Lanthanum and Elegance Coral

[MGarvo2]

We have a very nice Elegance which has been a picture of health until about a week ago (don’t have a pic of the change). It had been moved due to our Bella Goby digging it out and needing to return the sand into place to put it about where it had been prior. It has always tolerated sand being “processed” by the goby and falling onto it without the slightest retraction or change. (Just mentioning all this to ensure I’m hitting all possibilities that I can think of.) Phosphates have been my personal challenge since establishing the system a little over a year ago. I recently had been dosing TM’s Elimi-Phos Rapid (Lanthanum Chloride) after giving up on my stupid GFO for consistently clogging my media reactor in about a day. About a couple weeks after starting the Elimi-Phos, the Elegance has decided to retract almost completely, with no observable improvement over the past week. Fortunately, there doesn’t appear to be even a hint of necrosis (yet). I had thought I was being extremely cautious with the dosing, deciding to dose 5ml over about 10 minutes morning and night with an insulin syringe. I’d estimate I did this for around 2-3 weeks, on occasion missing one of the doses daily. I know nitrates can impact phos levels, but that has been fairly stable at 10-15. The phos had gotten as high as .52. Since starting the Elimi-Phos, the lowest measurement I got for phos has been .32 (but was slowly trending downward). I’ve done 15% water changes every 2-4 weeks since establishing our system. We have a mixed reef of SPS, LPS, and a couple softies. All of them have continued to look really pretty great throughout the addition of the Elimi-Phos. Also, I need to mention I haven’t dosed again since becoming concerned a few days ago. Anyone else have a similar experience? I have been unable to identify any other culprit.

 

[Mechano]

Your tank is a mirror of my system with phosphates. I even use the same product and I have 3 different variants of elegance. The lanthanum has no ill effect on my elegance.
I think elegance corals can just be finicky sometimes.
Eg. I had a healthy specimen that starting retracting for months then all of a sudden , it looks great now. (No explanation)
Second elegance I got was damaged and looked kinda ill when I got it. As soon as I put it in my system, within a few days , it looks amazing and has for over a year and grown ALOT as well.

My theory—-finicky—-don’t chase those number too hard. I think your water changes are the best bet and stability. Sadly some elegance just don’t do good—-hit or miss sometimes.

 

[MGarvo2]

Your tank is a mirror of my system with phosphates. I even use the same product and I have 3 different variants of elegance. The lanthanum has no ill effect on my elegance.
I think elegance corals can just be finicky sometimes.
Eg. I had a healthy specimen that starting retracting for months then all of a sudden , it looks great now. (No explanation)
Second elegance I got was damaged and looked kinda ill when I got it. As soon as I put it in my system, within a few days , it looks amazing and has for over a year and grown ALOT as well.

My theory—-finicky—-don’t chase those number too hard. I think your water changes are the best bet and stability. Sadly some elegance just don’t do good—-hit or miss sometimes.

Thank you for the reply! There’s always someone out there that has had similar situations. I’ve just recently started wondering if I have a naughty fish.
I’m curious though, do you still use Lanthanum? It seems to work so well. GFO is such a pita. And expensive, especially given it seems to exhaust so quickly.

 

[Mechano]

Thank you for the reply! There’s always someone out there that has had similar situations. I’ve just recently started wondering if I have a naughty fish.
I’m curious though, do you still use Lanthanum? It seems to work so well. GFO is such a pita. And expensive, especially given it seems to exhaust so quickly.

Yup. Just put some in yesterday and I have 6 tangs, also leopard wrasses and other wrasses. Never had an issue with it.
GFO is pure headache in my opinion and a waste of money on my system.
My nutrients were at .44ppm phosphate yesterday when I tested.
I added 10 ml of tropic Marin reduce phos rapid right into my filter sock.
Everyone is happy.

 

[Mechano]

Thank you for the reply! There’s always someone out there that has had similar situations. I’ve just recently started wondering if I have a naughty fish.
I’m curious though, do you still use Lanthanum? It seems to work so well. GFO is such a pita. And expensive, especially given it seems to exhaust so quickly.

Here’s a vid of my reef I took a week or 2 ago on YouTube as proof