Triton results, severe enough to bleach lps/sps?

[antnida2]

Tank Red Sea Reefer 450
Skimmer Reef Octopus Regal 170 sss
25W Aqua UV
Running carbon & GFO
Kalwasser added to ATO
Salt started with Fritz High Alk, switched to Red Sea Coral Pro Reef Salt
Water change 20% once a week for now.

I got good growth and color over the past year and recently I can't really explained why some of my sps are bleaching and lps melting so I send out a water sample to Triton. Here are the results.

 

[Flippers4pups]

Very high in aluminum! Any Marinepure block?

 

[antnida2]

Yup, I used one to raised my skimmer.

 

[Flippers4pups]

Yup, I used one to raised my skimmer.

It's likely the source of it. I'd remove it.

 

[PatW]

Another thing, very low iodine which is a biologically needed element. And there are formulations to dose iodine and even test kits for it.

You might look at flow, temperture, temperature swings, lighting intensity and lighting spectrum.

Another possibility would be toxins produced by corals that might be poisoning your corals. I don’t think any SPS corals use chemical means to combat rivals. Running charcoal in a reactor works well.

 

[Bounce House]

Might not be the case with you but I had a similar problem to you and did a triton test. I also had high aluminum levels. I don't have any marine pure blocks so I wasn't sure how it was so high. Then it struck me that aluminum is the main ingredient in most deodorant. When I reached my arm in to the tank to place corals and my armpit was getting wet, aluminum was getting into the tank.

Multiple water changes and running cuprisorb seemed to fix the problem for me.

 

[RandyC]

That amount of aluminum most likely is not toxic to your tank at that level. I've been in the 200+ ppb before without an issue. The exact concentration and effects of aluminum toxicity, however, I do not believe have been studied well as far as my online research has been able to find. Personally though, I wouldn't be concerned by it at all. I still have 1" marine pure plates in my tank and it's been there for almost three years.

Randy Holmes-Farley, however, did do some testing on softies and didn't see anything detrimental until 0.5 ppm, 10x what you have showing in your tank. See https://www.advancedaquarist.com/2003/7/chemistry

 

[antnida2]

thanks everyone, it's weird that the tank is thriving and all a sudden some corals are not doing well especially some chalice that have been with me for a long time. I'll continue with routine maintenance and see where the tank is heading.

 

[Zoajohn]

thanks everyone, it's weird that the tank is thriving and all a sudden some corals are not doing well especially some chalice that have been with me for a long time. I'll continue with routine maintenance and see where the tank is heading.

Any updates? Having similar issues

 

[antnida2]

No, still having the same issue. Some of the corals (in my opinion) like porcilipora, green slimmer, cali tort, miami huricane chalice are some of the hardiest I had kept over the yrs and they are not doing well at all right now. Others that are growing fine are: blasto, mushroom, clams, rbta, red robin, pink lemonade, the vinh, some milies, blasto, goni, zoas and some other sps.

My latest ICP results I didn't see much other than ca being at 525, Iodine at 0 and Boron is a little bit lower than their set point.

 

[yepreef]

i had same problem with 121 ug/l in 6 months old tank, tested with some acan and it would not open up. I am removing my ceramic 2” bio media cube and running phostphate remover and water change to remove aluminum.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Not a bad test.
Could be high salinity, bright lights, cyano or inadequate flow that affected corals. Any pests you have inspected for?

 

[Zoajohn]

No, still having the same issue. Some of the corals (in my opinion) like porcilipora, green slimmer, cali tort, miami huricane chalice are some of the hardiest I had kept over the yrs and they are not doing well at all right now. Others that are growing fine are: blasto, mushroom, clams, rbta, red robin, pink lemonade, the vinh, some milies, blasto, goni, zoas and some other sps.

My latest ICP results I didn't see much other than ca being at 525, Iodine at 0 and Boron is a little bit lower than their set point.

Sorry to hear that. I’m having the opposite issue. My SPS and zoas are thriving while LPS all melt after a month. No idea why. I removed my marine pure gems to see if it helps.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Are you running carbon? If not, add chemiPure Blue. Some softies/LPS release toxins that can harm other coral.

 

[TexasReefer82]

What's your Nitrate at?

Also, your Phosphate is pretty low. The standard deviation of 0.007 is nearly as large as the mean of 0.011. It's been my observation that corals use phosphate/phosphorus to make protective pigments. In the past when my phosphates have gotten too low I had pale coloration, bleaching, and STN on my acropora. You may try dosing phosphate up to 0.05ppm.

 

[Cory]

Yup bleaching is mostly a food issue. Start raising po4 and no3 if needed. Keep them low but not zero.

If you said rtn ir stn id suspect heavy metals.

 

[blasterman]

I'm leaning more towards biological warfare here. My general rule is if water changes don't help the issue, and you know your salt mix and source water is good (and all your turbo snails are accounted for) then it almost has to be a biologic issue.

Poccilopora's are dang near impossible to kill. Big reason they are one of them most dominant organisms on a reef.

Some species of palythoa once they start growing in larger colonies go into combat mode and will play havoc with LPS and some species of SPS. Seen this and experienced it first hand. The good news is the pretty ones / expensive ones don't cause the problems. It's the dull green, olive colored ones that cause the problems. A hermit crab crawls over the top and the next day all your SPS are skeletons and LPS shriveled up.