Tunze coral gum and my use of it

mpsteve · Oct 5, 2017

I’m not sure if anyone else has used this stuff but I have and had great results. Up until a couple months ago. I noticed I had sps randomly stn from the base. I have been trying to figure it out and have asked others about it as well. One person happened to notice all the frags that were stn from the base All had been placed down to the tiles using tunze coral gum.

I have cut all the frags back that had grown over the coral gum and super glued the edges. Stn still persisted. So I removed the coral gum and used super glue like I did for a lot of my smaller frags that were not stn at all. So I have come to the conclusion that once my SPS in MY tank, once encrusted over the tunze coral gum it will stn.

Has anyone else had this issue or is it just me?

reefwiser · Oct 5, 2017

You do know that RTH is caused by a bacterial infection.

mpsteve · Oct 5, 2017

I don’t believe that to be fact as I have not seen that confirmed yet. And what’s the odds that only the coral that was attached with the tunze coral gum stn and not one other coral? They were not next to each other they were all scattered all over the frag tank. No corals in the display stn as they were glued to the rock with glue. So the only consistent thing with all the coral that stn is the tunze coral gum.

reefwiser · Oct 5, 2017

What ever you want to think [emoji3] I have been keeping SPS corals since 1990.
So what causes all the other corals in the world to STN. I don’t Tunze owns the coral glue market. [emoji3] When you Frag a coral you are breaking the skin barrier of the coral. An just like humans when we get a break in our skin it is exposed to bacteria. This can lead to STN in Corals. I can remember when my friend Steve Tyree was selling SPS corals back in the day and the first STN incidents showed up everyone blamed Steve for causing it When it was actually a naturally occurring problem. Always treat a new Frag a mixture of lugos and RO/DI water after fraging to help with STN issues. I wish we could solve the reason corals die due to STN and RTN as over the last 27 years I have lost many battles with it.

mpsteve · Oct 5, 2017

Almost all the coral have been in the frag tank for 6+ months. Tyree pink lemonade fully encrusted a 3x3 tile then stn. No fresh cuts on it and was growing very fast. Stn till it reaches the frag plug then stops. Everything covering the tunze coral gum stn. Idk man seems pretty cut and dry

mpsteve · Oct 6, 2017

So 24 hours after the removal of the coral gum and I have to say my acros are showing full polyp extension again were there polyps under the coral gum would not come out before

BluewaterLa · Oct 18, 2017

Many bacterial strains are common in our systems as well as in the ocean. The difference is our tanks are closes systems and elevated bacteria can be an issue. This is one cause or issue.
I do not think that the Tunze coral glue would or is the issue here as many things can trigger Stn and Rtn.
Things like parameter swings, nutrient issues, contamination and the list could go on.
Something upsetting the balance of bacteria in either direction is also a possibility.
Many issues in our systems either go not noticed or happen and months later we see the after effects in sps as it can take several weeks to months for something to show its ugly head.

All corals have a population of bacteria withing them from the environment they are living in and this can vary in species/ types depending on the tank or part of the ocean that the coral/ frag comes from so adding a new coral / frag to your tank can have NO effect, some or bad effect on one or more corals.
In the end some things are not understood well or simply can not be explained on a hobby level unfortunately.
The easiest thing for us to do is place blame on the most obvious culprit and 99% of the time this culprit is just a scape goat and not the actual issue.

In short there are far too many things that can cause the issue you are experiencing though I would not place the Tunze coral gum in the hot seat since there would be several folks all saying the same thing from their experiences as well.
It may have something to do with the way those corals were fragged or exposed to after being fragged, OR it could just be the first sign of a larger issue within your tank. Sometimes this will take place with just a couple corals and appear random and sometimes it will happen to similar species but not others.
No rhyme or reason to be had often times.

Cutting the bad spots and sacrificing some good tissue like you did and then re mounting them on new plugs is what helps out and is done by most folks in attempt to save the coral. Really this is all we can do for such things and unfortunately it is something we all will deal with from time to time or at some point keeping a reef tank with small polyp stoney corals.
Good luck and happy reefing
BluewaterLa/ Mike