Zoas not opening all the way

Teen reefer

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Hello, I have a 13.5 soft coral tank and I bought about 6 zoas about 2 weeks ago from tidal gardens and they were open and nice on the first few day and open all the way then they started to close up and opening half way and also I do not does the tank a lot due to the fact there are only soft corals in there and right now in the tank I have 1 gorgonian, finger leathers, and pulsing Xenia and GSP and some mushroom and ricordea and they all look good a happy and I wanted to know what is wrong with them? Sorry I do not have any pictures
Salinity: 1.028
Nitrate: 2 ppm
Phosphate: 5 ppm
 

footgal

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Seeing as the other corals you have like similar water conditions, I’d guess the issue is a pest. Can you inspect the frags very carefully for me? You’re looking for small bugs, worms, spiders, or flatworms. If you have a coral dip (coral rx, revive, something like that) I would also try that and see if any baddies come off
 

Biokabe

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There might not be anything wrong with them... Zoas are pretty tough little corals, but some morphs are a little finnicky sometimes. Also, they will close up if absolutely anything brushes up against them.

Having said that, your salinity does look a little high, assuming that's not a typo. 1.026 is what you want to shoot for.

Beyond that, there really isn't enough to really say what might or might not be bothering them. What kind of light do you have? What kind of flow do you have? Aside from corals, what critters do you have in the tank? What fish?
 
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Teen reefer

Teen reefer

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My light is a AI prime and I have it on medium flow. But sometimes my hermit crabs or snail knock over the frag and it falls into the sand but that is about it there is a little bit of algae growing on the sides of them but that’s about it there is some white spots on one of my zoas but I check them every day and it doesn’t look like there are any pests.
 

Biokabe

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Hermits walking over them, getting knocked into the sand, and having algae grow on them are all things that will make a zoa close up. Closing is a defensive mechanism, and the longer they're exposed to the irritant the longer they'll stay closed.

Scrape the algae off the plugs if you can, and then glue the plugs to your rockwork to secure them in place. You can't stop your CUC from walking over them, but you can prevent them from getting dumped in the sand when that happens. If they just get bumped by a snail, they'll open back up relatively quickly. If they spend a lot of time face-first in the sand, they'll stay closed for longer.
 
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