LPS Tissue Recession & Death

[Phil]

Hi folks, I've been struggling with tissue loss on some LPS corals. Torches and hammers seem affected the most. They all seem to flourish for several months then it begins. I've just recently added some Poly Bio Filters to see if there are any heavy metals present as I cannot see anything obvious. I read today that LPS are almost as fussy as SPS when it comes to Nitrates. Not sure how true that is though. They are not in any strong current. I also have a CadLights Conic Bio-pellet reactor but it is not being used at the moment. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.

Temp 78.5
Salinity 1.025
pH 8.05
Calcium 400
Alkalinity 8.51 dKH
Magnesium 1500
Nitrates 10
Phosphates 0

 

[teebone110]

Could be your ROX 8 carbon and GFO.
How much are you using and how often do you change it?

 

[Reef Hero]

Phosphates?? My nitrates are undetectable..... Can't comment on whether nitrates at 10ppm would still be ok for lps.....maybe someone else?

 

[Poseidon]

if your params are generally good then i would look to something else...
fish, or some sort of predator?

had that with a brain of mine, was doing great and then i cut back on feedings and my angel started to munch,
barely saved it.

what is your fish list?

 

[Phil]

Could be your ROX 8 carbon and GFO.
How much are you using and how often do you change it?

I pretty much fill a TLC 150 reactor with carbon and about 1/2 another TLC 150 reactor with High Capacity GFO. Each are changed out monthly about 2 weeks apart.

 

[Phil]

Phosphates?? My nitrates are undetectable..... Can't comment on whether nitrates at 10ppm would still be ok for lps.....maybe someone else?

Sorry, forgot to post that. They check out at 0ppm with a Hanna tester.

 

[Phil]

if your params are generally good then i would look to something else...
fish, or some sort of predator?

had that with a brain of mine, was doing great and then i cut back on feedings and my angel started to munch,
barely saved it.

what is your fish list?

I have some red LED's turn on by themselves in my Vertex Illumina and I've never seen anything chewing away. Same goes for the fish, never seen any of these guys nibbling. List is in my signature.

 

[Salty Cracker]

If you are aggressive with GFO, I might suggest that you need to do manual feedings on LPS.  mysis or micro pellets directly into the 'mouths' of the lps works wonders.  I think you may actually be starving them.  But again, that's just a total guess.

I know my torch, candycane and acans absolutely stagnate when I don't feed.  They don't die, but they don't grow -at all-.  If I direct feed late at night they start to take off.  'cane can grow new heads almost weekly with big feedings, and never grow a single head without. 

Hope you figure it out, lps is usually pretty easy to keep, but I think they like a bit of a dirty tank. 

 

[Phil]

Feeding is a confusing and frustrating topic. On one side people feed and on the other people swear off it. What do you feed and how often?

 

[Salty Cracker]

Feeding is a confusing and frustrating topic. On one side people feed and on the other people swear off it. What do you feed and how often?

I turn off the pumps at ~1am, I drop a few pellets in a corner for the shrimp so he stays off the lps, then I drop/spot feed first a bunch of mysis shrimp, then I use a syringe to drop the little mini sinking pellets right into the tentacles of the ones that don't grab the mysis (the mysis floats around pretty easy).

I have no idea who would say not to feed lps, if they have tentacles out at night, they're hungry.  If they don't like what they eat, they spit it out.  I will say that in a 'dirty' system I never had to feed lps, they grew like weeds, but with aggressive GFO use, I have to feed at least once a week, more for greater growth. 

 

[copperkills]

Feeding is a confusing and frustrating topic. On one side people feed and on the other people swear off it. What do you feed and how often?

I feed feed feed my Lps...feed my fish 2 brine cubes a day....spot feed my Lps 1 cube nightly...and feed reef roids 2x week....although I'm running hefty amount of pellets!  Nitrate of 10 ppm is basically 0 for Lps IMO.  I also have sps that maintain colour,  growth is a little slowed tho.

 

[Phil]

I wonder if I am using too much carbon and should be spot feeding once per week?

 

[Poseidon]

I don't feed anything to my lps
I run bio pellets and gfo
Po4, are 0.00>
Nitrates are 5>
I have great growth, my Hollywood stunner chalice frag doubled size in 1.5 months.
But I don't run carbon and never have

 

[Salty Cracker]

Ah but Pos you feed your fish, no? 

Fish feeding = lps feeding.  I have ~6 fish in my 125 and they are fed just a few flakes per day.  If I didn't spot feed the sps would do okay, but the lps would do nothing. 

If I spot feed, my lps expands like crazy.  When I stop, they stop.  For me at least, it's a pretty easy conclusion that they like to be fed. 

 

[Poseidon]

Oh yea I would like to feed them
I'm just too lazy/ busy to do it...

 

[teebone110]

GFO and ROX carbon can be your friend and enemy, I would cut back to about half of what you are using for both and observe for a few weeks. You can also shut off your skimmer for a night and see if your lps starts looking better. I think your tank is too nutirient deprived.

Try not to mess with too many variables so you can try a one thing at time. Maybe maintain your same feedings, but just decrease your nutrient export and see where that gets you.

I have noticed similar observations in my tank before, and have done the above and things really improved.

 

[Phil]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I know that almost all corals will use some phosphates. Our testers don't really tell the whole story. Even though they read 0 there are phospates present. We shoot for a low number to avoid nuisance algae. That part I understand. Bio-Pellets are so good at removing nitrates and phosphates that I guess they allow us to feed our corals and are fish much heavier than you normally could or would. What I cannot understand is how Carbon or more specifically referring to one of the previous posts too much carbon fits into this picture?

 

[Salty Cracker]

Just my opinion, but I don't think carbon does a whole lot to corals...I suppose if you were using a lot of it, it may take out trace elements the coral needs, but I've never seen this myself.  That said, I'm pretty regular with the water changes...

 

[Phil]

I've seen BRS has a carbon calculator on their site. I do 15 gallon water changes every 2 weeks.

 

[AdInfinitum]

I've seen BRS has a carbon calculator on their site. I do 15 gallon water changes every 2 weeks.

Interesting...I change 4x as much water as you do...have 2x your system volume...and 1/4 your fish population...

Not commenting just have been wondering about people's fish populations...

As the poster child for high nitrates...  :?

I have had a number of LPS that grow like crazy but then start to recede and die.  I feed everything that has a mouth or tentacles to put food into.  I have put that down to my high nitrates as well (around 45ppm).  Conversely, since I
started running GFO I have only lost 1 SPS frag and have good growth and decent color on all my Acro's. (Monti's more survive than thrive however).
My current experience would say that LPS are a lot less predictable and or "easy to keep" than accepted knowledge would have you think.  I would love to see other people's feedback on this thread.

If your told me today that I had to pick one stoney coral and it had to be alive and growing six months from now or I lose my right to keep corals  I would definitely pick a Milli or Stag.