Struggling Red Monti Cap

[Salt1972]

Apologies in advance for the poor photos-- that's another challenge.

We have some red monti cap that we've been nursing since November. The edges are a bright / red orange, growing, and seem healthy. The middle turns white, fades, and is starting to grow algae.

Tank is stable - 1.5yr 125g mixed reef. We change 30g every 2 weeks, dose BRS 2 part, and test each week.

Latest Parameters:

78.8 deg
1.026 salinity
8.1 pH
411 Ca
8.8 dKh
3 NO3
.07 PO4
1320 Mag
200lbs+ live rock
TONS of Flow - 2 Wave Pumps, 1 Gyre Pump, Lots of turnover through filters and refugium

Despite low / in range PO4 & NO3, the tank develops a film on the glass within 48 hours and we have slight / random dinos or cyano. We brush that and the minor sprouts of algae with a toothbrush several times per week.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

M

 

[dwest]

Apologies in advance for the poor photos-- that's another challenge.

We have some red monti cap that we've been nursing since November. The edges are a bright / red orange, growing, and seem healthy. The middle turns white, fades, and is starting to grow algae.

Tank is stable - 1.5yr 125g mixed reef. We change 30g every 2 weeks, dose BRS 2 part, and test each week.

Latest Parameters:

78.8 deg
1.026 salinity
8.1 pH
411 Ca
8.8 dKh
3 NO3
.07 PO4
1320 Mag
200lbs+ live rock
TONS of Flow - 2 Wave Pumps, 1 Gyre Pump, Lots of turnover through filters and refugium

Despite low / in range PO4 & NO3, the tank develops a film on the glass within 48 hours and we have slight / random dinos or cyano. We brush that and the minor sprouts of algae with a toothbrush several times per week.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

M

I have 2 suggestions you might try. The first is that I would run GAC in case you do have dinos and this would help remove toxins. The second is I might try splitting the water changes into once per week, about 10 % each time. My thinking is you might get too large of an alkalinity swing when you do your biweekly wc now. This obviously depends on which salt you are using.

 

[Salt1972]

I have 2 suggestions you might try. The first is that I would run GAC in case you do have dinos and this would help remove toxins. The second is I might try splitting the water changes into once per week, about 10 % each time. My thinking is you might get too large of an alkalinity swing when you do your biweekly wc now. This obviously depends on which salt you are using.

Thanks for the suggestions. I run Rox.8 off and on... I suppose just because most people do. I didn't know that dinos could have harmful toxins or that GAC might mitigate the effects. I'll add some today during WC.

With regard to the weekly vs. every other week, 2 things. Realities of life make weekly water changes difficult to maintain. I'm afraid I would miss as often as I hit and the instability would be worse maintaining a 2 week regimen. I use IO or RC salt, but I match Alk using acid first. We target 8.5dKH and, so, dose the fresh mix with a bit of acid to bring the dKH down to 8.5 before water change.

I want to learn more about the effects of dinos or cyano. I'm not sure what we have, but there is some nuisance growth(s) that are dark red or mustard yellow/green that are easily blown / brushed off the areas of growth. How would we determine exactly what that is?

We also have these very small, hard growths that are 2-4mm in length and maybe .5-1mm in diameter that grow all over the rocks - hundreds maybe thousands. I can break them free using a tooth brush back, but they're strong enough to cut skin.

 

[Dsnakes]

We also have these very small, hard growths that are 2-4mm in length and maybe .5-1mm in diameter that grow all over the rocks - hundreds maybe thousands. I can break them free using a tooth brush back, but they're strong enough to cut skin.

Sounds like Vermetid Snails.

 

[Salt1972]

Sounds like Vermetid Snails.

Googled that and believe you're right. Cursory article indicates no real danger to reef / corals. Any way to reduce the population?

 

[Dsnakes]

Googled that and believe you're right. Cursory article indicates no real danger to reef / corals. Any way to reduce the population?

The only potential issue they can cause with corals is their slime string they release when feeding from the water column. It can irritate corals.

Do you feed heavily? Filter socks and skimming to reduce particles in the water can help, along with manual removal. Break them off and scrape out or super glue over them once broken.

 

[Salt1972]

The only potential issue they can cause with corals is their slime string they release when feeding from the water column. It can irritate corals.

Do you feed heavily? Filter socks and skimming to reduce particles in the water can help, along with manual removal. Break them off and scrape out or super glue over them once broken.

Feed heavily? I'm not sure. We have 4 lyretail anthias, 9 green chromis, 2 ocellaris clowns, and an atlantic blue tang in addition to several different types of shrimp - pistol, scarlett, peppermint. We have 150+ hermits. 2 urchins. Large Duncan, Frogspawn, & Torch + ~20 SPS frags. I feed 1-1.5 cubes daily (either Mysis or Reef Frenzy) with Selcon and 1/2 sheet of green or red Nori. We also have an auto feeder that adds a small pinch of NLS pellets / Sustainable Aquatics pellets.

 

[dwest]

Thanks for the suggestions. I run Rox.8 off and on... I suppose just because most people do. I didn't know that dinos could have harmful toxins or that GAC might mitigate the effects. I'll add some today during WC.

With regard to the weekly vs. every other week, 2 things. Realities of life make weekly water changes difficult to maintain. I'm afraid I would miss as often as I hit and the instability would be worse maintaining a 2 week regimen. I use IO or RC salt, but I match Alk using acid first. We target 8.5dKH and, so, dose the fresh mix with a bit of acid to bring the dKH down to 8.5 before water change.

I want to learn more about the effects of dinos or cyano. I'm not sure what we have, but there is some nuisance growth(s) that are dark red or mustard yellow/green that are easily blown / brushed off the areas of growth. How would we determine exactly what that is?

We also have these very small, hard growths that are 2-4mm in length and maybe .5-1mm in diameter that grow all over the rocks - hundreds maybe thousands. I can break them free using a tooth brush back, but they're strong enough to cut skin.

I don’t think you have dinos by your description, but this a $12 way to know for sure: (I would still add GAC, it’s a low risk trial)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B071JQFXC4/ref=oh_aui_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Agree with vermatid snails. I have them. I hate them. I manually remove some and deal with the rest. I bought stainless needle nose pliers to rip them out.

Since you match alkalinity, I wouldn’t change your wc procedure. Be sure you mix a day or so after adding acid so the pH stabilizes. I don’t match alkalinity any more because I do auto wc, but when I did, I was amazed at how much time it took for pH to equilibrate back to 8.3 ish.

Do you have any hard corals that are doing well?

 

[dwest]

I don’t think you have dinos by your description, but this a $12 way to know for sure: (I would still add GAC, it’s a low risk trial)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B071JQFXC4/ref=oh_aui_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Agree with vermatid snails. I have them. I hate them. I manually remove some and deal with the rest. I bought stainless needle nose pliers to rip them out.

Since you match alkalinity, I wouldn’t change your wc procedure. Be sure you mix a day or so after adding acid so the pH stabilizes. I don’t match alkalinity any more because I do auto wc, but when I did, I was amazed at how much time it took for pH to equilibrate back to 8.3 ish.

Do you have any hard corals that are doing well?

Oops I see you have lps doing well.

 

[Salt1972]

Do you have any hard corals that are doing well?

70% of our SPS frags seem to be doing well... that means that most acro frags have polyp extension and maintain color. Some have lost color and died. (We're only about 6 months into SPS efforts). We have 2 types of cyphastrea, sunset monti, and digitata that are growing reasonably quickly. Coraline algae is growing quickly.

 

[Turtlesteve]

In my experience, trouble with plating montipora indicates alkalinity is too high or is not consistent (provided that other SPS are generally OK). It's hard to prove though - any time I've had alkalinity swings, there have been other things going on in the background.

Plating monti's really seem to do better for me at 7 dKh.

Steve