Acro Problem

[alexwolf]

I am having a bit of a problem. I had 2 colonies die on me literally overnight. In the morning, all the flesh was gone. 2 full colonies. None of my frags are being bothered, and there are other acros in the area of the ones that died. Any idea what can cause this????

[JimD]

Google search "rapid tissue necrosis" or coral RTN, youll find plenty of info on the subject,.

[Tim Marvin]

How long have the colonies been in the tank in the spot they are in? Possibly waste is not been moved away from them? Do you have heavy current across them? Acropora thrives in strong current, I went for years thinking they were doing fine in my tank with only 4 maxijet 1200s on a wave maker, but after adding the tunze 6060 I have been seeing a remarkable difference. This is in a 90 gallon corner tank. Now I run the tunze and a return, that is it. A tank your size would probably do well with 2 of the larger Tunzes on a controller. If all your parameters are fine, this would be my next guess. The two main factors that I have been able to tell in reef keeping are lighting and water movement as far as tank health. If you come up short on either one of these you are bound to have problem eventually. Stick to your 20-30% water changes and clean your mechanical filters monthly. I clean my sponges weekly.

[alexwolf]

They are both on the right side. The first one went immediately after i put the new 20k bulbs on, which was ~3 days ago. I have 4 MJ1200's, 1 Tunze 6080, and the massive return pump for flow. They were from your order Tim, and havent moved since then. I will remove them from the tank tonight, change the filter floss and hope.

[alexwolf]

You know, I have that pump scaled way down, because it makes the overflows VERY loud if I turn it up any. Maybe I will give it another shot.

[alexwolf]

Oh yeah, and I had 2 colonies of zoos melt away recently ??????????????

[alexwolf]

I have 250w DE's. I went from 14k to some loaner 20k's. When I went to the loaners, everything turned brown. I lost ALL color in my acros. I figured since they were already used to 20k's, switching brands wouldnt be a problem.

[RobertG]

I also think the light has killed them. I was worried abit when I changed all the lights over to new 14K's. Lost lots of color, My purple monster that was bright purple has taken a little loss. I could never keep an acro alive with some used bulbs I got with the geissmans.

[alexwolf]

strange also, this morning the bulb over the area in questsion didnt fire up......i had to plug and unplug the ballast several times.

[cpreefguy]

ahhhh...i'd better get my digitata!!!

[alexwolf]

lol, that doesnt affect montipora

[cpreefguy]

sorry to hear, i had a small colony of 10 green zoos that disappeared over night, and a small blue tri-color faded in less than a day too...

[Tim Marvin]

Zoo's melted.....? Hmmmmmm, run a good sized bag of carbon. I have never had a problem with lights other than the corals changing color. Usually if the light kills them it is because you raised the wattage way up, and they bleach, but from 14k to 20k should not have been a problem.

[adaminaustin]

Wild colonies are less tolarent of bad water parameters and other stresses than a captive frag that is several generations old.

If the colonies died but not the frags this could why the frags survived.

[alexwolf]

the frags were off colonies of the same order....

[matt]

I agree with Tim on the innocent lights theory; if it literally happened overnight, you got a case of RTN as JimD says. Better hope it doesn't spread! I'd get the dead ones out ASAP; I guess you've done that. I'd pay very close attention to any similar colonies in the tank or especially in the vicinity. I'd second the carbon suggestion; use ALOT in a big canister. Plus if you get any indication it's spreading consider getting all the stony corals out into a different environment. Occasionally I've heard of RTN taking out a whole tank in a couple of days.

[Tim Marvin]

Also, we haven't had many others die out of that shipment that I know of.... Kopplin lost one at the start, but all mine made it except for one branch on one of them....I killed off some gold zoo's once that almost wiped out all my caps....I'm wondering why the zoo's died? Carbon, and this phosguard may help, but don't you have a large refugium running also? Were they both at the same level in the water colum? Same flow? Have you done anything to the tank other than change the bulbs in the last couple weeks? Do you add lugols? Any additives? I'm grasping at straws here.

[Tim Marvin]

I agree with Joshua, except I beleive the zoos added to the problem and may have been the last straw for the already struggling acropora.

[Tim Marvin]

Maybe GaryP can drop by sometime and run some water test... By the sounds of it he has a pretty complete set of test kits. Of course I would offer to pay him something for his tests and time... I'll give him a couple frags if he can find a problem....Gary...?

[GaryP]

Sure, NP.

I have done some tests for Alex before. Alex, just remember me when that Tort you are so proud of is ready to frag.

Gary

[alexwolf]

lol :-D i already told you that you can have the first!!! I checked this morning, and everything seemed fine. Tim, they were the pink zoos that you brought for that guy, they melted away. I havent had any fish die, and all the other acros seem fine. My torts are actually showing growth. The 2 colonies that died were right next to each other, so maybe it just spread? They went the same day i put the new lights on. I havent had any fish die, i dont have a huge amount of softies. I have been running carbon for some time, i think i will change it out though. I just cant think of anything else that I have changed. Arg, frustrating.

[Tim Marvin]

Hmmm, well wierd things happen.. I doubt if the light change RTN'd the acropora.... Carbon is usually exhausted after 5-10 days of continuous use depending on the water flow through it.

[Instar]

There is an infinite puzzle brought up here that revolves around lighting. The reason I say infinite, is that there are infinite combinations of bulb brands vs age vs life vs ballast brands. The same bulb on different ballasts is driven in different fasions to produce sometimes a really bad spectrum of light. Old bulbs are a guarenteed recipe for disaster. You don't have any idea if they are intensly ultraviolet or way up in the 4,000k range on a used ballast unless you have the technology to test all that. Handling, the way the bulb was used, orientation (verticle vs horizontal vs ratings) fans blowing right at the bulbs, all cause undesired shifts in the spectrum. Most often we assume the wave length is what the bulb is rated for under all conditions and that is just simply not true. If you knew where a bulb came from, who used it and for how long, then a bulb that is a little used can be worth buying. Otherwise, its best not to use such a thing. A day or even a couple of no MH days with only some actinics on should not hurt anything.

[GaryP]

Alex,

Did you set up a routine schedule for cleaning your skimmer like I suggested? If the gunk in the skimmer isn't cleaned out routinely it can be degraded and it becomes more water soluble and go back into the bulk water.

Gary

[NaCl_H2O]

Alex, I put the acros I picked up Tuesday in my small frag tank - running on the same system as my new setup which is getting fairly stable, nitrogen cycle wise, so I don't consider this an ideal environment, to say the least. They are under a 175W 10K MH and are starting to color back up and are looking better.

How's your tank looking?

You need to checkout parms on your tank, or switch back to the old lighting to see if that helps. Something must be out of whack there?

[alexwolf]

They were starting to color back up when you picked them up.

[StephenA]

I agree with Tim. The only time I've ever had issues with lighting is when I've gone up in wattage. I'd go with dead zoos, too much lugol's, GaryP's Skimmer theory, etc. My son added to much Lugols one time and it killed several things overnight.

[Tim Marvin]

Lugols is medical grade iodine solution, antiseptic......

[StephenA]

Tim
Isn't an overdose bad on most animals?

[Tim Marvin]

very lethal, use caution when you use any iodine, but especially Lugol's. It has been said numerous times on this board, "don't dose what you can't test", great advice. Iodine will even burn some patients skin if it isn't washed off after surgery, and you definately don't want to get any in your eyes, mouth or nose. With that said, it is also useful to the reef. Lots of reef critters use it to aid the metabolism, but in tiny TRACE amounts. If you use a good grade salt the addition of iodine should not be an issue.