white tips on my birdsnest

[Poor Boy]

I've had it for a good month and hasn't had any problems. It would open up nicely in the morning and go about its day.

Last night I noticed a bit of white on one of the branches and this morning the white was a bit more.

Nothing has changed really. I did a 8g water change and its a 30g tank with a 10g sump. I also rinsed out my carbon filter.

Any ideas?

[Dkray944]

I would play it safe and clip it off a little ways before it turns white. I had one do that and it kept going until I about lost the colony. I'm glad I eventually cut it up and saved the good parts. On another note it might be something as simple as water quality or lighting.

[Poor Boy]

its slowly getting worse so i guess i can try and clip it.

should i lower the lights for a bit and do a water change before i clip it or just clip it?

[Dean]

Check your alkalinity also bud. Your water change may have brought it back up too quickly if it was low before hand. Always good to try to test alkalinity weekly if your level drops between water changes.

[Poor Boy]

my salt level is at .022 and im testing for nitrates, ammonia, and checking my ph levels now.

[Poor Boy]

i cannot test for anything else because i do not own anything other than those four i listed...

[Dean]

Salinity is low and you should definitely get you an alk test kit if you're keeping sps and lps

[Poor Boy]

thanks. ill look into that.

i could do a small water change and raise the level a bit...

[Poor Boy]

my nitrates are a little high, but everything else checks out.

ill run a quick water change...

[Justin]

Bird nests can be a little finicky at times. They grow like weeds but also bleach like crazy with the slightest nuance. I would check for the following:

Obvious things to check are:
Salinity= you mentioned .022, did you mean 1.022 or is it literally at .022?
No4= This will be caused by high Nutrients, any LFS can check
PO4= same as above
Alk= any LFS can help you out with this
Ca= Same as above
Mg= Same as above
Temp= should be around 77-79, there are extremes out there but you should be in this range

Not so obvious things:
I would check for sweeper tentacles from something else
Any fish or livestock that is preying on the polyps

Are you running Carbon, if so how much?

What other corals do you have in your system? The reason I ask this is that sometimes leathers can excrete a toxin to secure their location on a reef. Other corals as well cast out sweeper tentacles that can sting nearby corals. You may also have a fish, crab, etc....chewing on your coral

[Poor Boy]

thanks. i will def try to get my water tested this weekend.

i am running carbon filters from tetra. i have a cart. sitting at the bottom of my drain tube which is attached to my over flow.

do they recover from the bleaching or should i cut it off? i did post in the trade form, but i guess no one was interested. i dont think im quite ready for these coral. you said something about a leather? i have a leather toadstool sitting front and center. could this be the issue?

[sealmeister]

what kind of lights are you using?

[Poor Boy]

LEDs

[sealmeister]

You could be giving them to much light some corals that aren't use to the LEDs need an acclimation period where you slowly ramp up the power on your LEDs over a month or so

[Poor Boy]

i did just that.

will the two recover? i moved them to a lower part of the tank, but i could move them to a darker spot as well.

[sealmeister]

I haven't had birds nest but they might recover idk

[Poor Boy]

well the birdsnest did spread to the main stem, but the growth seems to have halted. the white hasnt progressed any further and on some parts of the white it looks like some of the polyps might be coming back.

my other hammer bubble coral is doing great too. its odd how the one head melted, but the second stayed in tact...