High alk do not often mesh well if changes are relatively rapid.

In my tank I lowered my alk back to 7.5 give or take - and actively trimmed all of the tips that were STN'ing. All of them are now healed and growing.

As to why some coral look great and some dont - IMHO - every tank has its own 'stability'. The things that have survived in your tank have adapted to whats in your tank. When you change that some might be more affected than others. resulting in damage to some - not all. It could also be coral 'fighting' - or releasing chemicals in the tank to kill/stunt other coral. One way to approach it (you might not like this) is - trim back the dead pieces - and continue to do so until that coral is 'gone' or it recovers (dying coral release toxins, etc) - and allow the ones that are thriving in your conditions to thrive and grow.

 

[MnFish1]

PS - my guess is that chasing parameters, po4, etc - MAY cause more harm than good.. Good luck with this - its sad when it happens.

 

[w2inc]

potassium?

Thanks for taking time to help. Do you think it would be high or low Potassium that would cause the issue?

My base knowledge of Potassium came from a MACNA conference where a guy that called himself "Justin Credible" spoke about his reef husbandry. He dosed Potassium daily at a specific level as well as random bottle pours of Iron.

I dont remember the K dose he recommended, I just know that 2 tablespoons of Brightwell K with 16 oz of water, dosed at 25 ml per day fit the formula he gave at the time. I dose every 3 to 5 days. My ICP tests show K to be at a normal level on all quarterly reports.

There is a chance it could be high or low. I can find a way to get it checked if you think it is worth looking at. I feel like if it were one value like K that I would see issues in all the corals?

Could you share your experience with K values and tissue loss with me? Have you seen the kind of random damage I am getting from it?

 

[TexasReefer82]

Looks like you have a substantial substrate bed in the tank. Is this typically vacuumed during water water changes? Or it is laden with silt and detritus? Several months ago I started to observe STN on some of my Acros and I stopped it by performing a series of water changes during which I siphoned out a portion of the sandbed (1/6th or so) rinsed it clean in the bathtub until there was no more detritus coming out in the rinse water, then added it back to the tank along with the new make-up water. I did this until the entire sandbed had been rinsed clean. It worked for me - and I have no idea otherwise what specifically was causing the STN.

 

[w2inc]

Recently - I had a situation where my alk - which is usually 7-8 rose to 10 (over maybe 5 days). I could have taken the exact pictures that you did. I tend to use high PAR (light wise) - did the light you changed to have a higher PAR level? High light and High alk do not often mesh well if changes are relatively rapid.

In my tank I lowered my alk back to 7.5 give or take - and actively trimmed all of the tips that were STN'ing. All of them are now healed and growing.

As to why some coral look great and some dont - IMHO - every tank has its own 'stability'. The things that have survived in your tank have adapted to whats in your tank. When you change that some might be more affected than others. resulting in damage to some - not all. It could also be coral 'fighting' - or releasing chemicals in the tank to kill/stunt other coral. One way to approach it (you might not like this) is - trim back the dead pieces - and continue to do so until that coral is 'gone' or it recovers (dying coral release toxins, etc) - and allow the ones that are thriving in your conditions to thrive and grow.

Thanks for that. This makes the most sense to me so far. I did not know that dying coral release toxins. I was really leaning toward a bacterial infection and thinking that the infected tissue was landing on other corals and spreading that way.

I did pick up the par >10% over the past 3 weeks, but as of 2 days ago I stopped the acclimation program and left the lights where they are. They are still not as bright as they were 2 months ago. The birds nest that is up top took some damage that I really think was light a few weeks ago, but now the tissue loss is from the base. Leads me to think it is some other kind of issue.

I dont like fragging up some of my favorite pieces, but it has worked for me in the past. Maybe it is just time to round up the dead and dying, cut off the good pieces and start from frags again.

Thanks again for sharing your experience.

 

[MnFish1]

Thanks for that. This makes the most sense to me so far. I did not know that dying coral release toxins. I was really leaning toward a bacterial infection and thinking that the infected tissue was landing on other corals and spreading that way.

I did pick up the par >10% over the past 3 weeks, but as of 2 days ago I stopped the acclimation program and left the lights where they are. They are still not as bright as they were 2 months ago. The birds nest that is up top took some damage that I really think was light a few weeks ago, but now the tissue loss is from the base. Leads me to think it is some other kind of issue.

I dont like fragging up some of my favorite pieces, but it has worked for me in the past. Maybe it is just time to round up the dead and dying, cut off the good pieces and start from frags again.

Thanks again for sharing your experience.

just for explanation - I dont mean fragging your pieces - I mean cutting off the dead parts in their entirety Meaning if there is a 'dying' tip - clip it. If its in the middle of a branch - ie the tip is ok - and the base is ok - clip it at the base (of the damage) - and if you want to save the tip - glue it somewhere. This procedure literally saved my coral. Granted - I'm not sure I would have had a similar result if I just 'left it' - but past experience (mine) suggests it would have spread throughout the rest of the affected coral

 

[w2inc]

Looks like you have a substantial substrate bed in the tank. Is this typically vacuumed during water water changes? Or it is laden with silt and detritus? Several months ago I started to observe STN on some of my Acros and I stopped it by performing a series of water changes during which I siphoned out a portion of the sandbed (1/6th or so) rinsed it clean in the bathtub until there was no more detritus coming out in the rinse water, then added it back to the tank along with the new make-up water. I did this until the entire sandbed had been rinsed clean. It worked for me - and I have no idea otherwise what specifically was causing the STN.

I really appreciate you sharing that.

I don't change water, and try to avoid disturbing my sand bed. There is a good amount of silt and detritus in it. The green wrasse kicks it up every time it digs. Most of it ends up in the sump and it is time to scrape all that out.

Seems like a good idea to go pull some of that out tonight.

 

[TexasReefer82]

As for potassium - yes you should test for that regularly, although there's no need to test K+ as frequently as with alkalinity. Aim to keep it a 400ppm which is the natural level. My tank does consume Potassium but not enough to put it on a dosing pump, IMO. It's gotta get pretty low to really cause problems though.

 

[w2inc]

As for potassium - yes you should test for that regularly, although there's no need to test K+ as frequently as with alkalinity. Aim to keep it a 400ppm which is the natural level. My tank does consume Potassium but not enough to put it on a dosing pump, IMO. It's gotta get pretty low to really cause problems though.

Good feedback, thanks.

I am not terribly committed to K. I only dose it in one tank. I kind of feel like it brings out some of the color in my corals, but the tank that doesn't get dosed seems to look really good lately. I had continued dosing since ICP tests were showing appropriate levels. I am definitely not low in the problem tank. High if anything.

 

[MnFish1]

Good feedback, thanks.

I am not terribly committed to K. I only dose it in one tank. I kind of feel like it brings out some of the color in my corals, but the tank that doesn't get dosed seems to look really good lately. I had continued dosing since ICP tests were showing appropriate levels. I am definitely not low in the problem tank. High if anything.

High can be a problem as well. I hear it repeated often here - if you're going to dose something you should test for it - Im not a big fan of ICP testing - but I know you can get a K test at the LFS here. Just a suggestion - not a criticism.

 

[TexasReefer82]

I really appreciate you sharing that.

I don't change water, and try to avoid disturbing my sand bed. There is a good amount of silt and detritus in it. The green wrasse kicks it up every time it digs. Most of it ends up in the sump and it is time to scrape all that out.

Seems like a good idea to go pull some of that out tonight.

In that case... I'd recommend you start a series of water changes and substrate rinsing! Just do a portion at a time. Go get yourself a length of 3/4" tubing from Home Depot so you can really suck out the sand without clogging the line. Once you start siphoning and rinsing you'll be horribly amazed and disgusted at how much silt and detritus is hiding in the substrate. I did my water changes every other day until ALL THE SUBSTRATE WAS RINSED CLEAN. By the end I'd performed about a 70% total water change.

 

[Sarah24!]

Hello,

This may sound odd the wall or different per say but may help. I carbon dose using Red Sea nopox, now not sure on yours but if it’s like redsea, you can not stop the dosing of this at all. Once you start it’s s life commitment and or your corals will suffer, aka it’s like an addiction.

So I have sps and carbon dose, but I also manually myself dose everything myself and record how much I literally put in each time. Yes api tests are not the best but they are great when I test daily. By doing this my tank has less swing issues. One thing that has helped my sps and corals become immune or per say adapting to changes is allowing small changes. Now since your doing a calcium reactor generslly that only maintains calcium. Some still have to dose alk to keep it constant and when you start the calcium reactor all parameters need to be equal etc. But the idea is super stable water etc right. Well, from doing some reading and research, the tanks that are super constant look great. But the corals sensitivity is extremely elevated. So if it encounters any change stn or rtn occurs. Yet, if one allows small (I do mean small changes, the corals which are simple animals adapt to such conditions and less likely to rtn etc.

Also if your running super low nutrients you want your alk around 7-8 max and calcium 420-440 at the top. If these are too high with low nutrients then this can happen. It has also shown to help that I literally feed each coral twice a week by hand. I do this mainly to make sure they are getting food, one can assume it gets it by the water column. Yet we don’t know for sure, but if I tske my eye dropper over each one (and I have a 240 size tank), I know they get food. After about ten minutes turn the flow back on. This puts nitrates back in the water, and keeps me from bottoming out.

Depending on your lights, I would turn them back down where they were before. Then maybe 10% less to give things time to heal. It’s frustrating losing corals, I know and everyone has a different method. But this has worked very well for me and great growth etc. however, mine are use to this system, and if your corals are not use to change (you made lots of them) and they became upset etc. Also to help stop or slow the rtn on others if you can reach, tske the aquarium version super glue and where the rtn line is and good tissue meet, super glue that line. It has saved every one so far that I have used it on. Sometimes they are too far gone but this has definitely saved some from completely dying on me.