NewReefer455
Community Member
I have been in the hobby just about 3 years now and have had great success keeping and growing coral, but euphillia always seem to have a shelf life in my tank. I have always purchased euphillia as healthy single/double heads from both reputable online distributors and lfs'. Many of these purchases have grown to 15-20 head colonies and then they seem to wither away head by head. I have tried to combat this with varying pest and iodine dip methods with no indication that it is working at all. My tank has been consistently stable at the following parameters and I have never witnessed or tested any swings. There are no flat worms in my system and zero indication that any fish/snail/crab is doing any physical damage (I have watched the tank religiously and have even set up cameras).
Typically the corals will look and feed totally normal in the morning, but when I get home from work the mouths will look slightly more open than normal followed by deflation of tentacles as the lights dim. The following morning the flesh will be sloughing off the affected heads. No evidence of brown jelly on the heads either. This is a very quick process, from healthy tissue that is actively feeding, to seeing the affected heads a bit angry, to the flesh finally leaving the heads entirely is probably less than 15-20 hours.
Parameters:
- Salinity: 1.026 (Refractometer checked with differing calibration fluids before each use)
- ALK: 9.5 dKh (Hanna Checker, confirmed with standard)
- CAL: 450 ppm (Salifert)
- MAG: 1400 ppm (Salifert)
- Nitrate: 2.5-5.0 ppm (Hanna HR, confirmed with standard)
- Phosphate: .06 ppm (Hanna Phosphorus ULR, confirmed with standard)
- PH: 8.15 (Salifert - Remains relatively constant throughout the day/night (8.0-8.2))
- Ammonia and Nitrite both are zero and have never spiked since the tank was cycled (Salifert)
Recently, as in the last few weeks, I have lost 90% of my euphillia in what I am considering a mass death. I came to the tank every morning with the expectation of removing coral skeletons that had melted overnight. Christmas morning was hard as the final remaining head of the first hammer coral we had ever purchased finally met its end. Examining some of my old growth colonies I am finding very strange growth at the skirts of the skeletons that I have never seen before and I cannot find online. I brought one of these skeletons to my LFS and the owner had no idea either. Two of these colonies, that I've had for the past 2.5 years, both succumbed to whatever this growth is; it almost looks cancerous. Here are two examples of the growths on two different smaller colonies. As you can see, I was cutting the affected heads back as far as possible to attempt to eliminate any potential infection to healthy tissue, but this did not seem to help at all.
As of this writing I have only a two headed frammer, 5 headed frogpawn, single headed hammer, and a 5 headed torch left. All other corals are completely unaffected. Mushrooms, zoas, bubble corals, RFAs, favias, chalices, etc are all healthy and thriving. I am currently awaiting an ICP test so that I can send out samples of tank and RODI water to see if there is some kind of contaminant in the water that has been slowly building over time (heavy metals, etc), I just don't understand how euphillia, specifically hammers, are the only ones affected.
Typically the corals will look and feed totally normal in the morning, but when I get home from work the mouths will look slightly more open than normal followed by deflation of tentacles as the lights dim. The following morning the flesh will be sloughing off the affected heads. No evidence of brown jelly on the heads either. This is a very quick process, from healthy tissue that is actively feeding, to seeing the affected heads a bit angry, to the flesh finally leaving the heads entirely is probably less than 15-20 hours.
Parameters:
- Salinity: 1.026 (Refractometer checked with differing calibration fluids before each use)
- ALK: 9.5 dKh (Hanna Checker, confirmed with standard)
- CAL: 450 ppm (Salifert)
- MAG: 1400 ppm (Salifert)
- Nitrate: 2.5-5.0 ppm (Hanna HR, confirmed with standard)
- Phosphate: .06 ppm (Hanna Phosphorus ULR, confirmed with standard)
- PH: 8.15 (Salifert - Remains relatively constant throughout the day/night (8.0-8.2))
- Ammonia and Nitrite both are zero and have never spiked since the tank was cycled (Salifert)
Recently, as in the last few weeks, I have lost 90% of my euphillia in what I am considering a mass death. I came to the tank every morning with the expectation of removing coral skeletons that had melted overnight. Christmas morning was hard as the final remaining head of the first hammer coral we had ever purchased finally met its end. Examining some of my old growth colonies I am finding very strange growth at the skirts of the skeletons that I have never seen before and I cannot find online. I brought one of these skeletons to my LFS and the owner had no idea either. Two of these colonies, that I've had for the past 2.5 years, both succumbed to whatever this growth is; it almost looks cancerous. Here are two examples of the growths on two different smaller colonies. As you can see, I was cutting the affected heads back as far as possible to attempt to eliminate any potential infection to healthy tissue, but this did not seem to help at all.
As of this writing I have only a two headed frammer, 5 headed frogpawn, single headed hammer, and a 5 headed torch left. All other corals are completely unaffected. Mushrooms, zoas, bubble corals, RFAs, favias, chalices, etc are all healthy and thriving. I am currently awaiting an ICP test so that I can send out samples of tank and RODI water to see if there is some kind of contaminant in the water that has been slowly building over time (heavy metals, etc), I just don't understand how euphillia, specifically hammers, are the only ones affected.
