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a couple of days ago I noticed my black sun coral had receded a good bit in a couple of places. I thought it was an isolated incident, maybe an aptasia too close or something so I moved it. Today I noticed my orange one has also receded in a few places, the orange one had been very happy and had tripled its polyps in the last year. Can anyone tell me different causes for this so that I can eliminate possibilities? Thanx!
Laura
What are your parameters Laura? Have you changed what or how much you are feeding? Any new inhabitants?
no new inhabs, the only thing that has changed is that I have increased my calcium to 480 from 420 over the past month.
Hey Laura. :heart: Good to see you back on the boards. Sorry to hear about the suns. Is the yellow one the same that you got about 2 years ago?
HEY! yes, same coral, it has spread SOOO much, I am distressed to see some recession. It cant be lighting, I am a bit confused. Any thoughts?
Hey wait, could too much flow be a problem?
Laura, I was not avoiding your Qs.... it's just that I have no experience with the suns. :huh: I would believe that the flow or light exposure would affect them like that more so than the cal at that level. Just guessing of course. I know how you are obsessed with your tank.... so guessing is not good for you. :up: You have any recent pics? Would love to see those beauties.
Flow could be the problem, with the orange sun coral anyways, the black will require higher flow whereas the oranges tend to do best in moderate flow environments. how often and what are you feeding?
It's possible you've got some food that has gone bad as well (I've experienced this with some corals). When nursing tubastrea I'll typically feed twice a day (just before or around lights on and about an hour after lights off) with a mixture of frozen brine shrimp and hikari mysis. I'll rinse the cubes in RO and then thaw them in a measuring cup full of tank water. When thawing I'll typically add a little bit of cyclopeeze for variety. I also add an amino supplement (currently using brightwell's coral amino with good success). once everything is thawed and soaked I'll cut pumps off and wait a few minutes for tank circulation to settle before target feeding. Pumps usually dont go back on for a half hour or so.
He'res the trick...
sometimes the polyps will get everything they can eat and excess food will stay stuck on the polyps themselves, I've seen this cause degradation in tissue as well so an hour or two after feeding I'll check back again and make sure to blow off any excess "gunk" on the corals.
I havent experienced too many issues with tubastrea in a high light environment but it's possible a chemistry change might have affected the corals ability to fight off the excess light exposure. Check iodine levels and such.
That is also how I feed and blow off, The orange has flourished over the past couple of years, the black one I have only had for a few months and the tissue recession is on the outer portions. Maybe a chemistry change, I have found that SOMEONE in my family has been using rain water to top off everyday instead of RO water (we have had a LOT of rain) for the past couple of weeks. I wonder if this is the issue or if, in fact, they are victims of aptasia.
Hrmm unless you've seen a ton of aptasia around them it's doubtful, Tubastrea is pretty tough and from my experience has a pretty high tolerance to competition when it's healthy. I've got a colony in my display thats been winning the battle against encroaching zoanthids for quite some time now. the downside is if the colony does start to recede and lose it's healthy tissue I'm sure it's much more suceptible.
Keep us posted!
The rainwater hasn't changed the pH in your tank has it?
just checked, ph a bit off, 8.1 ish. Just did 20% water change yesterday so it was probably more off.
Well that is not that much off but I guess it could cause a problem. But maybe there are other things in it that could have caused problems.
I am wondering that too, nothing I can detect, but I'll do another water change in a few days. will tissue grow back or contine to recede until that polyp dies?
When I had one the receded it didn't grow back. But it did grow new polyps after that.
depends on how bad the recession is and whats causing it. just like any other living creature there are bacterial and viral infections to stave off as well. Typcally as long as there is still some healthy tissue covering the septa (the inner ring of the cup part and you can get the polyp to expand enough to take food you've got a fighting chance. I've nursed many tubastrea back over time from this bad of a tissue decline. If tissue detaches and blows off when you feed / blow off excess you might be in big trouble as it's more of a sign of a pathogenic issue.
Look for color variations along the recession as well as it might be a sign of infection or pathogen created problem. I dont know why it didnt occur to me before but it's entirely possible the rainwater introduced a pathogenic issue rather than a chemistry issue. Do you have a UV unit handy or can you borrow one temporarily? While not exactly super efficient even a small uv would help reduce the level of such a problem. Are any other corals affected at all?
are you target feeding the coral? Is there any hermit crab's or coral banded shrimp's in the tank?
lance
hmm maybe they where happyer with a cal lvl of 420 rather then 480
or the change over the month was to rapid for them ?
Hmmm. PH off, rain water, calcium change. I may never know exactly, but all could have played a part I guess. No sterilizer. I will do another water change, but if something was introduced with rain water I may be in trouble.
yea i think thoes 3 factors the rain, cal, and ph may have affected it
hrmmm ph will affect tissue recession but calcium change will take a lot of time to affect it. Depends on how far the PH is off, if only a couple of points I wouldnt blame PH itself as swings are natural. I'm still airing on the side of a pathogen. best bet at this point, keep up with water changes maybe up your change amount a touch for the next few weeks and monitor. Ensure your top off is as pristine as possible and do all you can to nurse and feed the corals. I hesitate to recommend adding an amino at this point to the food mixture as it could throw any balance left over off but for free floating food sources (food dropped into tanks with pumps on) it may be a good idea as these foods will be caught as well dependant on flow and such.
If light is of concern try shading the area with a peice of egg crate or other object but it doesnt sound like a light problem at all. with tissue recession detritus and algae's (cyano especially) can take a better hold so dropping flow in a hurry is almost always a bad idea, reducing flow slightly and monitoring might be but if your flow hasnt changed in a while thats most likely NOT the culprit.
Try and feed smaller amounts more often if possible, if you can double feeding schedule (from 3 times to 6 times per day, etc.) but feed slightly less, just enough for the polyps to consume food within just a couple of minutes. and work diligently to blow detritus and settlement off the coral.
If tissue begins to blow off the coral your most likely going to lose it. Lower flow and stop the feeding / blowing off regimen and allow the coral to slowly recouperate naturally. At this point your goal is to avoid a near imminent death of a coral. Very very light feedings of larger items one by one (such as PE Mysis) to healthier polyps will help sustain the colony without allowing excess foods to settle on the tissue further degrading it. I've recovered only a few tubastrea colonies at that stage. Hopefully it's not that bad.
just out of curiosity, how was the rainwater collected? did it run off of a roof and thru a gutter/downspout? if so, every contaminant on the roof/gutter/downspout is now in your tank. even if it's just out of a rainbarrel, whatever falls into the barrel (dust, etc) may be a problem.
im going to have to agree with Greg, im leaning towards the rain water being the culprit in this case. no matter how it is collected, there is always some degree of contamination in it, whether that is pollution from the air, or contamination from the collection site.