Battlecorals Snipes Blue Discussion Thread

[Frizzles7]

I hope others in the contest could give me some advice/offer theories as to why acropora (in this case the Sniper's Blue) will some times stall out after apparently thriving in my tank. Although not a realistic contest contender at any point, I was still quite pleased with the growth, coloration and PE with the snipers for the first 5 months in my tank, as shown in the composite photo below.

But then, from January until present day, the Snipers growth just halted. There has been some slow encrusting but no discernable branching growth.

There really were no significant changes in my maintenance routine, salt mix (Fritz RPM), flow properties, basic parameters (calcium/alk/magnesium/pH/specific gravity), lighting, etc. I sent off a sample to Triton to see if one of the minor elements was off, but that test really didn't show anything that I thought explained the change in the Snipers.

In May I tried increasing the water change frequency to every week instead of every 2 weeks, replaced my T5 bulbs (even though they were only 10 months old), but that didn't rekindle the Snipers. I am stumped....Why did the Snipers stall out when most of my Acros have continued to grow at their previous rates (although my 'blueberry' acro stalled out at about the same time and has actually faded to an ugly brown). I suspect there must be some unknown element that the Sniper's needs which was initially present in my system but then became depleted.

My Sniper's 1 year anniversary is coming up in 8 days so the contest is basically over for me, but I still would like to figure out how to 'revive' this beautiful piece. If anyone has some suggestions or theories about what happened to my Snipers, I'd sure like to hear them. I'd also be grateful if those contestants who have had such remarkable growth (Frizzles, MRX789, Hieger, etc) would be willing to share any details about their systems.

I sure have enjoyed being involved in this contest and wish you all reefing success.

As far as my routine goes, I do a 10% water change every week, using Red Sea Coral Pro. I keep my salt on the higher side, 1.027 to 1.028. I’m not sure if Battlecorals are happier with the higher salinity. See https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/high-salinity-am-i-a-one-man-gang-or-anyone-else-in.399025/
for a discussion.

I dose calc and alk with dosers, and I add the Red Sea colors every other week. Otherwise, stability is my key. I try to keep everything the same and not make changes.

My acros generally seem to be happy and growing. However, I do have one acro that is just a dud for me. It’s colored up and has PE but it just encrusted the frag plug a bit, and that’s all it’s grown in months. I have no idea why. Sometimes I think they just have minds of their own! ;Facepalm

 

[ESH]

Mine pretty much did nothing until these past few months. Finally growing.

Oddly enough, other SPS in my tank that were previously growing all of sudden bleached out. I think it's related to a couple of things. A sarcophyton housed in my frag tank has been splitting. 5 babies so far, appears more are coming. The return line from my frag tank goes into my refugium. I do run carbon, but its in a mesh sock before the refugium. So it's possible that its pushing out a ton of chemicals into the tank that gets put into my display before ever seeing any carbon.

The other likely reason is in the same frag tank, bryopsis took over. I let it go for a while, and then When I pulled it all out by hand, I then dosed fluconazole to kill any remaining strands. For a few days, the skimmer was turned off and carbon was removed. Pair this up with a splitting softie and I think I found my reasons for the random bleaching. I also noticed phosphate went up slightly during this time (less bryopsis consuming it - from .02 to .12).

 

[kurtp]

As far as my routine goes, I do a 10% water change every week, using Red Sea Coral Pro. I keep my salt on the higher side, 1.027 to 1.028. I’m not sure if Battlecorals are happier with the higher salinity. See https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/high-salinity-am-i-a-one-man-gang-or-anyone-else-in.399025/
for a discussion.

I dose calc and alk with dosers, and I add the Red Sea colors every other week. Otherwise, stability is my key. I try to keep everything the same and not make changes.

My acros generally seem to be happy and growing. However, I do have one acro that is just a dud for me. It’s colored up and has PE but it just encrusted the frag plug a bit, and that’s all it’s grown in months. I have no idea why. Sometimes I think they just have minds of their own! ;Facepalm

Thanks for the reply, Frizzles.
I have to agree, acropora may just have minds of their own.
I was out of town for most of July and my July 26th photo entry was taken by my house sitter and texted to me so I really didn't get a good look at the Sniper until I got home yesterday. To my surprise, after months of no growth other than slow encrusting, there are now some definite new 'nubs' developing on the encrusted area. While I am glad to see some sign of growth recovery, it puzzles me. My tank underwent some significant alk and calcium swings at the end of June/early July. I was out of town for 2 weeks, and 3 days into my trip my house sitter texted me that the jug that the BRS Alk solution was in had leaked all over the floor. I gave what I thought were clear instructions on mixing up a new batch in another jug and reinserting the tubing from the dosing pump, but when I got home and tested my parameters, the alkalinity was at 3.4 and the calcium level was over 600. It turns out the house sitter had made the mix using the calcium bucket, not the Alk bucket. I could see signs of STN on only one of my SPS (a deep water FrogSkin look a like) but I was fully expecting wide-scale die offs as I gradually corrected the levels over the next few days. Surprisingly, the frogskin knock off stopped STNing and no other corals appeared to be suffering by the time I had to leave town again a few days later. I was particularly worried about the Snipers because of it's prolonged stall out, but now it is actually showing signs of growth. Why would the Snipers have halted its former good growth when no discernable changes to the system were present, hang there for months, only to show the first signs of recovery after what I consider a severe instability in alk and calcium levels?
If Frizzles is right and SPS just 'have a mind of their own,' my Snipers must have a bit of a twisted sense of humor to be messing with me like this.
I'll be posting my final 1 year photo in a few days, not enough time to tell if those new nubs are going to take off, but I am cautiously optimistic.

 

[kurtp]

Although not dramatic, these pics show that for the first time in months my Sniper's has started to show signs of branching growth. There are the beginnings of several nubs close to the base of the original branch, with one more prominent nub further away to the left. Hopefully these continue to grow. If they do, I will probably frag off the original branch now that the contest is over and mount it in a different area of my tank. Maybe its just coincidence, but I've had a few other colonies that had stalled out in the past start to regrow after fragging them...I'm not sure why. So much of this hobby is a mystery to me, and that is a large part of why it has held my interest for years.

Anyway, I sure enjoyed being in this contest and congratulations to the winners...I'll be checking back to see if my guesses for first and second place were right.

 

[Frizzles7]

Do we know when the contest ends?

 

[bubbaque]

September should be the final month to make it 12 full months.

 

[MTBake]

Curious as to who won this. I know I didn't, lol.

 

[Battlecorals]

right! I think its about time to start figuring out how to organize judging this one guys.

 

[bubbaque]

I sent Adam the pics to decide.

 

[Frizzles7]

The anticipation!!!

Do you know when the decision will be announced?

 

[bubbaque]

You are just waiting on @Battlecorals to choose.

 

[kurtp]

Where can I find out the winners for this contest?