Hey,

A few days ago my leather coral was fully out. I turned the light on and the polyps went in. Later that night I noticed a brown patch on one side, but wasnt too worried as I thought it was just shedding. By the next night the brown had spread and again still thought it was shedding, but the next day it had completely flopped over.

The coral has a jelly covering and its flesh has got gaping wounds, parts are very yellow.

Is it just shedding, because if it is it seems a weird way to do it?

I included images of what it went from to what it is now. The 4th shows the biggest wound on its stalk.

http://www.ballacottier.com/steven/tank.jpg
http://www.ballacottier.com/steven/ill1.jpg
http://www.ballacottier.com/steven/ill2.jpg
http://www.ballacottier.com/steven/ill3.jpg
http://www.ballacottier.com/steven/ill4.jpg

Looks really bad, i would kill all flow in the tank, and carefully remove the coral. If the brown jelly gets on another coral it can infect that coral as well. You can try an iodine dip and place the coral in a seperate QT tank with good flow, and hope for the best.

I tried moving it and it had attached itself to another of the larger rocks in the tank lol.

When i slightly moved it lots of white powder like stuff came from it and the top started to break up. It already has holes through the top and the stalk is nearly hollow.

Is there any chance this could come back? It looks kind of better now i removed some of the mucus with a suction pipe, but anything would look better I think.

Hi unre4l and :welcome: to TR.
Beautiful tank. I am sorry that you are having trouble with your leather. Were you able to get it out of your tank and into QT?

If it's actually breaking up then you have likely crossed the point of no return.

Just be aware that leathers *do* shed... and they go through cycles. Just because it looks bad does not mean it's doomed.

Except this time, I am thinking it is doomed. Following the lead of the lovely CarmieJo... do you have another tank where you can QT it until you know for sure???

I dont think it would be worth it anymore, its top has torn right to the centre and i doubt the stalk would hold it up.

I think it started its cycle but then got some kind of infection and this made it worse, maybe not enough flow to get rid of the mucus layer.

Thanks for the welcome and help though :) Much more useful than another forum i used.

Is it out of your tank? Otherwise you are going to have problems with your water quality as it decomposes.

Agreed!

If not, you will likely have to do a decent water change as well.

I would recommend starting a siphon and when things are really rolling, brush your hose up, on, and around your decomposing leather. You may get a lot of it this way and that will stop it brom breaking up even more when you remove it from the tank, if it is indeed decomposing.

Yeh it has been removed from the tank and it stunk really badly lol.

The whole of the upstairs of my house smells now xD I will be doing a few water changes over the next few days. The tank already started to see the effects of decomposition with the start of a small bloom

sorry about the loss, these things are always no fun.

how long had the leather been in the tank before this happened?
if it had been a while, anything new added or changed recently?

It had been in the tank for months and been fine. Some days it didnt open etc but was never ill.

The only things recently added were two cleaner shrimp, but that was a week before this happened. The only thing i can think how they could have caused it if they cut into the flesh of it.

On the side of the stalk of it it did have what looked like stones lodged into it, so maybe the flesh had been open before i got it and it was just a reoccurrance of the same problem.

Welcome to TR unre4l! So sorry that you weren't able to catch this coral in time, but we're happy to have you here on our forum.

I had a beautiful Sarcophyton specimen that withered and fell apart within a matter of two days. It's quite strange how common that actually is. Mine wasn't due to a brown jelly infection, mine just fell apart. It didn't seem to have any deleterious effects to any of my other corals and unfortunately the stump of it didn't grow back.

??? Strange....

...it stunk really badly lol.

Aquarium animals are a lot like red meat. You might be iffy as to whether it's any good... but the nose knows...

A healthy animal will generally not have the putrid stench of death. :)