2nd dieing Elegance

[Treefer32]

I have a simple green Aussie Elegance that is dieing. It's my second one. The first one was much smaller and I had a fish that liked to dump sand on it. That fish is gone and thought I'd retry and get a larger one. It was opening up fully for the last 2 months I've had it. Now it's starting to shrivel and not opening as wide and closed up during the day. Flesh is shrinking.

Is there anything I can do to save it?

Parameters at last check:

Salinity: 1.026
PH: 7.8 - 8.0
Alk: 8.4-9.0
Calcium: 450
MG: is usually around 1540
Temp: 76.6 to 78.
Phosphates: .17ppm
Nitrates: 15ppm

It's placed on the sand bed with low to medium flow. I have gonipora on a rock about 4" above the elegance that are doing really awesome. 1 red goni, 1 white, and then an alveopora on the sand about a few inches away. All three in that general area are doing awesome. But the elegance wants nothing to do with it. My Acropora are taking off and full of color. I have hammers and torches all taking off. I got a fox coral recently that's fully inflating and doing great, a bubble coral that I've had going on 6 months now that seems bigger than when I got it.

What's so hard about elegance corals? Can I do anything to salvage it? The only thing I can think of is to try moving it to a lower light area. Under a rock overhang or something to see if it's still too much light on the sand bed. Change in flow?

It frustrates me to lose a $150 coral. Plus, elegance are my favorite corals and I seem unable to keep them alive.

 

[Lavey29]

My elegance was in semi shade low par low flow and loved it there. Basically under a rock crevice.

 

[Tcook]

Picture of it? @OrionN has an article on elegance coral disease treatment.

 

[Treefer32]

Here it is. It's worse today than it was yesterday. One end of it still opens and the flesh is visible int he crevices of it's skeleton, but this is how my last one died. Just shriveled and then eventually the flesh just released and only the skeleton was left.

 

[exnisstech]

Not an expert but looks like a goner to me. I've tried them twice. Both times they did great for a few months then withered away. I've added them to the list of things I can't keep.

 

[Treefer32]

Not an expert but looks like a goner to me. I've tried them twice. Both times they did great for a few months then withered away. I've added them to the list of things I can't keep.

I'm trying to figure out the reason for that even if it does die. What are the limiting factors. It was in the Fish store's tank for 3 months. Which is why I took the chance on it. I watched every few weeks for any signs of degradation and it was fine there. The only difference is that his nutrients - Phosphates and nitrates were both pretty much zero, he was feeding liquid phyto daily for his clams and for the other corals. Maybe they just can't be in tanks with elevated phosphates? I don't know. It's frustrating.

 

[exnisstech]

I'm trying to figure out the reason for that even if it does die. What are the limiting factors. It was in the Fish store's tank for 3 months. Which is why I took the chance on it. I watched every few weeks for any signs of degradation and it was fine there. The only difference is that his nutrients - Phosphates and nitrates were both pretty much zero, he was feeding liquid phyto daily for his clams and for the other corals. Maybe they just can't be in tanks with elevated phosphates? I don't know. It's frustrating.

I wish I could offer more assistance. I'm not super knowledgeable and tend to just accept that certain things will not survive in my tanks and stop trying them. Probably not the correct way to do things but when I have one coral or fish that will not survive in my tanks I just accept it and move on as long as it is just one piece and not the entire tank looking bad.

 

[Tonycass12]

Weird I don't see anything offhand that would be an issue. My elegance is in relatively high light and medium to high flow and has shown to be one of the least bothered corals in my system when it comes to parameter swings. I got mine about a year ago and it was a freshly cut chunk of skeleton and flesh from a frag show. Im kind of wondering if the goinis you have are irritating or stinging it?

 

[Treefer32]

They aren't anywhere near it in terms of being able to touch it. Yes they're glued down above the elegance, but they're small goni frags still on the frag plugs. Their branches are at most an inch long and unable to reach the elegance no matter the water flow. I know, I wish there were a simple answer.


I just retested parameters, because it's been about a week since I tested.

Alk was a little low: 7.7 Dkh
Nitrates: 11.3 (lowest they've ever been)
Phosphate: .12 (Down from .17 last week).

 

[vetteguy53081]

Here it is. It's worse today than it was yesterday. One end of it still opens and the flesh is visible int he crevices of it's skeleton, but this is how my last one died. Just shriveled and then eventually the flesh just released and only the skeleton was left. View attachment 3142468

Its highly receded but your numbers appear satisfactory with Mag just a little high.
I have mine on a rock off the sand and see a little purple on skeleton which may be Cyano. Moderate water flow and lighting are crucial. Too little flow and they will be miserable and too much like euphyllia coral- you risk tearing the flesh off the skeleton. Moderate flow will provide the nutrients to reach them and being a photosynthetic, moderate to medium light will provide nutrients to zooxanthellae which is within them to provide color and energy.
They must be fed 2-3x a week with foods such as krill, Mysis shrimp, brine shrimp, or small pieces of fish, and shrimp. Powdered foods such as reef roids will not satisfy their needs.
Elegance are prone to elegance coral syndrome (ECS). If your elegance has this disease, you’ll see swelling around the oral disc and unopened polyps or a white mucus coating on the coral surface

Here is mine:

 

[abc123]

Had a similar issue with mine. I dipped it in Frag Recover and it seemed to work

 

[Treefer32]

There's one spot of Cyano covering a former koral skeleton or snail shell. I'll try moving it to higher light and more flow. I feed 12-14 cubes of frozen food a day - a combination of Krill, mysis, and brine shrimp. Plus 1 sheet of nori a day. The coral gets pooped on a lot! There's an MP 40 almost blowing directly on it from behind. IT's at 30 % speed. so, not full bore. There's two Gyres rated at 5000 gph each running at 90% at the top of each side of the tank. The swirl pattern of the water flow should be bringing fine particles to the elegance. But yeah, it could be feeding. It could be light. I don't know. It opened more, even the dieing flesh, now that my phosphates are down from .17 to .12 today and after raising alk a bit. But, I suspect the flesh is too far gone to make a comeback. We'll see.

 

[Outlaw Corals]

Here it is. It's worse today than it was yesterday. One end of it still opens and the flesh is visible int he crevices of it's skeleton, but this is how my last one died. Just shriveled and then eventually the flesh just released and only the skeleton was left. View attachment 3142468

I think you waited much too long to try and save it, but next time you ever see one of your Corals starting to go downhill do a KFC dip

 

[homer1475]

Looks a lot like ECS(elegance coral syndrome) where they close up, tentacles get short and stubby, then they turn to mush(often times on side will remain fully inflated and puffy, while the other end is all closed up and no tnetacles, or they are short and stubby). It is thought to be a pathogen of some sort, that can stay in your tank for quite a while, and infect incoming elegances for some time.

How long has it been since your first one died?

Nothing jumps out at me as "wrong" with your system.

They do depending on actual species, tend to like low flow and low light.

If it has a conical base, push it into the sandbed so the polyp can lay out on the sand. If it has a flat base, then place it on a rock.

 

[Treefer32]

Looks a lot like ECS(elegance coral syndrome) where they close up, tentacles get short and stubby, then they turn to mush(often times on side will remain fully inflated and puffy, while the other end is all closed up and no tnetacles, or they are short and stubby). It is thought to be a pathogen of some sort, that can stay in your tank for quite a while, and infect incoming elegances for some time.

How long has it been since your first one died?

Nothing jumps out at me as "wrong" with your system.

They do depending on actual species, tend to like low flow and low light.

If it has a conical base, push it into the sandbed so the polyp can lay out on the sand. If it has a flat base, then place it on a rock.

The last one I had was only 1 polyp or so and I got it November 19th. Got it home and acclimated, and it died about a month later. same thing polyp got stubby tentacles and the polyp withered away. I had much higher phosphates and nitrates then ranging between .3 and .5 ppm on the phosphate side and nitrates as high as 65 ppm. I was dosing heavy amounts of vodka as well and had really low ph as a result. PH hitting 7.5 at night. I assumed it was water quality (even though I lost no other corals with such high phosphates and nitrates). I spent the last 4 months getting things into acceptable ranges with the numbers previously stated and stopped all vodka dosing prior to adding this coral.

So the previous elegance would have withered and died by end of December and I got this end of April. So, 4-5 months between Elegances. I've done 3 50% water changes between December and now to try to clean things up and stabilize things.

Is this an infection that only affects elegances? I've got probably 10-12 heads of hammers, 2 torches, Huge fox coral, Bubble coral, all relatively sensitive to infections and they're all doing great so far.

I appreciate the feedback. Assuming it is ECS, can it recover on its own or is it a terminal illness (unless I do something). I have coral RX and I have iodine. If those two would help doing a dip. I just don't want to make it worse.