Total loss of sps corals/need advice

[Mike646]

hello everyone!

I had another thread running about what lead me to where I am now. I am looking to get advice on what to do next. Long story short my tank was suffering from a mixture of too much light and low nutrients. By attempting to fix this I lost about 99% of my sps. I have only two frags left and they are bleaching rapidly. I decided I’m done with corals for a while until I get things well under control. I still have a few hammers, shrooms, and zoas but they don’t look like they will pull through. Leather is only one going strong. So the changes I made in hopes to better keep sps are as follows:

Lighting was a T5 and hydra 52. Was Running 8 hours for T5 and 12 for LED. My par was insane with 500+ up top and 300 on bottom. I now am running T5 from 10 am to 10pm (hybrid fixture) and my hydra is now running the schedule in the pics attached. This should greatly reduce the par issue.

Nutrient deficiency (nitrate and phosphate) has been addressed by cutting cheato way down, lowered lighting period (kessil a380), increased feeding (2 clowns and four line wrasse), turned off skimmer completely and no longer doing weekly 5 gallon water changes (one 5 gallon change every 2-3 weeks).

Here are the specs for the tank:
65 gallon cube
24” aqua sun t5 hybrid system with AI hydra 52 HD
2x 3K gyres
Reef octo classic 150SSS skimmer (currently off)
Sump with refug, marine pure big block, cheato, kessil a380 light
50lbs of live rock
25lbs black live sand
2 clowns and 4 line wrasse
Assorted cleanup crew with 6 large Mexican turbos, hermits, etc.
Alk 9.5
Cal 472
PH 8
Phos .01
Nitrate 1

Tank is about 8 months old but live rock is 3 years old from previous tank. Corals were recently added past few months. Last SPS survivors are ORA acros but bleaching fast.


I would appreciate any feedback or help to see if this plan will work! I’m about to call it quits on corals and have a fish only system. It’s sad because that’s what got me into saltwater. But I have easily lost $1000 in corals so far.

 

[Flippers4pups]

I think your heading in the right direction. I would go as far as pulling the marine block out till at some point you may need it.

There are many points that we can cover, all of which can lead to SPS struggling or death.

1. Aggressive means of nutrient export with very little nutrients. Sounds like you have that covered right now.

2. Excessive of par. Sounds like you have that covered as well.

3. Light exclamation. Starting low in the tank and observation. Then move up a little and observation.

4. Dipping corals.

Correcting your nutrient issue and keeping it stable for a while. Testing weekly. Try easy SPS again as a test. Go from there.

 

[jda]

First thing that I would do is to run the T5 for 12 hours and cut the Hydras back to 6. Swap the dependency on these. You can just do this... no need for acclimation since the T5s are a less harsh light form than the Hydras.

A pair of 3k gyres on this tank is a lot. Less is probably better here. You can indeed have too much flow.

Are you sure that the black sand is safe? Some of it is fine and some of it releases harsh and toxic metals. If the stuff has ever stuck to a magnet, then it is for-sure not good, but it might not be safe even if it did not. I had to learn this the hard way a long time ago and I decide that it was never worth the risk again.

 

[tripdad]

Can you please elaborate a little. Are the corals healthy tissue wise but lacking/losing all color then dying or are they loosing color and flesh at the same time?

 

[Kevin Duprey]

Take this FWIW, but there are many anecdotal posts I've seen on R2R where black sand was attributed to SPS RTN/STN.
For example:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...me-without-growing.577463/page-3#post-5888281

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/help-me-to-understand.558773/page-7#post-5743621

Have you done an ICP test recently?

 

[Kevin Duprey]

Of course @jda beat me to it...

 

[Katrina71]

@jda I'm learning...t5 for growth and led for color? Is that why?

 

[Mike646]

Can you please elaborate a little. Are the corals healthy tissue wise but lacking/losing all color then dying or are they loosing color and flesh at the same time?

They started off fine, then losing color followed by flesh peeling off. Bleaching until they are a white skeleton.

 

[Mike646]

First thing that I would do is to run the T5 for 12 hours and cut the Hydras back to 6. Swap the dependency on these. You can just do this... no need for acclimation since the T5s are a less harsh light form than the Hydras.

A pair of 3k gyres on this tank is a lot. Less is probably better here. You can indeed have too much flow.

Are you sure that the black sand is safe? Some of it is fine and some of it releases harsh and toxic metals. If the stuff has ever stuck to a magnet, then it is for-sure not good, but it might not be safe even if it did not. I had to learn this the hard way a long time ago and I decide that it was never worth the risk again.

With the “peak” led period around 6 hours should I be ok to leave it? It has respite periods during those times also. Sand was from caribsea, I would hope that’s ok? Never had issues with them before. In regards to flow should I have them run at max peak of 50%? They run random mode and peak at 100%

 

[Mike646]

Take this FWIW, but there are many anecdotal posts I've seen on R2R where black sand was attributed to SPS RTN/STN.
For example:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...me-without-growing.577463/page-3#post-5888281

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/help-me-to-understand.558773/page-7#post-5743621

Have you done an ICP test recently?

No icp test done ever. Should I get one done now?

 

[tripdad]

So you can understand where I'm asking from I'll explain. If the coral is actually bleaching from either over par exposure or thermally caused expulsion of zooxanthalae then the flesh will still be intact and healthy for a short while, may even have polyp extension. Then the coral will die and as such flesh just falls off. If however the flesh is falling off while still retaining color, or just turning white on the tips or base then peeling it indicates other reasons for the death. Just trying to get to the root of the problem. There has been plenty of success with very high par, your basic nutrient levels, etc.. Sometimes it all stacks up and causes the failure, sometimes people succeed with crazy numbers that I can't possibly succeed with. Just trying to narrow the focus and find the problem.

 

[Kevin Duprey]

No icp test done ever. Should I get one done now?

Yes. I would get one done ASAP. You never know if there is a heavy metal issue underlying all of this. ICP is the only way to find out.

 

[Mike646]

So you can understand where I'm asking from I'll explain. If the coral is actually bleaching from either over par exposure or thermally caused expulsion of zooxanthalae then the flesh will still be intact and healthy for a short while, may even have polyp extension. Then the coral will die and as such flesh just falls off. If however the flesh is falling off while still retaining color, or just turning white on the tips or base then peeling it indicates other reasons for the death. Just trying to get to the root of the problem. There has been plenty of success with very high par, your basic nutrient levels, etc.. Sometimes it all stacks up and causes the failure, sometimes people succeed with crazy numbers that I can't possibly succeed with. Just trying to narrow the focus and find the problem.

Ah ok I understand now! So what has been happening is they start off losing color, polyp extension is still happening but after all color is lost the flesh comes off rapidly. I will say recently my ORA frags have lost color at tips and then quickly flesh comes off in areas with no color. Much faster process on them then the others which took about a week.

 

[Mike646]

Yes. I would get one done ASAP. You never know if there is a heavy metal issue underlying all of this. ICP is the only way to find out.

Should I do the one offered for Triton ICP-OES on bulk reef supply?

 

[Kevin Duprey]

Should I do the one offered for Triton ICP-OES on bulk reef supply?

That's what I use, but my understanding is that any of them will work for detecting heavy metals. Triton has been doing it the longest, though.

 

[29bonsaireef]

If you cannot keep LPS, Zoas, Shrooms etc.. my guess would be there is a more serious underlying issue, other than lighting, nutrients. Though your alk level and po4/no3 paired with high par don't commonly work well for SPS. I've never really seen it be an issue for those types of coral, unless they were all sitting at the top of your rock work in 500 par.

Don't have any experience with the black sand, never used it before, but I can't recall ever seeing a thriving reef tank with black sand used? ICP test is your best bet for now.

If it we're my system I'd be looking into doing some large WC maybe a full tank change or 2-3 large ones.

 

[tripdad]

What temp are you running tank at? Have you verified it with a second thermometer/meter?

 

[ycnibrc]

Your bio load is 2 clown n a 4 line wrasse and u have chaeto, Marine pure , skimmer and water change so what's left for your Sps to consume. Sps need to eat all day not just using light for photosynthesis.dont be afraid of algae dirty tank don't kill Sps

 

[lewisriverfisherman]

I would pull the marine pure block until you get nitrates to about 5-10 then start your skimmer

 

[road_runner]

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