Tulip-polyp syndrome and neoplasia

[branbray07]

Same here my tanks is full of acros having this issue. So discouraging, since it makes polyps look horrendous. I had this in the past, and stopped. Putting 2 and 2 together, i was carbon dosing when i had this in the past, and im carbon dosing now (Aquaforest NP-PRO-PRO BIO S). I have stopped it completely, and see if i have any changes. Any help from would be greatly appreciated.

 

[chcgregg]

Same here my tanks is full of acros having this issue. So discouraging, since it makes polyps look horrendous. I had this in the past, and stopped. Putting 2 and 2 together, i was carbon dosing when i had this in the past, and im carbon dosing now (Aquaforest NP-PRO-PRO BIO S). I have stopped it completely, and see if i have any changes. Any help from would be greatly appreciated.

Any luck?

 

[branbray07]

Any luck?

Nop none so far. No one really has any definitive answer about this seemingly recurring issue. All is speculation.

 

[branbray07]

 

[TylerR]

I restarted my problematic tank. Soaked everything in hydrogen peroxide. I haven’t put any corals in my restarted tank yet but I started a little 10 gallon with completely new rock, sand, everything. It doesn’t have the tulip polyp yet but my sps are showing unusually long/extended polyps. I suspect it’s the same underlying cause as the tulip syndrome issue. I also suspect bacterial. I think it’s something in my fresh water or maybe it’s coming from my hands when I reach in to clean or adjust things.

My corals in my 10 gallon are still growing despite the unusual polyps so it may not be completely devastating. Here’s a red montipora and an Oregon Tort. See how the polyps are unusually long? I’ve got a green pocillipora in there with polyps over an inch long which is just weird. They’re usually tiny!

 

[djf91]

I restarted my problematic tank. Soaked everything in hydrogen peroxide. I haven’t put any corals in my restarted tank yet but I started a little 10 gallon with completely new rock, sand, everything. It doesn’t have the tulip polyp yet but my sps are showing unusually long/extended polyps. I suspect it’s the same underlying cause as the tulip syndrome issue. I also suspect bacterial. I think it’s something in my fresh water or maybe it’s coming from my hands when I reach in to clean or adjust things.

My corals in my 10 gallon are still growing despite the unusual polyps so it may not be completely devastating. Here’s a red montipora and an Oregon Tort. See how the polyps are unusually long? I’ve got a green pocillipora in there with polyps over an inch long which is just weird. They’re usually tiny!

What lighting are you using?

 

[TylerR]

What lighting are you using?

For my 10g I’m running a Radion xR15 Gen5. Running at 70% which hits about 300 par on my sps.

 

[SamMule]

Has anyone tried UV sterilizer? I have also been dealing with this issue for several months.

 

[dwhanc00]

Bump to see if anyone has figured anything out. Same issue here.

 

[branbray07]

I completely stopped mine. By stopping kalk dosing and making sure my alk calc mag where balanced

 

[dwhanc00]

can you help define balanced? My alk stays pretty steady around 8-9. Calcium 420-450 and mag I just increased to 1400.

 

[East1]

can you help define balanced? My alk stays pretty steady around 8-9. Calcium 420-450 and mag I just increased to 1400.

It means ionically balanced, if you're adding 3-part balling and also adding kalk for example, the 3-part is balanced and the kalk is relatively unbalanced so there will either be more ca than alk ions added, this over time I think stresses the corals and causes irregularities in their calcification and the issues we see.

 

[SamMule]

This thing about kalk not being balanced confuses me.

I've never dosed anything but kalk through ATO in this tank.
Clearly, I am low on some trace elements, but Alk, Cal, and mag are all in good shape.

 

[dwhanc00]

It means ionically balanced, if you're adding 3-part balling and also adding kalk for example, the 3-part is balanced and the kalk is relatively unbalanced so there will either be more ca than alk ions added, this over time I think stresses the corals and causes irregularities in their calcification and the issues we see.

All I do is AF123 so no Kalk here.

 

[East1]

All I do is AF123 so no Kalk here.

Hard to diagnose without details if your tank, it could be that you're adding too much AFR to get a desired alk level and cal is sequestering or something like that, that's how I managed to cause this symptom in corals before.

This thing about kalk not being balanced confuses me.

It's not about the Kalk, it's about your tank water. Either there are too many consumers of the bicarbonate ion, or there is too much. Based on your tests it is that there are too many consumers relative to consumers of calcium because your calcium level is commensurate with what I'd expect for an alk of around 9-11.

I expect if you lowered your Ca to 380-400 the symptoms would reverse, however not all tanks are the same so more details of your system, coral load and photos of the animals would help.

 

[SamMule]

Hard to diagnose without details if your tank, it could be that you're adding too much AFR to get a desired alk level and cal is sequestering or something like that, that's how I managed to cause this symptom in corals before.


It's not about the Kalk, it's about your tank water. Either there are too many consumers of the bicarbonate ion, or there is too much. Based on your tests it is that there are too many consumers relative to consumers of calcium because your calcium level is commensurate with what I'd expect for an alk of around 9-11.

I expect if you lowered your Ca to 380-400 the symptoms would reverse, however not all tanks are the same so more details of your system, coral load and photos of the animals would help.

380-400? That seems really low. Tank has been 420-450 for years without issues. Alk is usually 7-8 range. My acros hate when it starts to climb over 9. So, respectfully, I have to disagree with that assessment.
FWIW, here is a snapshot of my ICP from about a year ago. Tank was doing just fine.

Here is a shot from tonight. Poor quality, but you asked... things are starting to turn back around for me. Didn't realize I was using expired phosphate reagents. Lo and behold, with new reagents, PO4 was somewhere above. .9... LaCl had been bringing it back down to the normal .2-.3.range.

Also... I recently switched to TM pro salt. I like the parameters and clear mix better than blue bucket.

 

[SamMule]

I'll elaborate on each of those questions when I breakdown the next journal article, this research is still ongoing so I haven't fully concluded the application of the hypothesis in that paper yet.

In essence, the only thing that is basically require for acropora is balance - you can use any light (originally the 1gallon acro tank just used a ceiling MR 16 LED downlight and had good colour) and you can have any alk, with corresponding nutrient and flow, the only importance is balance between these. Here is the ratios:

You must have

Low alk : Low nutrients
More N : P
Regularly available I and Fe
Replenished trace elements - stuff like B, Sr, K and micro elements
Stable alk (hourly addition via dosing)
Food (fish poop, phyto and zooplankton, amino acids, nitrogen in urea form)
High flow : High light

You target coral health via

Polyp extension - always the most important. This is a structural parameter in coral, the larger the polyp, the more endoplasmic reticulum etc
Basal encrustation - they won't encrust in dormancy, indicating something is missing
Thickness of the coenosarc - the thickness of the coral skin is very variable if they're unhealthy, it's easy to observe
Deformation - Hyperplasia can ocurr when there's an imbalance of structural elements to alkalinity ie. calcium, strontium, barium, magnesium etc. it looks like tumours or cancerous growth.
bleaching and colour loss - other than from light or heat, this ocurrs when trace elements are limited, things like potassium, boron/bromine iron, and also when phosphate is low. When coral metabloism is higher through external means like temperature they need more phosphate. Often a heat wave will stress my coral unless I give them extra phosphate to compensate.

Another thing I think is important for acropora is intermittent flow. I have one pump creating a strong gyre effect every 30 seconds, and another on a timer to create a high flow standing wave. I think standing waves are the most important in terms of all coral health due to the way it makes the entire water volume 'bounce'

The standing wave runs when the lights are above 50% intensity this was configured manually. The reason is that high light and low flow has the same effect as high temperatures.

I browsed through your 5g acro tank thread and found it to be extremely informative!
The part about hyperplasia referenced above was particularly interesting to me.

Maybe since this tank has been running on Kalk alone and does not get any other elements aside from large (30%+) weekly water changes, it is chronically low on some of these major/minor elements?

 

[East1]

I browsed through your 5g acro tank thread and found it to be extremely informative!
The part about hyperplasia referenced above was particularly interesting to me.

Maybe since this tank has been running on Kalk alone and does not get any other elements aside from large (30%+) weekly water changes, it is chronically low on some of these major/minor elements?

looking at your photos and the ICP results, as well as the range of your base elements (ca/mg/alk) i’d be inclined to agree with you.

you are right that ca at this level shouldn’t cause problems but i recently helped someone via instagram with a similar issue (hyperplasia and he was dosing AFR and Kalk) he switched to 3 part balling and didn’t even really adjust his levels (ca:420/7dkh) and it started to reverse in a week or two and since then he’s shown me great growth. he tried adding kalk back and within a few days the issue resurfaced. it may be something to do with the local ph shift from dosing kalk? Because this also causes issues with other elements like iodine from my limited experience.

I’m still not entirely certain if it’s the ultimate levels or what’s being dosed and the relative availability of ions over time that causes this, but it definitely lies in the elements that are incorporated directly to the skeleton.

I’d recommend looking at strontium first because that’s the one i’ve noticed lacking most from salt mixes and additives.

 

[SamMule]

I have been considering switching to AFR or the TM balling method, but that would mean adding dosing pump(s). Also, PH tends to be on the low end in my tanks, so the boost I get from kalk is nice to have.

I suppose hand dosing some elements daily based on ICP wouldn't be a bad idea. Going to send another in another ICP anyway since i changed salts.

 

[dwhanc00]

Hard to diagnose without details if your tank, it could be that you're adding too much AFR to get a desired alk level and cal is sequestering or something like that, that's how I managed to cause this symptom in corals before.


It's not about the Kalk, it's about your tank water. Either there are too many consumers of the bicarbonate ion, or there is too much. Based on your tests it is that there are too many consumers relative to consumers of calcium because your calcium level is commensurate with what I'd expect for an alk of around 9-11.

I expect if you lowered your Ca to 380-400 the symptoms would reverse, however not all tanks are the same so more details of your system, coral load and photos of the animals would help.

Thanks for your response! Just to provide some details:
140 gallon tank, 35 gallon sump
Alk: between 8-9 - last three weeks before that running 7-8. Swings about 1 point in a day.
Cal: consistent 400-430 on apex; probably 20 points higher than that based on confirming ICP tests.
Mag: 1350 - 1400 consistent

Been running AF probiotic (several threads on it with a lot of detail) with nutrients of NO4: 13-20 over last few months; PO4: 0.14-0.20 same period. Trying to get those to <10 and 0.10 consistent.